Suspect's Reviews

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Suspect's Ten Worst Films of the Year

Well, you saw my top ten of the year, now here are the trash that I'm ashamed to have seen.

3. The Forrest



Another horror film that had to be really bad to ruin the already good premise. Where are the scares?????? Not in this film.

x10



I've seen two out of your ten worst. I liked Dirty Grandpa a lot, and I also liked The Neon Demon, and I think I'd like it even more with another viewing.



Welcome to the human race...
remember when we used to post reviews in our own threads instead of Rate The Last Movie You Saw
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I really just want you all angry and confused the whole time.
Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0



28 days...6 hours...42 minutes...12 seconds
remember when we used to post reviews in our own threads instead of Rate The Last Movie You Saw
I do. But people never went to my review thread I felt. So it seemed that no one was reading my reviews.
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"A laugh can be a very powerful thing. Why, sometimes in life, it's the only weapon we have."

Suspect's Reviews



Yeah, and when we started tagging them there was another way to link to them all in one place even if they were spread out.

Review threads can be pretty cool, but they rose in popularity to achieve something that has been mostly automated by some of the newer features.



Welcome to the human race...
Yeah, it's been sorta fascinating to see how this sub-forum got left behind as the rest of the forum got more streamlined. Discussion about individual movies stayed in the upcoming movies forum, people's posting progress went into Rate the Last Movie or Movie Tab II, and how many people consistently write full-length reviews for this place anyway? A handful? Sign of the times, really.



Yeah, usage changes, just gotta roll with it.

There are some pretty dramatic choices coming up and I'm increasingly erring on the "shake things up a lot" side of them.



28 days...6 hours...42 minutes...12 seconds
Yeah, it's been sorta fascinating to see how this sub-forum got left behind as the rest of the forum got more streamlined. Discussion about individual movies stayed in the upcoming movies forum, people's posting progress went into Rate the Last Movie or Movie Tab II, and how many people consistently write full-length reviews for this place anyway? A handful? Sign of the times, really.
I use to start threads for newer films for discussion...but people seemed to stay in that damn upcoming sub-forum, which never made any sense to me.



Don’t Draft Me, I Watch Anime!
remember when we used to post reviews in our own threads instead of Rate The Last Movie You Saw
I do. But people never went to my review thread I felt. So it seemed that no one was reading my reviews.
It’s so weird. I’ll post a long-form review and get maybe 3 rep out of it, but then post just the name and ratings in Rate The Last Movie and get like 5 rep our of it. I guess it’s just easier to digest?



That elusive hide-and-seek cow is at it again
I do. But people never went to my review thread I felt. So it seemed that no one was reading my reviews.
From the perspective of a relative newbie here, I was not attracted to searching out personal review threads by users I did not yet know. I had not met, held conversation with, or observed enough of the user base here to get a feel for the individual personalities for some time that might have guided me to their individual threads. I'm still working on that btw, learning personalities.

Beyond that new user ignorance, I also did not really understand or want to scroll through pages of one review after another to maybe find the movie I was looking for. I'm speaking in general and not towards you specifically.

To me, it was an awkward chore to seek out reviews that I didn't even know existed. It's only been in the last few months that I learned there was a dedicated site-wide review list that I could search through. Up to that point, I would just do a basic word search for a title and hope for the best. Seeing the "what are you watching tonight?" thread and the amount of traffic that seemed to be flowing through it, I figured I'd go with the flow and follow that one for reviews, even if they were only mostly bite-sized. It's been a decent foot-in-the-door seeing so many personalities posting their quick thoughts from time to time, but at the same time it is a bit of a trap to fall into for convenience.

I am slowly creeping into the individual review pages (through the movie list, I think?), and that will eventually lead me deeper into the individual review pages when I just want to read without any specific movie in mind. But yeah, that watching tonight thread is damn convenient.
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"Ever try to forcibly pin down a house cat? It's not easy." - Captain Steel

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28 days...6 hours...42 minutes...12 seconds
Den of Thieves

(Christian Gudegast)




I had little to no interest in seeing this film. I think because I saw the poster and it did nothing for me. Then I saw the cast and the name Curtis '50 Cent' Jackson stood out. That man only does direct to DVD garbage. That is what I expected this film be. So imagine my surprise when I hear people actually like the film, not only that but they are speaking its praises. I look to the critics....BOOO, they hiss and sneer at such a film. Who does this Christian Gudegast think he is, Michael Mann? The critics turned their heads at Den of Thieves, but the audience spoke loudly. They enjoyed the hell out of this movie and it over performed at the box office. Expecting to make just under $10 million for opening weekend, it made just over $15 Million. So when I saw that the film dropped on this little streaming service called Netflix, I decided to give it a go.

At 2 hours and 20 minutes, I can't help but feel that Gudegast thinks he has a masterpiece on his hands. Sir, your film is no Heat. In fact, it doesn't live up to a lot of heist films that it inspires to be. Den of Thieves more often than not treads along the b-movie line and it does so very well. To say I was surprised by the effort put forth would be an understatement. Gudegast directs the film with more confidence than many first time directors and actually has enough patience to build the tension in the final act. The smooth movement of the characters and the quietness before the storm elevate the film above other fare like Takers.

Much like Heat, Den of Thieves follows two sides of the law, the robbers and the cops. The robbers in this case are calm cool and collected leader Merrimen, played by Pablo Schreiber. His number two, overprotective father Enson, played by Curtis Jackson and their young but talent getaway driver Donnie, played by newcomer O'Shea Jackson Jr. The cops in this case are Nick O'Brien played by Gerard Butler and a bunch of other guys that the film never gives a minute to care about. Much like Heat, the film carries the villains as professionals at their craft who are always calm. The cop chasing after them is unhinged, dangerous and good at his job. Butler on screen is an a-hole to everyone, it's hard to sympathize with him. His only genuine scenes are with his two daughters, this is where his true self emerges. Once he's back to talking to adults, the shield goes up.

The heist itself is exciting and different. It's funny to look back at a film like Heat and think the most memorable part of the film was the heist sequence. But that is not exciting at all, it's the aftermath of the heist. It's Val Kilmer not hesitating for a second when he sees a cop and open fires into the streets. The heist itself is rather dull and boring. Den of Thieves changes that up a bit by making the viewer try and guess where the antagonist is doing, much like in Inside Man. We are not 100% in the know when things go down. The action set pieces are entertaining and yet again owe a great deal to Heat.

Den of Thieves is a good heist film that might be off putting to some due to the overly long runtime. I see where they tried to add more stuff to make the film feel fleshed out with real characters, I was an hour and a half in when I realized I almost had another hour to go. The film is 100% macho and fails the Bechtel test...miserably.



28 days...6 hours...42 minutes...12 seconds
Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald

(David Yates)




One of the complaints I hear about the Marvel movies is that they seem to be too focused on setting up elements for future films. Those people would absolutely hate this movie. At the very least those Marvel films had a self contained story. Fantastic Beasts, as far as I can tell has no story. I sat there in the theatre as the credits rolled trying to go over in my head what the plot was to the film I just watched, I came back with nothing. Fantastic Plots and Where to Find Them? Not here I'm afraid.

Grindelwald is captured and while being transported to another location to answer for his crimes, he breaks free. Now able to walk the streets, he gathers his minions and tries to recruit others for his cause. His ultimate plan is very Magento like. He believes Wizards should be the dominate people and is willing to kill in order to obtain that belief. Our hero from the last film, Newt, is sent on a mission to find Credence, a boy who is an Obscures. He hopes to free him from his parasitic like powers before it consumes him.

The big issue, and there are many, with this film is that it is a prologue. Why have a prologue for a second film? Shouldn't the first movie be doing this? We have a film here with no plot, no story and simply more on the fly world building from the screenwriter, J.K. Rowling. The author of the successful Harry Potter books is writing the screenplays for this series. I think that is a mistake. She is a wonderful world building writer, but she is no screenwriter. The dialogue is stiff, the plotting is nonsensical and she isn't a visual storyteller. Writing a book and writing for the screen are two different mediums and she doesn't have the skill to make that transferable. She should write the story and hand over scriptwriting duties to someone else. Then we can maybe have a film with a sense of direction. I had no idea where this film was going, I felt like I literally watched a movie about a guy recruiting people and nothing else.

The film opens with a prison break of sorts. Grindelwald escapes his prison transport. I had a hard time keeping track of what was happening. Its dark, its stormy, they are flying in a stagecoach and Yates decides to cut at exponential speeds to the point where I had no idea what was up or down. I had no idea how many people were transporting him, how they all died or anything else for that matter. Yates has directed every Harry Potter film since Order of the Phoenix, so this one makes it 6. He's not particularly bad, but he doesn't seem to have a whimsical eye. I think this series needs a fresh eye behind the lens or it suffers from being too stale. I don't recall any visual thrills in this film, anything that looked cool and has a sense of tension. The film wanders around with nothing to do. Sith so much magic as part of the story and visuals, you'd think I'd be gushing about something.

A lot of people were upset with Depp taking over the role from Farrell. I thought he was going to potentially ruin this film too, but he ends up being the best part of the movie. I was intrigued and invested with Depp's performance the entire time. He brought a bit of 'magic' to the screen. His albino look is off-putting enough to be interesting and he uses his wand like a music conductor. It's nothing big, but a small gesture that elevates the performance. How boring is it when people flick their wands at others to cast a spell. Depp plays with his a bit, adding something to the role that others might not have thought of. Newt is another who uses magic a bit more interesting than others. That's the pro and con of Beasts. We get to see magic be used a little bit more in-depth to things, but then Rowling uses it as crutch to get out of situations. So our leads need to find someone, let's use magic. Need to leave, use magic, need to stop this, do that...magic, magic, magic. Magic is the magical word that is used to get the writer out of a tough situation. A little bit lazy.

Story elements are introduced that immediately shrink the world these people are living in. Everything has to be connected for Rowling, she can't just let characters be different characters. I feel like Lucas suffered from this with the prequels. Small fan service helps the audience connect, too much and you lose them. A lot of the film is dedicated to a character and their arc, which literally leads nowhere. This is time and story progression that could have been used elsewhere. Other characters from the first have little to nothing to do here, specifically Katherine Waterston. She does absolutely nothing in this film.

I was intrigued with the direction of this series, leaving the kids behind for a more adult fare. But this movie did more to hurt the series than help. We know that the last film will be a battle between Dumbledore and Grindelwald, so it seems every movie will just be fodder leading up to that and nothing else. Crimes is an empty film, there is simply nothing to it. Which is a shame because it looks beautiful. The costumes, art direction, set design, everything about the look of this film is fantastic. It's just a shame that the story elements don't match it.