Suspect's 2019 Movie Watch List

Stealing the idea from multiple people who do yearly review threads. Figured I'd keep them in here and try to branch out of posting my reviews in the RTLMYS thread.




January

1. January 3rd - A Quiet Place -

2. January 5th - Can't Buy Me Love -

3. January 6th - eXistenZ -

4. January 7th - Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse -

5. January 8th - Grease 2 -

6. January 13th - My Bodyguard -

7. January 16th - Sorry To Bother You -

8. January 17th - BLACKkKLANSMAN -

9. January 19th - Truth or Dare? -

10. January 22nd - Ocean's 8 -

11. January 23rd - Jigsaw -

12. January 25th - Solo: A Star Wars Story -

13. January 28th - Crossroads -

14. January 29th - The Amityville Horror -

February

15. February 2nd - Friend Request -

16. February 4th - Macabre -

17. February 5th - Upgrade -

18. February 7th - Pulse -

19. February 12th - Hour of the Wolf -

20. February 13th - Ginger Snaps -

21. February 15th - Happy Death Day 2 U -

22. February 26th - Tag -

23. February 28th - Fyre -

March

24. March 5th - Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom -

25. March 12th - Searching -

26. March 20th - Love, Simon -

27. March 21st - The Snowman -

28. March 22nd - The Dirt -

29. March 23rd - The Meg -

30. March 26th - The Stepfather -

31. March 27th - Eighth Grade -

32. March 28th - The Howling -

33. March 29th - Us -

34. March 30th - Instant Family -

April

35. April 3rd - Velvet Buzzsaw -

36. April 7th - Aladdin -

37. April 11th - The Silence -

38. April 14th - The Strangers: Prey At Night -

39. April 16th - The Oath -

40. April 20th - The Happytime Murders -

41. April 23rd - Slumber Party Massacre -

42. April 24th - Pet Semetary -

43. April 26th - Venom -

44. April 30th - Avengers: Endgame -

May

45. May 1st - Unicorn Store -

46. May 3rd - Unfriended: Dark Web -

47. May 5th - The Fast & The Furious -

48. May 6th - 2 Fast 2 Furious -

49. May 7th - The Fast & The Furious: Tokyo Drift -

50. May 9th - Fast & Furious -

51. May 13th - Fast Five -

52. May 16th - Fast & Furious 6 -

53. May 20th - Furious 7 -

54. May 21st - John Wick 3: Parabellum -

55. May 29th - Aliens -

56. May 31st - The Fate of the Furious -

June

57. June 3rd - Brightburn -

58. June 5th - Deja Vu -

59. June 19th - Murder Mystery -

60. June 21st - Someone Great -

61. June 23rd - Always Be My Maybe -

62. June 24th - Minority Report -

63. June 29th - Videodrome -

64. June 30th - Wine Country -

July

65. July 3rd - Midsommar -

66. July 12th - Gattaca -

67. July 13th - Turbo Kid -

68. July 14th - Attack the Block -

69. July 16th - Going Overboard -

70. July 18th - Night of the Creeps -

71. July 20th - Grosse Pointe Blank -

72. July 23rd - PCU -

73. July 25th - The Monster Squad -

74. July 27th - Teen Witch -

75. July 28th - Forbidden Planet

76. July 29th - Robinson Crusoe on Mars -

77. July 30th - Dance Till Dawn -

78. July 31st - Time Crimes -

August

79. August 1st - Once Upon A Time...in Hollywood -

80. August 3rd - Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween -

81. August 5th - The Nun -

82. August 7th - Widows -

83. August 10th - Deep Rising -

84. August 13th - Toy Story 4 -

85. August 15th - Holmes & Watson -

86. August 16th - The Possession of Hannah Grace -

87. August 17th - Bad Times at the El Royale -

88. August 18th - Fear -

89. August 19th - North By Northwest -

90. August 21st - The Long Dumb Road -

91. August 22nd - Rear Window -

92. August 24th - Shadow of a Doubt -

93. August 26th - Shazam! -

94. August 28th - Thoroughbreds -

95. August 29th - Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein -

96. August 30th - Rudderless -

September

97. September 1st - Journey 2: The Mysterious Island -

98. September 2nd - Monster House -

99. September 4th - Escape Room -

100. September 6th - Ready or Not -

101. September 7th - It: Chapter 2 -

102. September 9th - The Fanatic -

103. September 11th - The Equalizer 2 -

104. September 13th - Ted -

105. September 15th - Sing Street -

106. September 17th - Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon -

107. September 20th - Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure -

108. September 22nd - Heathers -

109. September 23rd - Dope -

October

110. October 1st - The Void -

111. October 2nd - Climax -

112. October 3rd - Hellbaby -

113. October 4th - In The Tall Grass -

114. October 5th - Overlord -

115. October 6th - Await Further Instructions -

116. October 7th - Black Christmas (1974) -

117. October 8th - Black Christmas (2006) -

118. October 9th - Annabelle: Creation -

119. October 10th - Scream -

120. October 11th - Psycho II -

121. October 20th - The VVitch -

122. October 24th - Braindead -

123. October 27th - IT -

November

124. November 3rd - Commando -

125. November 5th - Shogun Assassin -

126. November 8th - Willow -

127. November 9th - Doctor Sleep -

128. November 13th - Kung Fu Hustle -

129. November 16th - The Replacement Killers -

130. November 18th - The Big Hit -

131. November 20th - The Blues Brothers -

132. November 25th - The Skulls -

133. November 29th - Mystery, Alaska -

December

134. December 8th - Parasite -

135. December 12th - The Phantom -

136. December 18th - The Irishman -

137. December 20th - Scrooged -

138. December 22nd - Anna and the Apocalypse -

__________________
"A laugh can be a very powerful thing. Why, sometimes in life, it's the only weapon we have."

Suspect's Reviews

Anytime a genre picture relies on an interesting 'gimmick', people will jump in line to tear it apart when small things don't seem to line up 100% with what the film is presenting. A Quiet Place takes the ambitious task of creating a world where monsters kill you if you make a sound. So it makes sense that people are going to be waiting patiently for a sequence where someone makes a sound and then when they are not killed, we get to rant and rave about plot holes. On top of that, the "what would you do" scenario is escalated. Why wouldn't they do this? Why wouldn't they do that? If the characters don't do what you suggest, they are automatically dumb. I think it's incredibly hard to craft a film around such a premise and I applaud the film for giving it the old college try.

The world is decimated by an invasion of aliens/monsters that hunt by sound. a little over a year after the invasion, a small family tries their best at moving on after a devastating loss.

One of the aspects of the film that I think people are forgetting is that we only see this world through two perspectives. One is that of this family, who have taken painstaking steps to ensure they live in a place where sound is non-existent. The second is in the newspaper clippings we see where they gives us a peak into the backstory of this invasion. IT'S SOUND one headline reads, "How to Survive" is another. Smart move from the filmmakers to give us a glimpse into the bigger picture without exposition (there is non in this film, bravo).

People will automatically assume that the military is dumb for not finding out the weakness of these monsters. Maybe they did but it was too late? Maybe the pure shock of seeing these aliens/monsters was enough to make us lose the fight, maybe America's attitude of we have guns and we will win no matter what was the downfall. People are complaining about the shotgun killing the one alien. We need to pay attention, these creature are almost indestructible. He has armor written on the whiteboard, so the act of the sound and the weapon working in tandem makes sense to me, simple enough. In the chaos of an alien invasion, I think we shoot first and ask questions later. The questions that are asked...are asked too late.

Yes....yes, this film has a lot of issues with logic. Why would a family let their youngest child be at the end of the line, unsupervised, when monsters are around? Why not live near the waterfall to cover your sound? Why leave the God-Damn nail in the step when everyone walks around without shoes? Why not make more than one sound proof room? The biggest one of course is why jeopardize your entire family's lives with getting pregnant? It's never explained why they decided to have another child, was it on purpose or an accident? It's irresponsible. These are flaws in logic from the characters, but it makes for some great tension filled sequences. So I guess I'm one of those people I talk about in the opening paragraph.

A film about not making any sounds, has to pay extra attention to the sound design. Krasinski does a marvelous job here with very little dialogue, communication through sign language and the use of sound being only used in key moments. I read that they did some rough cuts of the film completely silent. For people able to tell a story without the aid of sound is hard, the classic show don't tell is on fire with A Quiet Place.

It wasn't horrible but I honestly don't think my rating of 6.5/10 would change much.

First time seeing this film, it fits perfectly for the 80's Teen HoF.

Ronald is a typical high school nerd, but he wants to change that. He's been mowing lawns for cash and saved up enough money to buy a telescope. When the girl he likes ruins her mom's dress, he decides to use that money instead to 'rent' her. So now she's able to buy a new dress, in return all she has to do is pretend to go out with him. This will make him more popular. In doing so, she actually starts to like the little guy, but the popularity he's been receiving has clouded his mind and he becomes obsessed with it. Ignoring the signs that she actually likes him, they "break-up" and he goes from zero to hero. How long can he keep this "charade" up before people find out that he's just a nerd trying to be cool? How long will the secret of renting the popular girl stay hidden?

In many films like this (there are many) it's obvious what the trajectory the character and actions will take. I've seen countless films where the nerd will leave his nerd friends behind for more recognition. When that goes away and he tries to crawl back...how many people take him back? Usually all of them. It was nice to see some real emotional conflict here when Ronald tries to crawl back to his friend in the arcade. I would have liked to have seen a bit more resolution to that relationship towards the end. The speech at the end would indicate that they possibly patched things up, but I felt like we deserved a more concrete answer there.

Patrick Dempsey does a good job playing the nerd trying to be cool. When he first shows up after the break-up, I had a good laugh at his clothing style. The fact that everyone else loves it made it even funnier. The film definitely shows how zombie like people are. It still is relevant today. People are willing to ignore the obvious when things become "cool". High school kids are sheep, they follow the flock.

When the film was over, I read up on it, as I normally do. Such a sad story for the lead actress Amanda Peterson. She was 15 when she did this movie, Dempsey was 20. Her parents revealed that she was raped at this age. With the current #MeToo state of Hollywood, it's not hard to imagine it was someone in power on this set. After such a traumatic event, she spun out of control and was on numerous drugs throughout the rest of her life. She died of an accidental drug overdose at the age of 43. Sad.

Can't Buy Me Love was remade years later as Love Don't Cost A Thing, starring Nick Cannon. Never seen it, don't intend do.

This is my second viewing. I left just as confused as the first.

Cronenberg and Lynch. Lynch and Cronenberg. Whenever I think of one of their films, I think of the other's. Why? I don't know. Both are named David and live for weird and obtuse filmmaking? With eXistenZ, Cronenberg channels his Naked Lunch era with a dash of The Matrix.

I was upset at my first viewing as I knew what the ending would be, knowing it ahead of time now let me enjoy it a bit more. I was along for the weirdness, which there are many and I really appreciated the gooey, grotesqueness of it all. Eating away at fish like creatures to pull out their bones are craft a rudimentary gun that shoots teeth instead of bullets? I'm game. Some might argue that Cronenberg is being weird just for the sake of being weird and using the excuse of being in a game to exercise these oddities. So what? If he wants to create a weird psycho-sexual game machine, let him. It made me feel uncomfortable every time Jennifer Jason Leigh would massage her fleshy pod, I would cringe and laugh. When she orgasms from Law using her port, I would cringe and laugh. Cronenberg probably had a lot of fun creating this world.

Yes the film is weird. Yes, Law licks a port hole on the tramp stamp side of Leigh. Yes, they finger each other's holes. The film is easy to follow, despite the confusing ways it tries to get to the end goal. The end result? It's such a Canadian movie.

Another Spider-Man movie coming out? Yawn.

It's a cartoon? Double yawn.

It's got a big theatrical release? What's going on here?

Watches trailer.....yooo, that looked kinda dope.

Reviews come in....staggeringly positive.

Sits in theatre with popcorn and wife.

Go home and chat about it.

Sit on it a few days.

Write review on Mofo.

I originally wasn't expecting much from this movie, then I saw the animation style they were going with and thought to myself, here they are actually doing something different. Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse could be the best superhero movie this year.

Mile Morales is spray painting a wall underground when a peculiar looking spider (which seems to be glitching too) crawls down and bites him. Boom, things are different the next day. He first assumes it's puberty, but discovers his powers are just like that of Spider-Man. He goes back to investigate the spider that bit him and while there discovers that Kingpin is trying to manipulate time and space with a new device that splits dimensions. Spider-Man shows up and is put through the dimensional beam, which absorbs his DNA and fractures the other dimensions. Now Spider-Men, women and pigs from all other dimensions are showing up and Miles must learn to control his new powers if he wants to help the team put a stop to Kingpin from doing further damage.

I made the mistake of seeing this in 3D. First, I saw no third dimension. I thought it would look great with the animation style (I had no 2D option for my time schedule too) but I was sitting there distracted the entire time. The filmmakers chose to pay homage to the old school comics which had some of the colour ink outside of the lines of the character. This "off-set" was used here in the background and it distracted the hell out of me because I thought it was bad 3D 75% of the time. I'm not entirely sure if such a creative choice was needed, even in 2D I would suspect it to be distracting. The rest of the animation was great though, blending 3D animation with anime, cell shading and others. It kind of felt like that one Futurama episode where they honour different animation styles.

This film needed more Nic Cage. Spider-Noir was a great addition, I loved his look and wanted more of him. You can add Peter Porker and Peni Parker to that as well. A few more scenes with these guys really would have put this movie over the edge for me. I felt like they could have had more sequences of them using each other as a team to defeat the bad guys. The enemy roster felt a little lack luster too. You have this entire villain catalog to use and give us the bare minimum.

The core bits of the story is that anyone can be behind the mask. This rings true throughout the whole movie. With women, kids and people of colour all having their time to shine as "Spider-Man". A cameo from Stan Lee got a smile from me and all the voice work is spot-on. Into The Spider-Verse is a fun film, with unique animation and a story anyone can relate to. Thumbs up.

I've heard the same thing about the animation style. I'll probably wait until it comes out on DVD to not get a headache looking at that big of a screen.

Not as bad as I was expecting, but still a bad movie.

While the music is nowhere near as memorable as the first, I didn't hate them. It was also funny to see people like Christopher McDonald doing his "bad boy" shtick. The acting in this is laughable, but it's obviously not trying to be good. I feel like the production of this had to have been rushed and everything was done without a finished script. So everything just sort of meanders around for a bit and I think that shows through the acting. It also shows through the music. Most of the time the music in musicals will help advance the story, but not so much here. A lot of it felt...pointless.

Something about this movie made the Pink Ladies and T-Birds...just not as cool as they are in the first.

Also...this film has the worst fake piano playing I've ever seen. It's hilarious.

When I was younger, I remember 3 instances of bullying towards me. One, some guy on a scooter stopped and threatened to shove my candy up my ass if I didn't give it to him. Two; some guy jumped on me and wanted my comic books, he pinned me down for ten or so minutes and three, a kid in my elementary school class would rub my snacks on his balls so that I would be grossed out and he could eat them. This movie brought those memories back. While I was in high school, I was neither the popular kid, nor the loser. I was one of the many kids caught in the grey area in between. If they made a high school teen movie in my area, I'd be the kid in the background.

My Bodyguard is a coming of age comedy/life lesson about a young kid who is new to a school and immediately pisses off the school bully, played by a young Matt Dillon. In order to get the bully off his back, he tries to hire the giant psychotic loner, played by Adam Baldwin. Everyone is afraid of the big guy, so it works. Yet the new kid wants to know more about this guy and actively tries to be his friend. Soon they hit it off, but the bully has a few more tricks up his sleeve in order to get even.

In the early 80's, films still had the 70's feel. So this film didn't feel like an 80's teen movie to me until maybe halfway through? Still, I was surprised that I liked it as much as I did. I was expecting this to be on the lower end of my ranking, but I don't feel like that will be the case. I wanted to know how this whole ordeal was going to end for everyone involved. The acting from everyone here is pretty bad (especially the ginger kid), with the exception of Matt Dillon, he portrays a convincing bully with an ego. He has that look down pat, it's mainly in the hair style.

I was taken back by the dramatic aspects they present here. The backstory to Baldwin's character is tragic. I applaud them for not spelling it out for people at times and just letting us know throw hints at his depression. The grandmother immediately took notice and tried her best to give him a glimmer of hope for his future. The story about his little brother is sad and even sadder later on when more is revealed. Would something like that be in a movie today? Probably not.

My Bodyguard is a genuine surprise for me and one that I am glad I got to see. Otherwise, I would have never seen it.

There are two scenes in this film that I would nominate in the Mofo Film Awards for 2019. Funniest Scene and Most Memorable Scene. I won't give away the most memorable scene because it correlates to my reasoning for this movie being the biggest WTF movie of the year for me. The funniest scene had me laughing for a good 5 minutes after the scene concluded. Sorry To Bother You is weird, it's so weird I don't even know how to process it. Yet here I am with a film that is probably going to make my top ten of the year.

Cassius "Cash" Green lives in his uncle's garage with his girlfriend. He needs a job desperately to be able to move out, afford nice things and seem interesting to her. He gets a job at a telemarketing company but is having trouble making sales. A kindly old man next to him tells him it's because he sounds too black and he needs to put on his 'white guy' voice to sound more appealing. Before he knows it, Cash is moving up the corporate ladder. The more money that flows in, the less he is of his former self. Alienating friends and lovers alike.

Boots Riley, in his directorial debut, shows precision and craft in his camerawork. He even manages to make simple telephone calls visually interesting and funny. This doesn't feel like a first-time director's film. He has a lot to say and he manages to tackle a variety of topics within this film; black vs white, slavery, capitalist greed, etc. Even though he has a lot to juggle here, none of it gets lost or jumbled. Sorry To Bother You is clear in what it wants to say. It laughs in the face of a three-act structure and screams at you in a unique voice. I haven't seen a movie like this all year and that's a good thing.

The comedy is obtuse to say the least. It's not your typical slapstick or parody film. It's something else. There are so many weird moments that suck the reality out of you that you question what you're watching with every scene. It helps that a strong cast is able to make the events of this film seem somewhat plausible. Lakeith Stanfield plays Cash, he was the poor chap at the beginning of Get Out. He's really good here playing the dilemma of trying to "Stay Black" while the struggle of "selling out" hangs over his head. Tessa Thompson plays his girlfriend, a free spirited artist. She seems to be popping up everywhere now and does a good job with an underwritten role. Two stars that are really great but you never see are David Cross and Patton Oswalt, they are the "white-guy" voices that you hear in the movie. Off putting at first, but hilarious as the movie goes on.

Sorry To Bother You is great satire and from someone who I expect will have a promising career. Embrace the oddities it presents to you and enjoy the absurd.

It's top 10 of the year for me, alright. Stanfield is one of those dudes who seems to do good work wherever I see him - Short Term 12, Atlanta, even Death Note. It's also one of those movies where I'm having trouble thinking of individual scenes for those categories because at least half the movie would qualify - what funny scene were you thinking of?

__________________
Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

Specifically for me it's when he was forced to rap and he just spits out the nonsense.

A reasonable choice. The first one I thought of was...this.

That is also a great scene.

I can't watch just one movie about a black guy calling white folks on the phone and using his white man voice to sound appealing now can I? To bring either film down to just those descriptors would be unjust, as both have a lot to say and both say it extremely well. Spike Lee isn't done talking about racism in America and with BLACKkKLANSMAN he tells a story from the early 70's the resonates more today than it ever did before.

Ron Stallworth is the first black officer in the Colorado Springs Police Department, he wants to be a detective so he can really puts his talents to good use. When a prominent Black Panther comes to town to give a speech, they grant him this wish. Gathering intel on this man and the race war he says is coming is his first assignment. After the rally he is reassigned to the intelligence division and it's there that he randomly calls the local Ku Klux Klan chapter number and puts on his "white voice" hoping to join. To his surprise they call him back. Now he needs a white officer to go undercover and gather information on any dangerous plotting these radicals might conjure up.

I find scenes in films that have an undercover cop in a real life situation such as Adam Driver constantly seems to find himself in, to be utterly nerve wracking. A monster chasing me in an abandoned building isn't scary. Standing in a room full of racists who will kill at the drop of a hat questioning you...is terrifying. Lee uses this to his advantage a few times with one character in particular, a paranoid kill hungry racist named Felix, played by Finnish actor Jasper Pääkkönen. A young Michael Biehn if I ever saw one. He hates black people and Jews so much that he will demand a polygraph test from Driver, to prove he isn't Jewish....which he is. A missed opportunity from Lee comes later when Felix discovers Driver's true identity, but the tension doesn't build as he leaves the scene almost immediately after. The scene that comes next is riddled with contradictory aspects to the story telling. It involves some C-4 and certain people that have the trigger, it just doesn't add up.

Lee misses key opportunities to ramp up the tension here, the story is oozing with potential in that area, but Lee seems focused on other things. Which is fine, as he nails the story he wants to tell. John David Washington plays Ron Stallworth, close your eyes and listen to him and you'd think it was his father on the screen. Topher Grace plays Grand Wizard David Duke. It's a little eerie seeing the calm and collected "Eric Foreman" spews such hatred, not in an angry way, but in a matter of fact way. He honestly believes the BS he is spewing.

While on the phone we hear the KKK's rhetoric through Ron's mouth. It's comical to see a black man spew such words because it helps to tear them apart. Show the viewer how ridiculous it all is. One of the more powerful scenes in the film is a sequence that jumps between the Klan indoctrinating more members and watching the film Birth of a Nation (literally cheering at the deaths of black characters on film) and the flip side being a quiet room full of young impressionable black people listening to an elderly black man recount the day he saw the brutal killing of a mentally challenge black kid. Though the most powerful and disturbing part of the film happens at the very end when Lee shows us footage of the 2017 Charlottesville rally. We see how ridiculous these people are throughout the film and keep telling ourselves how for we've come since the early 70's, only to be shown how little we've actually progressed as we witness a car rundown people in a protest and a man sitting in a white house not bothering to condemn such actions.

I have been meaning to go back and link the movies in my list on the front page of my record. Well. Can't be seen imitating you, so thanks for saving me the time

I didn't link them in my original reviews thread YEARS ago and it was always a pain trying to locate certain reviews in the thread. Go ahead man!!!

One of my thoughts while watching the film was: This guy looks and sounds EXACTLY like Steve Buscemi. it's uncanny.

I look up the credits on IMDB and find out it's his brother. What? Never knew.

This is a silly film. I rolled my eyes, laughed at the acting and genuinely had a good time watching. It's a PG-13 horror film aimed at teenage girls and it works. Is it scary? Not in the slightest. Is it bloody? Nope. Does it make sense? Who cares. Truth or Dare is a by the numbers neutered horror film....and I had a good time.

The film was pitched to Blumhouse based on the title and the opening scene. We start off at a gas station where a woman goes inside, looking distressed. She passes another woman looking at some food and goes to the teller asking for gas and cigarettes. He complies, then the phone rings. He answers it, speaking Spanish. Then he turns to her and asks....truth or dare? Next thing we know, she is setting the other woman on fire and apologizing. Sold. Let's make it for cheap (less than $4M) with young hot actors and we have a money maker ($95M WW)

In the film it is stated that a demon can posses a person, a thing, even an idea. So a demon infects the game truth or dare. There are certain rules you must abide by:

1: If you are asked to play, you must.
2: If you pick truth, you must tell the truth
3: If you pick dare, you must do the dare

Failure to follow these results in death. Simple enough, right? Let's just pick truth the whole time. The filmmakers have thought of that and worked their way around it. Second, all these people have deep dark secrets that will destroy their lives if they reveal them to anyone. Making it a little difficult for some to pick truth. But when your life depends on it I don't think anyone is going to care if you're gay or secretly are in love with your best friends boyfriend.

Truth or Dare is a mix of It Follows and Final Destination. They play the game in an abandoned church in Mexico and it follows them back home. Going in the order they did in the original game, they have to play or they die. The creepiest part of the movie is simply some dialogue. Our main protagonist meets this guy at a bar and when the night winds down he suggests they go somewhere fun. So they end up playing the game in the church. When one of her friends asks him what are his intentions with her he responds; "I needed to find somebody with friends, that I could trick into coming here. I could tell Olivia was an easy target. I brought you all up here because, I am okay with strangers dying if it means I get to live."

When the demon infects you your face becomes a snap chat filter. Eyes bulge like a fishbowl and you have a stupid grin on your face. Might be shocking to see in real life, but it's comical here. The ending was interesting as it called back to an earlier moment in the film when a character claimed she would do one thing, then it just so happens she does another. I liked that. The film shouldn't work and it probably won't for a lot of people, but I didn't hate it and that's a positive for me.

#NotMyOcean

Just kidding.....

Seriously though, this film lacks a lot of the style and charm of the first three films. Swapping out Soderbergh for Hunger Games director Gary Ross is very evident. The film does a few things right, one of them is basing the film in the world of the originals and it doesn't try to reboot anything. Overall though, the film felt lacking. The characters were one note, the heist was semi-enjoyable but severely lacking creativity, and the absence of a central antagonist made the film feel a little aimless at times.

Debbie Ocean is released from prison after a frame job and instead of going straight, she dives head first into the world of crime again. She meets up with her very own Brad Pitt aka Cate Blanchett and talks her into doing a heist. She needs a small crew, 7 people in total. But wait...isn't the film called Ocean's 8? Hmmm, I sense a twist coming!!!!

A lot of the film is 'obvious' if that makes any sense. Despite a somewhat enjoyable first half, the film really goes downhill after it meanders around for 20 extra minutes after the heist has gone down. This is when funny man James Corden enters the picture. Is he friend, is he foe? Is he neutral? By the end of the film, I honestly did not know.

Characters like Rihanna's 9-Ball have zero characterization whatsoever. She's hacker and she hacks. I know nothing else about her other than she has a little sister. Awkwafina does a bit of the comedic relief, she's the Matt Damon of the crew. She picks a man's watch and inspects it in front of everyone. Not very good at her job if you ask me, you hide it and look at it later. Everyone can see you steal this watch, but for the sake of the film no one says anything.

Sarah Paulson is a stay at home mom with a dark past, Mindy Kaling is a diamond expert who desperately needs to leave her mother's house and Helena Bonham Carter is a once famous fashion designer. This is an impressive cast and it sucks that the material isn't really worthy of their talents. Everything just kind of happens and people are just kind of there. The one thing this film lacks is fun. It almost gets there, but almost isn't enough is it?