Tag: Ryan Phillippe

Wish Upon

Sometimes it is really hard to remember all the genre specific films that come out in a year. Especially 2017 and horror.

When did Wish Upon come out? I don’t remember. I might have gotten an invite, but I don’t remember. Did I choose to not go, or was there something better to watch? Who fucking knows!

But at the end of the year, Wish Upon was already out, and I gave it a check because of the name and I knew that some shitty horror films had to be out there as well. And our star was not used to the leading role, but she was used to some horror films, so there was potential.

Chickfight
I bet the word viral is used in this movie at least twice.

Clare Shannon (Joey King) is your typical high school outcast. Small group of friends (Sydney Park, Shannon Purser), into some weird hobbies, sort of poor, normal stuff. Here mom (Elisabeth Röhm) committed suicide when she was younger, which haunts her occasionally. Her dad (Ryan Phillippe) has an embarrassing trait where he likes to dumpster dive for treasure for friends, but really it just makes him a hoarder and their house is a disaster.

And then one day, he finds a Chinese box that looks cool and leaves it in her room. She only dabbles in the language, and can see that it has wish on it, so for the lolz, she wishes this bully girl at school (Josephine Langford) will just rot away. And lo and behold! She gets a disease on her face and doesn’t return to school. Hooray!

However, this wish box has a deadly side. Every time it grants a wish, an entity the wisher knows will die. And if the wishes ever get used up, their own soul will be taken as well. But she doesn’t know Chinese, let alone ancient! And her old friend (Ki Hong Lee) can only help her so much, especially if she doesn’t listen. Time to wish for stupid stuff, consequences be damned!

Also starring Mitchell Slaggert.

Box
Behold, foreign mysticism as your villainous holder of items!

A horror movies where wishes don’t go as expected? That isn’t new at all. But these wishes basically work out well, except for the whole dead friends or neighbors or family members part. However, it takes way too long for the lead to realize the wishes are real, happening, and the box is the culprit.

By the time she for sure knows, she also knows she has seven max. She has done four of seven, and knows that she is running out, and that it brings danger to people. And she fucking wishes her fifth wish for school popularity.

It is so goddamn stupid. That is the sort of wish you can imagine in the first three, maybe, especially when testing to see if it worked. But at this point in the film, it is already clear the writers had lost their goddamn minds.

Wish Upon takes a regular story and tries to add some Final Destination elements to it. Because they quickly start playing up the deaths, so we can sort of guess and see how they will die. Or even WHO will die, as they show multiple characters in potentially deadly circumstances. But they feel cheesy and not scary, unlike the FD franchise.

And really, the ending is horseshit as well. This is a horror film about a girl of below intelligence, who thinks she is above average intelligence, and then some people die.

0 out of 4.

Straight A’s

I remember back in the day when I got Straight A’s. Then, I went to a smart residential public boarding school. There I learned that I am not always the smartest person, and learned to accept the B. Unfortunately, that lazy attitude went with me to college, and here I am today, writing movie reviews for you.

Related? Who is to say really.

Cigarette
If I keep it up, this might be me in a few years. And I don’t mean a well paid actor.

If I have learned anything from movies, it is that sometimes brothers compete over the same woman, and it is generally deemed acceptable. This is kind of one of those movies.

Scott (Ryan Phillippe) hasn’t been home in forever, many many years, because he has spent the last decade or so in and out of hospitals. I’m talkin’ rehab. He left home due to everyone hating him for the drugs and alcohols and having a falling out with the rest of his family.

He was dating Katherine (Anna Paquin) at the time, but she wasn’t cool with that lifestyle, even if she was in love with Scott. So she stayed behind, not willing to accept his plane ticket, and decided to get involved with his brother, William (Luke Wilson). They also had many children.

Either way, why is Scott back? Because their Mom died, and a vision of her as a ghost appeared to him, and spoke to him to make amends. Too bad his brother is out of town on a work thing most of the week, so making amends is kind of hard. He only has his ex and her children to work with. And his dad (Powers Boothe), who doesn’t appear to want to talk either. But hey, if he befriends the oldest kid (Riley Thomas Stewart), maybe that will be enough?

Audience
Perhaps the hardest adult task: watching a kid perform and trying to pay attention.

I started this a few days ago, and I will admit, I don’t remember a lot of it anymore. I remember I didn’t enjoy it.

This is another issue where the plot might have been a good idea, but the delivery was pitiful. The ending, man, the ending was horrible. All of it felt unnecessary and a bit confusing.

The cool uncle was supposed to help the kids out, and make them do fun things. He wasn’t even that cool. The things they did weren’t cool either.

The chemistry between the leads was basically missing.

I am done talking about this movie. It is dull and lame.

1 out of 4.

Setup

Damn it. WHY DAMN IT. I TRUSTED YOU BRUCE WILLIS.

Die Hard 2
Well. 95% Trust.

This is a pretty misleading movie, in my opinion. Heist like movie, something goes wrong, and people die. People may be Setup, even. (Okay, so yes a Heist goes wrong early on. They are setup. 50 cent gets mad and kills a bunch of people. Plot).

I am going to blame this all on 50 Cent. Because seriously. Bruce Willis was top billed in this movie, but he was barely in it. Ryan Phillippe, played a major roll. It just also sucked in this movie.

But damn it, Ryan was just in The Lincoln Lawyer. The pedo from Cruel Intentions. And he brought little to the movie. But I was excited because I thought that this may be a great movie with 50 cent in it, unlike the many before. 50 cents character I didn’t find exciting. They tried to bring in some sort of moral or religious dilemma, but I didn’t feel it. And a lot of people died. Just got tired of it though, nothing was that surprising.

Cruel Intentions and Director
This isn’t Ryan Phillipe being a pedophile, just awkward kinky sister stuff.

1 out of 4.