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Scorched Earth (2018)
Scorched Bank Account, more like.
When you walk into this, you get the feel that you're going to be watching some pretty good over-the-top camp. But you don't get the elements of good camp here. It sits squarely and firmly in that awkward place, where they either needed to improve the drama, and make this a serious film about global warming, or push it further, and give us some humor and outlandish action. You get neither of those things; just badly choreographed fist fights.
With the exception of Jackson, who might have some acting chops (he actually emoted! gasp!), the acting is tediously mediocre. I wouldn't let the inclusion of most of these actors deter me from future films, but if they weren't in this movie just for the paycheck, and doing their bare minimum, they need to find new careers or ramp up their lessons. And it's just not bad enough to loop around back to so-bad-it's-good. It feels like a cheap made-for-TV, late night slot time Syfy filler flick.
The props, I'll admit, are lovely. But they should have taken 75% of the prop budget and put it into writing and casting instead. I made it all the way through the movie, I'll grant it that, and maybe a single star isn't really warranted. But I feel like if you're going to be bad, be gloriously bad. Don't be this painfully forgettable mishmash of nothing impressive at all.
The Mind's Eye (2015)
Terrible.
You can't direct a pastiche without adding a few humorous nods to the elements you're using. Otherwise it simply comes off as painfully cliché, overdone crap. I agree with the "most helpful" review, in that it definitely feels like a student film. In fact, that was my very first critical thought. I was somewhere around the half hour mark, and said to myself, "This is like a bad student film."
None of the actors stood out, nor were they bad enough to be funny/ made fun of. For instance: Jeremy Irons in Dungeons and Dragons? That is gloriously bad ham acting, so bad that it actually makes the loop back to good, because it's just so damn funny at times. The villain could have taken some notes from Irons' performance there- or indeed, ANY time that Irons has played a villain- because he never hit that over-the-top stride that should be seen in both the 80's horror and pastiche genre.
This film either needed to take itself much more or much less seriously.
Jennifer's Body (2009)
This movie only has a 5 average BECAUSE MEGAN FOX.
This movie is an atrocity to both men and women everywhere. I knew getting into this, that there would be all kinds of sexual clichés lobbed against women. I literally watched this just so I could have something to point to, when people whined at me for saying that Megan Fox is a skank. I mean, anyone who doesn't think she's a complete prostitute really needs to read her interviews here on IMDb. She basically says it herself, she just uses wordplay to make it sound less obvious. But people I talk to often aren't willing to read interviews, so I will simply have this film to point out that NO woman with ANY degree of self respect would take the role of the protagonist in this movie. IT'S A MOVIE ABOUT UNDERAGE SEX AND SEXUAL PREDATION. Who would WANT to put their name on that?
But to my surprise, it wasn't just the women who were treated moronically. It was EVERYONE. Even the men in this movie are thrown under the bus, and portrayed as moronic stereotypes. There are only two types of dude in this movie: sexual predator or dumb-ass who sleeps with anything that shoves breasts in his face. This movie makes it out as though you can just walk up to a guy, shake your rack a little, and he'll take his pants off. So this movie is equally offensive to both genders.
Beyond that, I watched this movie a couple of months ago, and then forgot about it. Very promptly. Saying that it's forgettable is akin to saying lard is high in saturated fat. The only reason I remembered it at all, was because I was cleaning my "to watch" list of movies I'd actually, you know, watched.
It's probably not a one-star movie, probably a two or a three, because in spite of the terrible stereotypes and clichés and horrible teenage movie acting, the plot does hold up, and the pacing is actually fine. But if some of these other brain-dead reviewers can give this movie a glowing 9 star review, based purely on the fact that they like Megan Fox, I can give it 1 star based purely on the fact that I don't. I'm just self aware enough to admit it to myself.
The Jungle Book (2016)
Impressive- if this were the late 90's.
Honestly, the movie is solid, it has much of the feel of the original. The songs are preserved, and the re-cast voice actors do well. It's been called "darker", but I just think it feels a bit more real. When things are drawn like goofy cartoons, you lose the gravity of real life. When you have live action and CGI, however, you re-gain some of said gravity. Just as an example: King Louie, a giant ape, is set in the shadows of an old temple, and it makes him look absolutely beastly. But what can you do? This is the medium, it's beautiful, but when you're watching an old, flat cartoon... you do of course lose the weight, the atmosphere, of things like the collapse of a building. So the "darkness" isn't really dark, it's just something which looks incredibly close to reality coming to call. A snake that looks real is much more foreboding than a cartoon snake. There's a bit of violence, but it's just animals fighting. There's no blood, it's all implied, and it has an ending that is equally as happy as the original film. "Darker" is a stretch.
So, I would have given the movie a good 9 stars, save for one aspect. The animal figures look like they're out of the late 90's. They're quite beautifully textured, but when compared to the figures in say, Zootopia, who have been rendered so carefully and with such precision, it's disappointing. Zootopia's characters had INDIVIDUAL HAIRS and there was a program for the characters during the animation, which ran SIMULATED REALISTIC WIND, to make it look real. Since these two movies came out at roughly the same time, I have to give this movie flak for not living up to potential. When we know they can make the goofiest little animated characters look like living, breathing creatures, we shouldn't have these animal characters that look, quite often, very wooden in movement, and very cardboard around the edges. You can do better, Disney. I know that Zootopia was done by Pixar and that the Jungle Book was done the Jim Henson studio/ company. But it's 2016. If your animals only look slightly better than the animals in Doctor Dolittle (from 1998), then you need to figure out what you're doing wrong. I have video games from five or six years ago, that have cut scenes with more sophistication. Get on the ball.