Reviews

For transparency, I had no intention of writing a review. I read the books and loved the first movie so I had a feeling I'd like the 2nd film. And I loved it. But what really had me wanting to contribute is the 1 star reviews. I love them so much. So much anger and vitriol over a movie. Everything I loved about this move seems to be what they hate. It was long but thick with character development. The fight scenes were there for the plot only and didn't make me fall asleep to 30 mins of cgi superhero action. Instead it furthers the plot. It wasn't action packed but layers of lore and story building.

But the rage from the reviews of slow action, boring characters, "lame" sci-fi makes me laugh and worry. This is epic storytelling, not force fed action. You will have to have an attention span that can focus more than a few minutes at a time. If you can break the cycle of needing non stop stimulation and instead melt into a rich deep story with world building and character arch, you don't be disappointed. Obviously not for everyone but what is. But one of the best film (franchises) I've seen in years. Truly hoping to see the full arch of Paul's story with a 3rd.

I'll be honest that I've never watched Matt Rife do an entire stand up special. I've watched tons of clips on IG and TikTok so maybe my expectations were skewed by that. But this was not good...at least the 18 or so mins I watched before turning it off. Just boring. Didn't feel like there was really any comedic skill but more your friends brother who rips on people he saw out or dated. But I've seen really funny stuff online so I think he probably just taped not his best set and hopefully the next one is a step up. But this wasn't it. Maybe he's better when it's more casual and more spontaneous? Won't guess what the issue was but definitely can't skip this one and check out the next.

People are getting fired up in the reviews for whatever reason. Overall, the first season was watchable and silly. Cristiano is rich beyond belief so not exactly shocking they live a crazy extravagant lifestyle. If you're offended by that, not sure why you even tuned in. The second season takes a dip. You do learn a bit more about their loss but overall the second season is a lot of set up pieces of having fun with cameras around and fulfilling her "dreams" like visiting and dancing in the stage of the Royal Ballet. Basically it's reality fluff but certainly not worse than most reality shows. What I'm confused by is...what were people expecting? A hard core exposé on Cristiano and her love life? Her non stop sob story about how she once worked at Gucci and now shops there. It's just silly how angry people seem to be. Says more about their own anger at themselves for watching reality fluff and expecting more than it does about this show.

Feels like so much wasted opportunity. Poor Ana for having to even act in this. She absolutely does her best with a ridiculous story and script. But the most painful part truly is the directing. It's so self indulgent and screams film school director just trying too hard with every trick, shadow and play between color and black & white. The gratuitous sex and violence, the obsession of split personality, the constant waves of sorrow and emptiness really says more about the Director than it ever could about the subject. The hair and makeup was good, I'll give it that. But honestly don't waste your time. And stop giving these average at best directors multiple movies. There is so much talent that can't seem to break into Hollywood that this is disappointing to see get to the point of release without anyone questioning its value.

It's slightly cringe and extremely predictable but honestly the worst part is the never ending ans excessive product placements in nearly every scene. Is this the future of teen movies? Scary.

Really wanted to love it but overall was very disappointing. Felt very dated, like an Austin Powers 4 type thing. I really hoped it would be great and there were a few moments that were funny but overall so confusing. It felt like they thought their banter and cute antics would carry this poor storyline. Jamie Dornan did shine though in a comic role and clearly had a figure there.

I watched The Vow without much knowledge of the cult prior. Overall I found it interesting but felt like something was missing given the gravity of the legal issues, charges and accusations. Just a small amount of digging unearthed a much more severe case of abuse. The truly sick nature of what was happening and the level of extreme abuse. Why was so much left out of The Vow is my question? It is also so interesting to see that many of the top recruiters and people responsible for helping this monster continue are highly featured in this version yet they were major contributors, which is touched on but honestly not nearly enough. A few months later I watch the Starz series called "Seduced" and that appears to be a much more raw and honest portrayal of the level of abuse and true destruction. The Vow clearly sheds a favorable light on those it interviewed which feels a bit like propaganda to downplay their role.

So fun, so funny with a heart and message of acceptance. Beautiful show that embraces the world as it is now, not as we'd like it to be. You don't have to be a fan of drag to appreciate stories of different lives, different world and different beliefs coming together.

I'm completely mystified by the fact that there are no name titles given to a single person interviewed nor subtitles used when someone being interviewed did not speak in English (keep in mind this film is in English the majority of time so I guess those interviews in French weren't important for us to know). I watched this in Hulu so unless they released an incomplete version, I'm at a loss to understand such an amateur decision to leave your audience in the dark.

I actually went in with low expectations after reading a few of the early reviews but was very confused why this wasn't rated higher overall. It's fun and it has enough action to be fast paced but not so much I want to fall asleep to long CGI scenes. Kate is an absolute delight and hilarious through the entire thing. Sam is always easy on the eyes. Yes it's somewhat predictable but I wasn't coming for some sort of crazy plot twist spy thriller, I came for a solid comedy and that is exactly what I got. Overall two thumbs up. My friends and I all laughed throughout and would totally recommend.