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IR Film Review: SINNERS [Warner Bros.]
When a filmmaker like Ryan Coogler makes a film like "Black Panther" it opens the door to make projects that are both diametric but also have a certain expectation to them. "Sinners," his latest, is an interesting swing but one that keys into a specific perspective but also gives it that genre structure while hitting some hard issues and time frame.
IR Film Review: A MINECRAFT MOVIE [Warner Bros.]
The aspect of a video game adaption comes down to just what a film wants to do. If it is just entertainment with some semblance of sarcastic character structure thrown in, it can do well. "Super Mario Bros Movie" knew what it was but it was a series of sequences. "Borderlands" wanted to be something grand but seriously lost track of itself. "Minecraft" involves something in between. But they all share one thing: Jack Black.
IR Film Review: MICKEY 17 [Warner Bros.]
The intention of a film like "Mickey 17" is the context of an outsider finding meaning against the authority that oversees him. Mickey (Robert Pattinson) is having a time of it on Earth but he believes in the wrong people. What Director Bong Joon Ho ("Parasite") is more interested in is the perspective of someone from nothing rising up to change but sometimes through no great enlightenment of his own. It is just where his path leads.
IR Film Review: TRAP [Warner Bros]
The essence of an M. Night Shyamalan film rests many times where the filmmaker is in his own head and where that path might take him. With ”Trap,” there is a weird essence of dual personality not unlike his lead character Cooper (played by Josh Hartnett) who begins the movie taking his daughter to a concert. The irony is the way it is built.
IR Film Review: DUNE - PART II [Warner Bros]
The progression of a story depends on knowing where it is going in an overall sense. With "Dune - Part II", director Denis Villenueve understands and motivates on the context of what Part I promised. He delivers but there are different cracks and jumps that inherently lift but also restrict the film in certain ways.
IR Film Review: MEG 2 - THE TRENCH [Warner Bros]
The aspect of "The Meg" is based on the necessity of messing with the modern world through creatures from before humanity. While "Meg 2: The Trench" panders a bit less in its obviousness but also in its financing, the melodrama and by extension, bad writing and relationship structures tend to bog the film down despite an middling interesting mid-tier descent into the trench.
IR Film Review: THE BATMAN [Warner Bros.]
The texture of Batman is always tricky because you want to have him be more out of control than the villains he pursues but that can be a tall order and run against the texture of any given story. That is the trick of the series.
IR Film Review: THE MATRIX - RESURRECTIONS [Warner Bros]
The trigger point of "The Matrix" has always been what is reality and what are we? There was also a dexterity of approach that mirrored both with an intensity and with a coldness. There are some ideas in "The Matrix: Resurrections" that are quite undeniable but it doesn'‘t push it to the nth degree.