Matthew Liedke

REVIEW: Clumsy Execution Of Premise, Weak Humor Sink ‘I Feel Pretty’

“I Feel Pretty” is the type of film that has good ideas and even a concept that could work, but unfortunately, the execution is really rough.

The film follows the character Renee (Amy Schumer), a woman who’s insecure and is having difficulty in both her career and love life. However, after a fall during an exercise routine, Renee wakes up with the belief that she’s suddenly become seemingly more beautiful than before. This is despite her appearance not changing.

As a result, Renee becomes significantly more confident than before and she has success in many aspects of her life, starting a relationship with a guy named Ethan (Rory Scovel) and advancing her career with a promotion.

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REVIEW: ‘Rampage’ As A Whole Isn’t Saved By Monster Spectacle

There are two aspects with “Rampage,” one is the giant monster battles and the other is everything else. The giant fights are entertaining, the rest is forgettable.

The story behind the giant monsters in “Rampage” starts in space. A shady corporation turns out to be doing biological experiments high above Earth and after something goes wrong, three canisters are dropped from a space station containing genetic altering substances. One of those canisters falls in a San Diego wildlife center, where the protagonist Davis (Dwayne Johnson) works. The canister comes in contact with a gorilla Davis works with, named George, and it ends up making the primate grow to a massive size.

The other canisters land in North America, too, and have the same effect on two other animals. Meanwhile the (basically outright evil) corporation decides to lure the animals to Chicago, meaning it’s up to Davis, a former employee of the corp., Kate (Naomie Harris) and a government agent named Harvey (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) to stop them, as Davis has worked with George before.

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REVIEW: The Only Losers With ‘Truth Or Dare’ Are The Viewers

Was this whole movie a joke? Honestly, at points I thought it came across more like a comedy than a horror film.

As the title suggests, “Truth or Dare” revolves around the well known kids game. The film follows a group of college students, with a focus on one named Olivia (Lucy Hale). While on spring break in Mexico, they wind up getting cursed into playing a dangerous, haunted game of Truth or Dare.

They soon find out that if they respond with “Truth,” they have to reveal awful secrets, and if “Dare,” they have to do something immensely risky. If they refuse to do either, they will die.

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About REVIEW: ‘Blockers’ Is Funny As Both An Adult And Teen Movie

I’ve been burned by comedies before, by those that have been marketed to teens as well as the ones for adults. It was quite a pleasant surprise, then, that “Blockers” ended up being so good, having laughs come from both aspects.

The title should make the general concept here pretty apparent. The film takes place on prom night and follows three teen girls, Julie (Kathryn Newton), Kayla (Geraldine Viswanathan) and Sam (Gideon Adlon). The three want to have a memorable prom experience, but their parents, Lisa (Leslie Mann), Mitchell (John Cena) and Hunter (Ike Barinholtz) are worried about them potentially having sex.

As a result, while the teens are having their own adventures at the prom parties, the trio of parents set off on a crazy mission to prevent any sexual activity from taking place.

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REVIEW: ‘A Quiet Place’ Is An Intense, Technically Sound Thriller

“A Quiet Place” wasn’t completely located in just one single place, so maybe a “Quiet Area” would make more sense? “A Quiet Region” maybe? Whatever the title, though, this is a solid flick.

As the title implies, the film is all about remaining in silence. The movie follows a family that includes Lee (John Krasinski), his wife Evelyn (Emily Blunt) and their two children Regan (Millicent Simmonds) and Marcus (Noah Jupe). The family remains quiet throughout the film, as there are dangerous creatures all around that hunt any living being that they hear.

The picture takes place seemingly in the midst of a war between humanity and these creatures. However, the movie remains focused on this family just trying to survive against these sound hunters in a rural part of the U.S. Their situation is made difficult when it comes to staying quiet, though, as Evelyn is pregnant.

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REVIEW: ‘Ready Player One’ Is Heavy On Nostalgia, Low On Heart

There’s a section from 2012’s “Avengers” where Captain America very loudly tells the rest of the team that he understood a reference. That’s, more or less, how “Ready Player One” operates.

“Ready Player One” takes place in a rather depressed future. Picking up in 2045, the film is set in a world of mass poverty, with humanity facing numerous problems. However, much of the population gets away from these matters by way of a virtual reality gaming platform called the OASIS.

Not only do many people, escape their problems by way of the OASIS, they also search for a hidden treasure. That treasure is a massive ownership share of the OASIS company, which is valued at several billion dollars. In order to find it, the gamers, and entire companies, dig for clues related to the program’s late developer, Halliday (Mark Rylance).

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From ‘300’ To ‘Black Panther’ : How The Spring Box Office Changed Over The Past Decade

For the past five weeks, Marvel Studios’ “Black Panther” has dominated the box office, with relative ease in doing so.

These days, a major film coming out in the spring movie season and having tremendous success isn’t surprising. In fact, it’s become rather commonplace for this to happen. However, it wasn’t always the case, it only happened after a decade of change in Hollywood.

Let’s go back to 2006. For the most part, up until that point, Hollywood reserved major blockbusters for releases during the summer season, which lasts from May through August, and the fall/winter period between October and December.

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REVIEW: ‘Pacific Rim Uprising’ Is A Monster Sized Disappointment

Get rid of/kill off the main characters from the first one? Check. Create plot holes that invalidate the first one? Check. Feel less impact from the action despite being technically more on screen? Check. “Pacific Rim: Uprising” is officially a bad movie sequel.

The film takes place 10 years after the events of the 2013 film. Peace has largely returned to the Earth after mankind stopped an interdimensional invasion of giant monsters. However, the Jaeger program, which built the giant robots to fight monsters is still active, for some reason. Also, new candidates are being trained to pilot those robots, for some reason.

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REVIEW: ‘Love, Simon’ Has Enough Good Qualities To Satisfy Its Target Audience

Like with most genres, if you’ve seen one teen romantic comedy, you’ve seen them all. However, there are still some charming qualities featured in this feature.

“Love, Simon” follows the story of the titular character, played here by Nick Robinson, who’s making his way through high school. He has a good group of friends, a caring family and is involved in numerous activities. However, Simon hasn’t come out yet that he’s gay to his family, school or his friends.

The film picks up with Simon finding out via a social media website that an anonymous classmate of his has come out as gay. In response, Simon opts to reach out to his classmate and starts messaging him, and the two begin a discourse. Despite this, though, Simon keeps the fact that he’s gay a secret, choosing to wait out the time until he’s ready.

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REVIEW: ‘Tomb Raider’ Sets A New Standard For Video Game To Film Adaptations

After decades of waiting, a video game has successfully been adapted into a film with good execution.

While the early 2000s “Tomb Raider” pictures were based on the games of the same name that came out around that time, this film is based on the video game reboot that came out in 2015. The picture introduces the audience to a younger Lara Croft, the main character of the series, played here by Alicia Vikander.

The movie begins by showing Lara as a rebellious young woman who believes that her father Richard (Dominic West) is still alive, despite being missing for many years. Her refusal to believe that he’s dead puts her in a predicament, though, as her father has tremendous wealth and Lara has to sign off on legal documents to ensure that she receives the inheritance. As she starts dealing with those documents, she uncovers clues about her father’s location and sets off on an adventure to the Pacific to find out what happened to him.

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