Tag: Jack O’Connell

Who would have thought we would finally be getting a sequel to Big Fish. Or is Little Fish the prequel?

Really, Big Fish felt like a very complete story, so it is odd that it would have any follow up.

Oh, Little Fish is a different story. Well, shit.

Let me just take this moment to say that I don’t care what size fish you have. You can have a big fish, a little fish, a spotty fish, or a dead fish, and I equally do not want to cuddle your pet.

I am more of a people cuddler than an fish cuddler. Emma (Olivia Cooke) and Jude (Jack O’Connell) have been dating for some time, hell, they are married. It hasn’t always been easy. They are in a band. Oh, and there is a pandemic affecting the world.

No this isn’t COVID. This was probably made and developed before that. As far as I can remember, this virus seemingly affect people randomly at different levels of severity. What does it attack? The memory. It takes away memories from perfectly healthy individuals. No matter the age. Sometimes it is a slow loss, sometimes it is all in a big bunch, sometimes it is somewhere in between.

People who get the virus lose their lives, forget their loved ones, their kids, their purpose, and it is not great. And sure enough, Jude gets the virus, he starts to forget, so Emma puts all of her efforts into helping him remember, helping find strategies to fight the virus, and hope that her husband doesn’t lose all memories of their relationship and find her a stranger.

Also starring Raúl Castillo.

Surprisingly this scene has nothing to do with Covid. I know what you are thinking. “A memory wiping virus? How is that different than Alzheimer’s?”

Well, slight differences, but honestly yeah, this could be a story about that. The only difference is the sudden big wipes of memory that happens to some characters, which isn’t the most important part of this plot. Treating this like an Alzheimer’s movie that affects people of many ages helps keep it more grounded in reality, and make a lot of sense.

Early on, I didn’t expect much out of the film, but it grabbed me surely over time. I think I cried at least twice during the movie, two notable scenes involving Jude and his memory loss. A speech and a beach walk. With this sort of film, you can sort of tell where the ending is going to be, and the natural conclusion. This is true for this film, and yet despite knowing that, nothing is lost. I am there for the journey.

I loved Cooke in this role, she was so caring and raw. But is she starting to make a theme of movies of “Being in a band with a lover who has a problem affect him and she has to help him out?” At least Little Fish she is the main character and it is about her during this crisis, versus Sound of Metal where she was barely in it.  I hope her next movie is a period piece. Where she is in a relationship with someone in an orchestra, but that person she is courting ends up getting polio or something similar.

3 out of 4.

George Clooney, you little vixen you. That little grinning face of his, I cannot help but swoon.

But I also can’t help but note he has been in a lot of meh lately. Tomorrowland, The Monuments Men, and A Very Murray Christmas, ugh. I actually enjoyed Hail, Caesar! but it had very mixed reviews.

So now I am looking to George to try and fix this ship. Give me something good. I did end up seeing the trailer for Money Monster before some movie and hey, it interested me. I tend to love hostage situations (in film), and I am definitely interested in people angry about financial crashes, thanks to The Big Short.

Give me something to cheer for, Mr. Clooney.

Oooh guns. I love cheering for guns!

Lee Gates (George Clooney) is basically Jim Cramer from Mad Money, that is your main introduction to him. But he also can dance! He has been on the air for a long time, his director/control room person is Patty Fenn (Julia Roberts), and she too is good at her job.

The stock of the company IBIS crashed in a big way the day before and the CEO Walt Camby (Dominic West) was supposed to be show up for an interview but was somewhere else around the world, so they couldn’t explain it. Instead, a PR lady (Caitriona Balfe) was going to badly explain the situation, but hey, a gunman (Jack O’Connell) showed up!

With a gun!

And he is pissed. He lost all of his money thanks to the IBIS crashed, which Lee Gates promised was the best stock ever. Sure, he only lost $60,000, and some people lost way more, but he has a pregnant girlfriend (Emily Meade). And he is depressed. And he wants answers.

Also starring Aaron Yoo as mysterious Asian man, Dennis Boutsikaris as angry executive at IBIS, Giancarlo Esposito as a police captain, and Lenny Venito as the world’s most dedicated camera man.

And let’s not forget how much money this hostage situation will make the channel.

Guns and Money, Celebrities and Scandals, Money Monster is potentially one of the most American movies ever. It is directed by Jodie Foster, who hasn’t directed a film since the wonderful The Beaver. The Beaver was weird, unique, and touching. Money Monster is none of those things, but at times, it is a bit interesting.

I think the beginning and middle of Money Monster are the more interesting elements. The ending just starts to get weird once they leave the studio and decide to walk down NYC, straight to the source. Not weird in the good way, just awkward.

Clooney, Roberts, O’Connell were all fine in their parts, but no one in particular really stood out and seemed exceptional. The message is one that has been hounded before in many better films. And, overall, the ending is a bit uninspired.

I didn’t really get my big cry moment like I do in a lot of hostage films. Or the large amounts of witty banter, or really anything.

Movie watchers will not get anything new out of Money Monster. But hey, it got a little close at some points, so it could have been a lot worse.

2 out of 4.

What is this Unbroken thing? It isn’t Unbreakable or Unstoppable or Unthinkable. It is Unbroken? What does that even mean? I didn’t even know there was a word to describe something as not-broken. I just assumed it was the general state unless otherwise noted as broken.

English is weird.

My first thought seeing the trailer was Oscar Bait. My second thought was, wait, haven’t I already seen this movie? It was also based on a true story, during WW2, prisoner of war who got abused by a Japanese man but never gave up and overcame great struggle? Yeah. That was The Railway Man. This is just the same movie but a bigger budget and more CGI right?

Oh. That one was British and this is American. That’s the difference.

Yep, just replace him with a lad instead of a boy and it’s the same scenes.

Unbroken is the “true story” of Louie Zamperini (Jack O’Connell), an Italian-American hero or something like that. As a kid he got picked on for his nationality, so he had to run away a lot. Well, he got fast at running, noticed by his better brother Pete (Alex Russell). Next thing you know, he is on the track team, breaking records, and hey, even going to run for the Olympics.

Then boom, World War II. Next thing you know, Olympics are canceled, and Louie now a good boy wants to join the war effort. He gets to fly in planes, and protect us from Japan!

Then his plane gets shot down and they crash land in the Pacific. Fuck. A couple dudes, some sharks, no food, and nothing that can save them. Just like the Life of Pi, basically. And of course, as the trailers tell you, they eventually get found after a long ass time. Just by Japanese soldiers. So it is off to prisoner work camps for them, far from home, to be abused and treated like animals!

Boo animals!

Also featuring Domhnall Gleeson, Garrett Hedlund, Jai Courtney, Finn Wittrock and of course Takamasa Ishihara!

Run like no one is watching.

Look, I know Angelina Jolie directed it. And I know parts of it were written by the Coen brothers. But man, there was some questionable choices throughout this film for me.

First of all, the what felt like terrible CGI when they had the plane scenes bugged me. The film had some overall filter on it that got on my nerves. Was a subtle annoyance.

But also it had a lot of good things. Jack O’Connell was pretty good, although his accent could have used work. I enjoyed the scene where everyone beat the crap out of him. The backstory pre-war was entertaining for me. Some emotional stuff in the middle.

However, I think overall I liked The Railway Man more, because that confrontation between the the prisoner and his torturer were intense and a great build up. It was a bit more boring, technically, but it felt a bit more real and a lot less cheesy. This one didn’t have a great build up, but instead just your typical worse and worse until they are in a terrible camp, not just a bad camp.

In particular, near the end when main character finds extra strength despite being a beaten prisoner so that he can lift up wood high? That might as well have had cheese falling out of everyone’s ears. It made me cringe and think it was some ridiculous American power fantasy. I didn’t find it inspirational, I found it laugh able. Because up to that point too, the movie felt enjoyable enough for a 3 maybe. Even with all that time spent on the boat.

But then they went full Oscar bait or something. And I just had to shake my head.

2 out of 4.

Let’s talk about History. You know I like history, and studied Ancient History. We’ve been through that many times. I remember seeing the first 300 in theaters and being amazed by what I saw. I was so surprised and excited and at the edge of my seat. Later viewings, the excitement died a bit down, and I didn’t really like the movie as much. That is sad.

So why not a sequel, what, 8 years later? Based on the sequel graphic novel, Xerxes, that isn’t even out yet. 300: Rise of an Empire is also based on history I guess. You see, when the Spartans were forcing Xerxes’ forces to a bottle neck point, the Athenians and other Greece fighters were doing the same sort of strategy but with boats. Overall, both sides stalled enough time to eventually defeat Xerxes’ army!

Spoilers? No, fuck you, that’s history. So let’s get our boat on, and hopefully this movie doesn’t suck. After all, it doesn’t have what I will now call the “Gerard Butler Star Power” aspect that the first one had.

This man is not Gerard Butler.

Themistokles (Sullivan Stapleton) is a great Athenian, bu he wants to be a great Greek. He wants to unite the country, all of the city states (including Sparta) under one banner. He has wanted this for years, and it doesn’t help (or does it?) that Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro) is at their doorstep.

But Greece doesn’t want to do it. They have democracy now, so he can’t force them. He instead will go out with the small force and try and stall until a martyr can be formed, hopefully uniting the country and helping them win the war. He also has to deal with Artemisia (Eva Green), a Greek traitor who has risen through the ranks in Persia, leading his entire navy and wanting to see Athens burn.

But this isn’t just any sequel to 300. No, we also get material that happens before the invasion. We get the Battle of Marathon, ten years prior! We get to see how lowly Prince Xerxes became Xerxes the GodKing. And of course, we also get to see that after effects to the 300 getting slaughtered.

Lena Headey reprises her role as Queen Gorgo, and Hans Matheson, Callan Mulvey, and Jack O’Connell are the other soldiers who get speaking lines in the Athens boat force.

This shit is real too. A Greek woman commanded the Persian fleet. How progressive!

I am conflicted writing this review, just because I know I initially liked 300, and then started to kind of hate it. So, if I initially like this version too, will I hate it in a year?

I…don’t…think…so…?

I liked this one. Shit, thinking back on how much I liked 300, I think this one is actually a superior film. The problem with 300 really is that it got boring to me in later viewings. The beginning takes forever, and the fights feel repetitive once they start. It didn’t have lasting appeal. This movie balances all of that a lot more. We have a fight to begin, then some back story where cool shit happens. Then we have more fights, and then some fights, then some story, then more and more fights. Hell, we also have probably the most ridiculous sex scene I have ever seen in a film.

But I liked it.

That might have sound creepier than I intended. I liked all of the description above, not just the last sentence of the paragraph.

Mr. Not Gerard Butler? He was pretty charismatic. I really wanted to go up and help him unite Greece and defeat the Persians. Sullivan Stapleton, listen to me right now. Do NOT start starring in RomComs after this movie. None of those roles for Butler are good.

The ending could have ended on a more complete note. I am pretty sure they aren’t setting it up for another eventual film, because the last fight is the Battle Of Salamis, which basically ended the invasion into Greece. So, if they had them posing for victory, or Xerxes running, it would have told the whole ending. This part was left a bit too open ended for my sake.

Did I mention all the cool shit that they did? Man, boat battles sure are fun. No wonder why Rome flooded the Colosseum every once in awhile to hold them for audiences.

3 out of 4.