Reviews

I have to start out by saying that I disappointed myself with this film being my first watch of 2023.

I couldn't tell which was worse, the horrible acting or the story. It starts off with Taylor Russells character Maren. (with Russells performance being the most deadpan performance that I have ever seen in a motion picture by a so called actress.) She barely speaks or even acknowledges her father before chewing off her new "besties" finger at a sleepover. When she meets Lee (played by Timothee Chalamet) she becomes Chatty Cathy. You finally get to hear Maren speak..and she still has nothing of ANY INTEREST to say. The jump shots (apparently to look artsy) only added MORE confusion to a pretty shoddy film. Notable good acting standouts were Sully, played admirably by Mark Rylance, and the father played by André Holland, and a very brief cameo by the legendary Chloe Sevigny playing Marens handless mother Janelle. This film failed on soo many levels that it's hard to pick just one problem. But for starters, Ms Russell might want to attend a few more acting classes before she is featured in another motion picture as a lead. And the director Luca Guadagnino, and screenwriter David Kajganich really didn't think this one out, it's like they had little or no interest in creating or telling an interesting story, that had an intersting premise. I'm sure original writer Camille DeAngelis was just as disappointed as I was to see her vision literally destroyed on screen. This might be an interesting film to "Gen Z" 13 year old females. But anyone over 13 with a semblance of respect for a good story? SKIP THIS!!!!

From the start I thought a Cheers spinoff featuring Kelsey Grammars character Frazier was a bad idea. In the Cheers role the Frazier character was one of the Cheers gang. In the series Frazier the character becomes a snobby twit who is surrounded by other snobbish twits, and the appeal just wasn't there for me because there weren't opposites for Frazier to interact with. Sure Frazier won awards and that...but it is/was boring. After years of NOT watching the show I decided to watch the cameos of Cheers characters visiting the Frazier character in Seattle. And it was heartbreaking. It seems that the Frazier character has outgrown the gang at Cheers, and only "indulges" them when they visit Seattle. It was never more apparent than the episode "The Show Where Woody Shows Up". Even the title is demeaning, but the series had the same title when Ted Dansons Sam Malone character made a cameo. I don't care for Frazier outside of Cheers, and his pompous, arrogant characters spinoff proved me right.

I have to admit, when I heard the premise of this movie, I was intrigued. People dealing with a strange time dillema aging etc. I thought how could this go wrong? Everything about this film was god awful. There were some notable actors/actresses in this garbage but the dialogue and characters they were given were so over the top ridiculous it was almost a comedy. None of the chracters were remotely believable. People trapped on an island where death is all around them and they start confessing their feelings? Really??? I heard/read somewhere that Shyamalan had contributions from his children (nothing wrong with that) but in THIS case THAT is evident. The WORST film this year...hands down.

Don't get me wrong, it wasn't a bad movie by any means. What left me disappointed was the lack of clever writing for Thor and Banner. Reducing Dr. Banner (Yes, DOCTOR Banner) into a stumbling baffoon instead of an intelligent scientist was the wrong way to go. Instead the writers decided to turn Banner into hapless victim, first in Ragnarok and then in Infinity War, it seemed that the writers found a way for Ruffalo to get more face screen time out of the character rather than the CGI created Hulk. Thor seemed to have suffered the same fate after.

Finally saw the "prequel" to The Sopranos- The Many Saints of Newark. After a year of anticipation for this film, I was especially excited to hear the voice of Christopher Moltisanti (voiced by the original actor Michael Imperioli) during the opening, narrating from the grave.

After that, it was ALL DOWNHILL.

Being a fan of The Sopranos, there are a few things that I remembered from the show and the characters backgrounds. This film seemed to ignore these facts. Firstly, I remember from the series that Tony had a young crew that consisted of Ralph Ciffaretto, Giacomo (Jackie) Aprile and Silvio Dante to name a few, so how was it that in this movie, Silvio was older than Tony and already in the Johnny Boy Soprano crew while Tony and Jackie were robbing ice cream trucks? Didn't add up. It was inconsistencies like these (and other factors) that ruined The Many Saints of Newark for me.

Another of the things that ruined this film was the very idea that an entire film about a basically nonexistent character from the series could fly on it's own. Who thought that an entire film about Dickie Moltisanti was a great idea? How about a film about Johnny Boy or Junior Soprano or even the origins of the Dimeo crime family?

Honestly, when I saw that Ray Liotta was involved, I thought that perhaps he would play Ercoli Dimeo or a younger Feech Lamanna, but instead Liotta plays the father AND uncle who just happen to be identical twins. REALLY? Even fictional Chrissy Moltisanti wouldn't have approved of a script this awful And why the whole racial strife aspect of 1968 Newark? Why even include this aspect of history into a film about the mafia? Why is THAT in the film at all? This was NOT what Sopranos fans were waiting for for two years. Did David Chase lose a bet? Did he owe someone money?

Onto the acting? Well all that I saw were actors imitating characters from the series notably Silvio, Sal (Big Pussy) and Paulie. I didn't really see any acting from these actors, just imitations. And sadly, Michael Gandolfini (other than resembling his dad in certain scenes) didn't really capture the fire or mannerisms that you would imagine a young Tony Soprano having at 16 years old. Again, THAT didn't measure up either. Overall I could have waited ANOTHER year for the writers to rethink/recast/rewrite this whole movie idea before releasing it. DISAPPOINTING.

As an African American who have seen and read documentaries and biopics on Fred Hampton, this movie I cannot recommend. Don't get me wrong, after all I've read and seen over the decades, I STILL can't say that I know the full Fred Hampton story. But I know THIS film isn't anywhere NEAR a true depiction. This movie here is just trying to get some empathy awards during/before Oscar time based on race and the BLM movement. All that "Judas and the Black Messiah" really is is a slow emotional buildup to a black mans assassination. The SAD part is that this film could have easily been about ANY black man, because it never once depicted the true Fred Hampton. The title " Judas and the Black Messiah" doesn't even focus on who Bill O'Neal (Judas) was and what his motivations REALLY were. All we know from the "filmmaker" is that she views O'Neal as a traitor. Why not tell us why? Because emotion kills logic, so there doesn't have to be any truth OR logic right? If there are any people who are interested in more truth about Hampton or BBP? Try any and every documentary on the subject before you use this film as the truth.

This movie is just more lazy filmmaking.

To be honest, it's not the WORST film I've seen so far this year. It just really seems like since this covid outbreak, really great writers aren't even TRYING anymore. Wiig and Mumolo, who are great comedic writers, weren't giving THIS film the same attention or creativity that they had with the much superior "Bridesmaids". Sure it's unfair to compare the two, but it's hard not to. "Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar" just seemed all over the place. It never really came together as a wholesome hilarious film where you fell in love with the characters. It began to feel more like an "inside joke" between Wiig and Mumolo and the audience were left out. It also seemed to care more about the location than the development of the characters. And the plot was like something that these two women couldn't agree on, so it became this hodgepodge of sight gags and very little humor. I know we've all been shut in and feel uninspired during these times. But Wiig and Mumolo should have kept this one under wraps a little longer until the writing was truly DONE.

I have to admit to NOT being a huge Spike Lee fan. Don't get me wrong, I AGREE that he was robbed of the best director Oscar for Malcolm X in 1992. The film was a masterpiece. But how do you explain "Da 5 Bloods"??? As an African American, this was WITHOUT DOUBT the dumbest, most pointless film I have seen in quite some time. As some reviewers have mentioned, there were points where I wasn't sure if it was a comedy by intention or by default. I'm not understanding how some reviewers are giving this film anything higher than 3 stars (and that's for the comedic acting and dialogue alone) There were scenes like where Eddie (played by Norm Lewis) accidentally steps on a landmine, and the shockingly bad acting in response to this horrific event was laughable. I was really shocked at how awful most of the scenes and acting were. How a young Chadwick Boseman was in the same unit with 60-70 year olds was also laughable!! They never even tried to age the characters accordingly!!! How 100 gold bars just lay buried in shallow dirt for 50 years and NO ONE discovered them???? It was like Spike Lee had just discovered LSD! Nothing in this movie made sense, none of the characters were likeable or believable so there was ZERO empathy for any of them. This was just an up and down mess.

Didn't get the connection between the album and this god awful "Scorsese wannabe" film. It was garbage!!! It really aped the Scorsese blueprint, complete with the pointless meandering, the endless parade of pointless characters and the racial epithets for shock value. Don't know what Pete Townshend was thinking, but most times albums are better left to the listeners imagination, not to be adapted into a God awful, stupid and pointless script with Towshend's tendency for homo erotic undertones. Listening to the great Quadrophenia album countless times BEFORE seeing this "film", I wasn't aware that the theme was about shiftless boring drug addicts riding around on mopeds going about 10-15 m.p.h. To add insult injury, most of the great songs from Quadrophenia weren't even included in this movie!! Perhaps the idea would have worked better had the album RESEMBLED the film. Perhaps it would have worked had this garbage been released BEFORE the album. But with all respect to The Who,or Townshend as an entity , a film maker or whatever they collectively should have kept THIS one. Some of the burgeoning talent of the day attached themselves to this mess, including Sting who was at a beginning of success with The Police. Others included legendary actors like Timothy Spall and Ray Winstone. Don't get me wrong, the acting was decent, but the premise? Check out your local dvd dust bins at Walmart etc and see for yourselves.

Loved the film. It's a great reimagining of this eventful night. Writer Kemp Powers I believe took some liberties which seemed to be his OWN philosophies and put them in the mouths of some of the characters, mostly Malcolm X. But overall I liked the "story" as it SHOULD be called.. simply a "story" Another thing that didn't sit right with me was at the closing of the movie, while playing Sam Cooke's "A Change Is Gonna Come" Powers (perhaps purposefully) jumped straight ahead to the assassination of Malcolm X in Feb 65' without mentioning the murder of Sam Cooke in Dec 64' some two months earlier!! This almost deflated the movie for me. I'm not sure if this was an oversight, which would be impossible to believe, or simply a "preference for Malcolm over Sam Cooke. Also considering that the ENTIRE story is made up, I find it hard to believe that Sam Cooke would have suffered the verbal abuse handed to him by Malcolm X or anyone of the other characters. That's why the movie seemed "tilted". Some people in the AA community truly believe that Sam Cooke was a "sellout" and that he and Malcolm were worlds apart. I don't believe that narrative, but perhaps Powers does, who knows? But in the end, I had to remember that the movie is make believe, and for a make believe movie or "retelling" of this particular night in history, it was pretty solid.

Funny movie, no doubt about it. But the character of Missy (played by the absolutely adorable Lauren Lapkus) was a little too over the top for me. But the laughs were genuine nonetheless. There was a serious lack of ROMANTIC chemistry between Lapkus' Missy and the movies lead Tim (played by the always hilarious David Spade) And I think that's mostly because of the writing for the Missy character which again was way over the top. It was more buddy movie than romantic movie...and that's fine. Again a funny film to watch a FEW times, but if it's a convincing romcom thing you're looking for, this might not be the movie for you.

Just saw this film, and I have to say that it was visually stunning. As far as winning in the the Oscar for best cinematography, this film sould walk away with it hands down. The casting and acting was definitely top notch as well. The only thing that made me twinge just a bit was the character of Blake, (played superbly by Dean-Charles Chapman). I found his character, while noble and brave, to be extremely naive. From his almost over zealous additude towards going into enemy territory, to his foolish empathy towards the enemy which eventually cost him his life- in the most careless way possible. The character seemed unfinished, perhaps a bit too young, which is probably what the writers intended. Otherwise a great war film.