Ghostbusters: Afterlife (2021)

Unfortunately, this is just a nostaligic trip. It has all the elements from the original film, mixed in in ways that usually don't make any sense. The film cannot stand on it's own, and I find it hard to beleive that anyone who has never seen the original film nor is familairy to the franchise would get anything out of this film. As has happneed with may other sequel/reboot films, the creators of the new film seem to have seen all the elements of the original film, and included them in this film, but it's just a pale imation of the original. Didn't they even know the original film was a comedy? Always good to see Paul Rudd in any film, even so, this film didn't stand a ghost of a chance. My questions is, how do they expect to continue the franchise? How are these kids supposed to run a business busting ghosts? Their age alone makes this completely ridiculous, and not in a good way.

Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)

The plot of this film doesn't make a hole lot of sense, and it is quite contrived, but I can accept that, as they wanted to have a (flimsy) excuse to get all three of the actors together who played in the previous Spiderman films. It was merely a nostagic trip, bringing back six or so of the villians from the previous films. But the whole plot didn't make a lot of sense, and it made Dr Starnge look grossly incompetant and careless. The problem with the film is that it has no rewatchability. There weren't any great scenes that you would want to go back to and reawatch. This is the way with all films for at least the last decade (I am talking to you Star Wars sequels), in that they don't have great scenes, where as in older films, they would have multiple scenes that you wanted to watch over and over again. While that, and bring back most of the villans (What, no James Franco or Topher Grace - well Venom was completely wasted in that film...) Was this just a lame attempt to justify bringing back the villinas they killed off in the previous films? Take a lesson from the original Superman films (but not too much of a note), but not the Batman films (you don't have to kill off your villians at the end of each film). And as for Superman, you didn't really need to have Lex Luthor in 3 of the four films, as Gene Hackman plays a lousy Lex Luthor, but still the films he appeared in were better than the third film, even though the villian in that film wasn't too bad, and the evil computer did give a lot of kids nightmares. I still cannot understand why Zendaya is gettign roels in movies. She was slightly better in theilf film that the previous Spider-man film. But she shows nearly no reaction or emoiton. Okay, I get it. She wasin Shake in UP (TV) on Disney, and I know that many kids loved that show, mosstly for Bella Thore, who doesn't seem to be doing much these days, except screwing (not litterally) followers on OnlyFans.

The Mitchells vs. the Machines (2021)

I read somewhere that this was one of the mostly highly watched films on Netflix, and had a rating of 97%. I has seen a box for this video in the store, so I thought it was time I should check it out. It was a pretty good film, but I think not as great as the rating would suggest. One problem I had with the film was I couldn't relate to the daughter at all. Her constant need to add filters to her picuters, other add on special effects has never made sense to me. It doesn't any adding thing to the story of the video she (or anyone else) is adding it to. I guess I am getting to the point where I related more to the fathers in movies than the children. I did, however, appreciated that the father had a pretty big gut, but wasn't made out to be a clown or foolish. It's great to see when heavy people are accepted as they are, and are relevent characters, rather than being a source of comedy.

Ron's Gone Wrong (2021)

I intended to see this one in the theater, but either I missed it, or I don't know what happened, but I ended up wathicng in streaming. I thought this is one of the best movies I have seen in a long time, they way it deals with the concepts of not fitting in, bullying, friendship and technology. The whole concpet of the B-bot was incredible, partially from a techonological stand point, and how useful it could be, and partially from they way it demonstarted that social media is taking over people (espeically kid's) lives. I think that if anyone could make a real world B-Bot, they would pretty much take over the world, over night.

'71 (2014)

I've been reading the biography of Gerry Adams, which I acquired quite a long time ago, but just got aroudn to reading now, and I stumbled upon this film two days ago, which covered the same topic as the portion of Gerry Adams biography. So I knew I had to watch it immeidately, and I was able to find it for free on Hulu. Very convenient. The film does a great job of portraying the turmoil that was taking place in Northern Ireland during this time period. Also, it really captured the feel of the 70s, which I was quite surprised by. I would have though the film was actually made in the 70s, except for how clear the picture was. The look of the houses, especially their interiors, furniture and even wallpaper and the clothes the people wore all seemed to be right out of the 70s. One thing that I did wonder about was that the accents didn't sound very Irish to me. Of course I am no expert on Irish accents, and perhaps they are played up a bit in other films, but again they didn't stand out as sounding very Irish, but then again, the also didn't sound like the fake accents you often hear in American films. Wild Mountain Thyme, I'm talking to you. Also, I wondered about the title of the film, '71, which is so vague that no one would know what the film was about, from the title alone. I would think it might have been connected the the Ballymurphy Massacre, thought that event was not pictured, nor alluded to in the film. Or perhaps it is supposed to have taken place before the Ballymurphy Massacre, as it seems to depict the conditions in Northern Ireland just as they have taken a turn for the worst.

Osmosis Jones (2001)

I stumbled upon this movies, and was shocked to find I had never heard of this animated film, especially as it has such big stars are Bill Murry and Chris Rock in it. It also came with the warning about "bodily functions", which I have never heard of as a warning before, though it does seem like a good category to include for warnings epecially considering the use of it's gross out humor, and it couldn't be more appropreate for this film. There were a couple of instances where the use of bodily fluids weere taken too far, made a bit worse by the fact that those scenes were during the live actions sequences, during which Bill Murry appears.I am really impressed that that made this film, as it is such an odd ball concept, almost a childish Fantasitc Voyage. Unfortunately, the whole concept and dealing with the internal bodily fuctions doesn't make a very appealing film. Still, it was fairly well done, converting the location (inside a persons body) into a source for action and occational comedy.

Hamilton (2020)

The date on this is a bit confusing, as it was filmed at performance held in 2016, though the film itself was released in 2020.

I learned a lot from this film.  First, Alexander Hamilton was Latino, and a master at rap battles.  Also, that most of the founding fathers were black, and that racial diversity means making 3/4 of your cast black, without only one person who is half Asian, but no native Americans, Arabs or any other races.  And that a white parents can have two black daughters, and one half Chinese daughter.  And finally, that Thomas Jefferson was actually Prince.  I had no idea that randomly dancing was so common in colonial times, as well.  So the point being, this fantasy is clearly the product of it's times, with racial diversity triumphing over historical accuracy.


I had heard this was a great musical, and so I wanted to check it out for myself.

This film / musical is my worst fears of what musicals would be prior to my having ever seen a musical as a kid.  It's people signing sporadically for no reason, as well as dancing.  And the style of this film is that the everyone is constantly signing, so that there are about 50 songs in this musical, one after another, from the very beginning until the very end.  I watched this film with subtitles turned on, and when people sing, it is often hard to make out the words, I would think the story would be lost if I had seen in live on stage.

Also, all of the songs are completely unremarkable.  There is a lot of word repetition with a lot of the chorus repeating what the lead singer sings, and even some points where the lyrics are merely vocables (such as Da da da dat da dat da da da da ya da).  None of the songs stand out as emotional high points, nor do they have a catchy tune.

All of the action takes place on a single, nondescript set.  It doesn't appear to be a colonial setting, as the walls are at least two stories tall and brick.

While I realize that the creator of this musical is also the lead actor, and that is admirable in itself, I still prefer more of a story, with more depth than this musical goes into.

While the Founding Father Hamilton's life should really be better known, there are only 5 points that are relevant.  In this musical, those points are brought out every 3rd song or so.


1) He was born in the Caribbean, and lost both his mother and father at a young age.
2) He was the first Treasury Secretary and he created the banking system for the US
3) He cheated on his wife (though it appears to that he was tricked, to a point)
4) His son died in a duel
5) He died in a duel.

One other point is that his wife created an orphanage

This musical completely omits Alexander Hamilton's 7 other children, making it seem like Philip, who died, was his only child.