Tag: Himesh Patel

Greedy People was sent to me early as a screener.

Money money money, makes the world go round, and can make people act very differently. Will (Himesh Patel) is on his first day on the job in a new area. He just moved here recently with his wife (Lily James) who is pregnant. Oh, and this job is of course being a cop. Oh man.

His partner, Terry (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is an old hat at this job and really tells him on what he needs to know about the area. Truth is, its a very low crime city, so they aren’t going to have to do much at all. And make sure he doesn’t kill anyone! Well. Unfortunately due to events, and Terry not being that great of a person, Will accidentally kills someone! And while deciding what to do about it with Terry, they also…find a shit ton of cash!

Time to cover this up and make it look like a break in. The two agree to hide the cash in a storage unit, until things die down, and then start living life a little bit better. But of course, that is NOT what is going to happen. You see, the victim’s husband (Tim Blake Nelson) was actually already planning on ordering a hit on her that same day, so things just start to escalate from there, as more and more people get involved. That’s right. We are going to get a body count, because damn it, piles of money are just so exciting.

Also starring Jim Gaffigan, Joey Lauren Adams, José María Yazpik, Nina Arianda, Simon Rex, Traci Lords, and Uzo Aduba.

Just think of how much cash you could fit in JG-L’s mouth right there. Honestly, as a movie watcher and movie writer, and dare I say, movie critic, I get asked a lot about my favorite movies and least favorite movies. I also get asked about my favorite genre of movie. I think I finally have an answer for that, as I have hemmed and hawed in the past of various umbrella terms. I think I finally have a very specific answer. “Dark Comedies where things spiral out of control for regular people and a lot of people die.” Yeah, that might be my favorite drama.

From things like Fargo or Heathers or more recent bizarre ones like Arizona and The Death of Stalin. I almost always have a great and silly time. So, that is all to say, the same was true for Greedy People. A lot of people involved, mostly normal individuals, living their life, finding themselves a victim or a perpetuator of violence for one reason or another.

Patel is the lead of this film, but he ends up playing a mostly straight guy role throughout the proceedings. The remaining cast of characters is what really drives this movie forward. James, a pregnant and worried wife, amazing. Gorgon-Levitt, who has to play a lot of timid characters, was really let off of his leashes for this role. His character starts off as a normal shitty cop, sleazy, but becomes a scary force later on, with a just strong growling voice at times. Nelson, getting up in age, still can kick it like a Coen Bros film and give us a weird side character with special motives. Heck, Gaffigan played a literal hitman. I won’t say it is a role that is definitely suitable for him, but I will say it was notably different role for him, so its good to see him branch out and try something.

If you want main characters dying. This is the movie for you. If you like spiraling in a slightly comedic and deadly way. This is the movie for you. I had a lot of fun with this.

4 out of 4.

The Aeronauts is a an end of year movie that should have had all of the pomp and circumstance of a summer release and…did not. Because Amazon Studios bought it, I guess they felt it only deserved some amount of release, and one of those online a month or so later.

It was really swell of them to do that for me, as I got to see it before the end of 2019!

Although, I was curious about how the device would affect my enjoyment of the movie. So I split it into thirds by time, not my plot (as I hadn’t seen it yet). I started with my regular desktop computer, then the next third was my phone, and my final third was my living room television.

And the results will not surprise you at all!

The results are as shocking as this balloon ride.The Aeronauts is a fictionalized telling of James Glaisher (Eddie Redmayne), famed weather scientist, and him going on a balloon to do some science. His goal was to go super high up, higher than anyone else, with all the science equipment in order to help predict weather patterns and just figure out shit about the atmosphere.

His partner in crime? Fictional, Amelia Wren (Felicity Jones), hot air balloon pilot, loosely based on Sophie Blanchard. She was good a piloting, even though on one of her recent missions, her husband (Vincent Perez) died in the balloon, so that sucks a lot. She is all about the flair and the spectacle in order to get financing behind these trips. Science be damned, she just wants to fly and redeem herself.

And yeah. This is a movie about the hot air balloon trip that almost killed them both, where they went higher than any human before, and science’d a whole lot. Sort of based off of a real trip done, but way less crazy.

Also starring Himesh Patel, Phoebe Fox, Rebecca Front, and Robert Glenister.

She’s as cold as ice, but not willing to sacrifice their love. 

First, the screen results. I was much more excited abotu the movie and interested in its plot the bigger the screen. Shocking ahh! If you got to watch this on IMAX, I am jealous, because it is a beautiful movie with a lot of CGI that works really well together to take us on a trip above the clouds.

The biggest selling point for the film is the visuals.

Redmayne and Jones have really good chemistry together, and despite the story being told in a disjointed order, it doesn’t take away from their short and important flight.

Unfortunately, it is also really hard to get super psyched about this movie, knowing it is far closer to a fake tale than anything else. If it was sold just a fiction story? It’d be a fun adventure. But it is being sold as the sort of true story, and now the whole thing is muddled. This is not something you would get actual useful knowledge out of. It should not be seen as educational.

Unfortunately, the whole film is set up in a way to highlight this one big important moment and flight that really didn’t exist. A cool story, destroyed by its details.

2 out of 4.

When I first saw the trailer for Yesterday, I will admit it intrigued me. A world where only one person knew about The Beatles? Okay, cool.

A world where something never happened can be a hard subject to take over. Are the writers/director going to really drive hard into all the consequences of the bigger band ever never existing? Will a lot of the world be different? Or will it just be an awkward hole that needs filling.

And honestly, I don´t care about The Beatles at all. So hearing some guy do covers of their music all movie doesn´t appeal to me in the slightest, so I would go in only caring about the story, the why, and the ramifications.

He also seems to be screaming instead of singing most of these shots. Jack Malik (Himesh Patel) is a British man from an Indian family, trying to make it big in the music business. He can write songs and play guitar, but no one gives a damn about him. His best friend for a long time is his manager and a school teacher, and Ellie (Lily James) has always supported him, even when he wants to give up.

And he wants to give up, a lot. Especially after he is hit by a bus when a global blackout occurs.

After his recovery, he plays a Beatles song for his friends, and none of them recognize it. That is a dumb joke, but whatever. And when he references them to more and more people, no one has a clue what he is talking about. Shit, even the internet is confused by his nonsense.

Time to exploit this knowledge, sing all of their songs, and become world famous! But wait, it is 2019. Will people care about the Beatles songs outside of the context of their role in history? Aren´t they all basic forms of music compared to some of the complex music we have today?

Eh, who cares. Let´s get rich and deal with the how and moral implications later.

Also starring Kate McKinnon, Ed Sheeran, and Joel Fry.

Scream number 2.

If you want a light movie with some Beatles covers and some light romance too, then I got a movie with you. If you care at all about plot or the ramifications, well, do not watch this movie.

This is the type of film where they had the idea and stopped developing it after the idea. There were a few cute moments about OTHER popular things that did not exist because of the Beatles fame. But the only one that made direct sense was Oasis, because of course. The filmmakers just nonchalantly picked other famous things to delete as well.

Were they because of the no Beatles? Were they also wiped during this weird event? Were they the real thing that was disappeared and that caused no Beatles? They do not explain it at all, and do not make an attempt.

And also, as most of us would assume, no one would get super famous from Beatles music in 2019, if it didn´t come out 60-70 years ago. No way at all. So his strange rise to success feels forced and at no point am I given a believable picture of this strange rise to fame.

Just kidding. A scene where his parents gave no fuck that he was unveiling a new song for them to hear, and interrupted him multiple times? That was believable.

A concept that could have been great, but was instead left up to mysteries and lack of thought.

1 out of 4.