“Molly’s Game” Review

This is officially my last 2017 movie review! As tradition, I’ll post my top 10 right before the Oscars recapping my favorite films of the previous year, and man has it been a fantastic year. I’m glad that I was able to end the 2017 movie season with this film, because it was just one of many endlessly entertaining films that I’ve seen over the past year.

Molly’s game is about a woman named Molly who…actually, forget it. I won’t tell you the plot because the plot is based on such a wild real-life story that made me enjoy the film more, because I was completely unaware going into it. I definitely had that feeling multiple times throughout 2017, as there were a lot more movies based on real-life events for some reason. If you must know, it’s about a woman who used to be an Olympic skier, but then becomes much more once she becomes involved in the gambling world. I’d definitely suggest not knowing much and going into this movie with no expectations, because it was definitely more enjoyable for me that way.

In terms of the performances, it’s mostly Jessica Chastain for the entire 2 and a half hours. She puts up a great performance, and doesn’t let up despite the fact that she’s really on camera for a long amount of time. Her character goes through a lot of different phases, and Chastain does a great job of adapting through all the stages of Molly’s life. Idris Elba takes up a decent amount of screen time, and he’s great as well. He has one particularly fantastic scene near the end that really let him show off his acting chops.

The best part about the movie is the writing. Aaron Sorkin is known by many to be one of Hollywood’s best screenwriters currently in the business, and this movie was his directorial debut as well. The writing is sharp and biting, which is just classic Sorkin. At times, it was a bit difficult to follow though, because there were some poker terms that kinda just flew by you without too much explanation. For the most part though, it does a great job of keeping you engaged. I wouldn’t say the writing was as good as his incredibly dialogue-heavy Steve Jobs, but it was definitely a higher caliber of writing than most movies.

My biggest complaint would probably be about some of the narrative decisions. It shifts between a lot of different aspects of Molly’s life, which can definitely disrupt some of the natural flow to the movie. There’s also a feeling of buildup throughout the movie, but there never really is a climax to tie everything together. There’s one story element in particular that seemed a bit too cliche and perfect, but I’m not entirely sure if it happened in real life or not. In that sense, I felt like the movie fell a bit flat. However, the writing and Chastain’s performance make it very entertaining throughout, which makes up for some of the cliche narrative decisions that they made.

Jessica Chastain has surprisingly been snubbed from a lot of the award season love, but she definitely deserves some recognition. She did a fantastic job playing her part and Sorkin also shows that he can be as capable of a director as he is a writer. There were many solid directorial debuts this year, and Sorkin is one of those people that I’ll be watching closely in the years to come.

Grade: B/80

 

“All the Money in the World” Review

Almost done with 2017 movies!

All the Money in the World is Ridley Scott’s latest film that depicts the real life events of the kidnapping of John Paul Getty III, which was apparently a huge story back in the 70s. I’ve never heard of the story, so I felt that going into it completely unaware of what would happen would make for a pretty thrilling experience. Two things happened after finishing this movie—one, I found that the real life story to be very thrilling and intense; two, I ended up being more interested in the real life story than the actual movie itself.

I wouldn’t say this is a bad movie. However, it isn’t great. It’s a decent thriller movie, and with a story as crazy as this real-life kidnapping, it doesn’t need much more to make it more engrossing than it needs to be. However, I had issues with the pacing and the way that the narrative shifted between the kidnappers and the mother of the kidnapped son. There were a lot of moving parts in this movie, and I felt like it wasn’t balanced out well. However, the story is still undeniably gripping and I was definitely intrigued to see how it played out. Based on what I read, I think the film is mostly accurate so it definitely adds to the drama throughout the film.

I wasn’t particularly into any of the performances. Michelle Williams, Mark Wahlberg, and Christopher Plummer were all kind of a let down. There was a lot of buzz about Plummer replacing Kevin Spacey due to all the scandals, and I think that there was an overabundance of praise heaped upon Plummer’s performance just to kind of spite Spacey. While I do think that it’s absolutely incredible that they were able to completely remove him from the movie, Plummer’s performance wasn’t that impressive in my eyes. In fact, I think the best performance in the movie easily goes to one of the kidnappers, played by Romain Duris. I think he exhibited a wide range of emotions and really got to show off his acting chops based on the screen time given to him.

I was also oddly put off by the aesthetic of the movie. All of the colors in the film felt muted, and at times I wasn’t sure if I was watching a black and white film or not. There was a weird colorization to the movie that had me distracted at times, which is a first for me. Perhaps it was intentional to fit the mood of the film, but it actually seemed more distracting to me than atmospheric.

Overall, this movie has a great premise to work with. The story of the kidnapping is intense and unbelievable at times, but the pacing and the performances weighed it down a bit. I still found it to be enjoyable, but I felt like it definitely could have been much more. I’ve always found my enjoyment in Ridley Scott’s movies to vary quite a bit, and I would say this was one of this lesser movies compared to some other things he’s done in the past.

Grade: B-/72

“Phantom Thread” Review

Daniel Day Lewis’s final film prior to retirement comes in the form of PT Anderson’s Phantom Thread, an off kilter romance that takes place in London in the 1950s. Set in the setting of the fashion industry, Lewis plays an eccentric and renowned dressmaker that works with his sister, played by Lesley Manville.

I always thought this was a weird choice for a movie to be DDL’s last. The guy tends to pick his roles carefully and really invests himself into them, as you can see by the sheer amount of Oscar nominations and wins. So it doesn’t come as much of a surprise when I say that DDL is utterly captivating in his role, but what does come as a surprise is when I felt that the supporting cast actually outshone him in this film.

Lesley Manville, who I’ve never heard of prior to this film, is amazing. She plays the role of the stone-hearted sister that complements DDL’s character so well, as she’s definitely the more terrifying of the two. The way that they banter with one another is funny and biting at times, which made for all of Manville’s scenes very entertaining to watch.

Vicky Krieps, who plays DDL’s love interest, is also someone I’ve never heard of and was pleasantly surprised with. She fits her role well, which is that of a woman unfamiliar with DDL’s world. She is sweet and well-intentioned, but knows how to fight back when she is being mistreated.

All of the characters in this movie drive the film, as there really isn’t much of a plot. The story is light, which makes for the film to drag sometimes, but it’s the characters that really keep you invested.

PT Anderson’s direction with this film is fantastic. I’m actually not too familiar with his work, as I’ve only seen There Will Be Blood, which I thought was awesome. Anderson really creates a sort of dream-like aesthetic with his movie, as there’s a lot of light colors and scenes where people are just sewing dresses together. There was also a seemingly ever-present jazzy piano piece that played in the background. It made for a very other-worldy atmosphere that was really engrossing.

Overall, I’d say that this movie is definitely not for everyone. It definitely errs on the side of pretentiousness but if you prefer a character-driven movie and have an eye for cinematography, I’d say that this is worth a watch. Manville definitely steals the show in my book, but that’s not to take away anything from the great DDL. I hope that Phantom Thread isn’t the last that we’ve seen of him, but there’s not much more we can ask for from one of the greatest actors of our generation.

Grade: B+/81

“I, Tonya” Review

Even though I grew up in the 90s, I’ve actually never heard of the controversial incident involving Olympic figure skater Tonya Harding. In fact, I’ve barely ever heard of her at all, other than the fact that she’s a figure skater. So when this movie came out, I wasn’t really anticipating it in any other than the fact that it got some great reviews. However, I was pleased to see that this film made for a surprisingly great viewing experience.

In my last review where I talked about The Post, I mentioned that some real-life events are not worth adapting into movies. I, Tonya is an example of a movie that definitely SHOULD have been made into a movie. Tonya Harding’s life is so crazy, so unpredictable and so dramatic that it could make for a compelling story if given the keys to the right driver. Those keys, given to Margot Robbie, could not have been placed in better hands. This is easily her best role to date. I know a lot of people really liked her for her role in The Wolf of Wall Street, but Margot Robbie really puts herself out there with this film. I’d argue that she does a way better job playing a deeply troubled and disturbed person than she did playing the deeply troubled and disturbed Harley Quinn in the much-maligned Suicide Squad. She wasn’t afraid to show the beautiful and the ugly side of Harding’s life, and she portrayed all of it wonderfully.

The rest of the cast is pretty good too, particularly that of Allison Janney, who plays Harding’s mother. I got a lot of Frances McDormand from Three Billboards vibes, because they’re both foul-mouthed and deeply ambitious women. She really pushes Tonya in the film, up until the point where you can really sense animosity and hatred between the two. Sebastian Stan and Paul Walter Hauser play Tonya’s despicable significant other and his despicable friend, respectively. Both, while hard to watch in their roles, play them so very fittingly and convincingly.

This movie is dark. On the surface, this movie is about Tonya Harding striving to be the best figure skater she can be. When you dig deeper, it’s an intriguing character study on jealousy, ambition, love and hatred. There were so many moments where I just thought to myself, did this really happen in real life? Those who are familiar with her real life story probably know a lot about what happened, but if you don’t then I’d suggest going into this movie completely unaware.

The direction by Craig Gillespie is fantastic. The way that he filmed all the ice skating scenes made it seem like some sort of action movie, where it was unexpectedly exciting. While you can definitely tell that they superimposed Robbie’s face onto a professional figure skater’s body, it’s not terribly noticeable and didn’t detract from my enjoyment from the movie. There were some cuts and transitions that I enjoyed quite a bit, and overall just really felt pleasantly surprised by this movie.

Again, while this movie is considered a comedy, it’s got a lot of dark themes. The movie balances the darkness with the good excellently, and it made for a surprisingly complex movie. My biggest gripes with this movie is that it felt way too long, and definitely had some pacing issues. I personally felt like there were way too many scenes of Margot Robbie and Sebastian Stan fighting, and that they could have cut down on that and still make a good point with what they were trying to say. Overall, this was a movie I did not expect to enjoy that much, but the absolute insanity of Tonya Harding’s life made it a very entertaining watch.

Grade: B+/83

“The Post” Review

I have a confession to make.

I’ve never seen Jaws.

I know, I know. For a self-proclaimed movie buff, this is unacceptable. It’s known as a universal classic and one of the best movies ever made, but I never got around to watching it…until this past weekend. And wow, people weren’t kidding. I was really blown away by Steven Spielberg’s direction and his ability to make such a fascinating movie with such a simple premise. Jaws was the kind of movie that solidified Spielberg to be one of the best directors of all time.

I bring up this anecdote because I watched The Post the day after; another movie directed by Spielberg. After finishing that movie, all I could think was man…Spielberg made Jaws all those years ago and now this. He really fell off.

No, The Post is not a bad movie. Some could argue that it’s great. However, I felt very disappointed with this movie. This was one of those movies where I was left with the feeling of questioning why it was made. The publishing of the Pentagon Papers is a story that is fascinating and crucial to American history, there’s no doubt about that. However, I do feel like some real life events don’t necessarily warrant a movie adaptation. This was one of those times where I felt that.

The movie thrusts you right in the thick of it and leaves very little room for buildup. For someone who isn’t familiar with the history of the Pentagon Papers (me included, admittedly), it was kind of difficult to keep up with the huge cast of characters in play. The first half has a lot of exposition that left me struggling to put some of the pieces together, while the second half took its foot off of the accelerator and let me process things a bit. The pacing definitely bothered me, as the sections loaded with plot made it a bit exhaustive to watch. I felt like the movie went too fast on parts that could have taken a bit more time in, like introducing all the characters. Instead, it rushes a lot of that and spends a lot of time on the parts that I think should have been sped up.

Perhaps the most disappointing part of this viewing is that this seemed like a very obvious attempt to get some Oscar love. This movie has Oscar bait written all over it. Given some of Spielberg’s more recent films like War Horse, Lincoln, and Bridge of Spies, it seems like he’s resorted to making a lot of Oscar bait films. The man has had a long and storied career, so I’m definitely not knocking on him as a director. It just felt upsetting because I know that he’s capable of making a much better movie.

Like I said, this movie isn’t bad, there’s a lot to like about it. For one, this cast is KILLER. This is easily one of the craziest ensemble casts ever put together in a single movie. There is so much star power here, that you sort of wished this movie was 4 hours long so you could see everyone get a chance to shine. Tom Hanks is classic Tom Hanks, and Meryl Streep is excellent as well. I particularly liked Streep’s character the most, as she portrayed the real life Katharine Graham in a way that wasn’t overly biased in any way. She demonstrates moments of great bravery, but also had many scenes to show her vulnerability and doubts. I thought Spielberg directed Streep’s character very well, and she was definitely the standout performer in this movie.

I think overall, I was disappointed with the fact that Spielberg has been making just okay movies these past few years. We all know that he’s capable of crafting brilliant movies, but he resorts to pandering to the academy by making some clear Oscar bait movies. The Post is okay at best, as it overly dramatizes a real-life event that probably would have been better served as a documentary. At the end of the day, Spielberg will always be one of my favorite directors. I’m ashamed to admit that it took me this long to watch Jaws, but it’s definitely an incredible movie after all these decades. Basically, if you have to make any sort of takeaway from this review, it would be this: watch Jaws instead of The Post.

Grade: B-/74

“Darkest Hour” Review

Happy 2018! Another year has gone and I’m close to my one year anniversary on this blog. Kind of crazy to think that I’ve kept it up for this long, considering I’m generally a lazy person when it comes to writing. Anyway, I’m going to continue tagging my posts as “2017” for movies that technically came out last year. They’ll all factor into my top 10 of 2017 that I usually write before the Oscars, which is kind of my cut-off date. With that being said, let’s talk about Darkest Hour.

This movie highlights the events leading up to Churchill’s election as Prime Minister and soon afterwards the crucial decisions that he had to make in order to ensure Great Britain’s survival in WWII. Many have said this already, but this movie makes for a great companion piece alongside Dunkirk. While the movie does show the events leading up to Churchill’s decision to enact Operation Dynamo (the evacuation protocol in Dunkirk), most of the film focuses on the heavy resistance that faced Churchill upon his election.

Before you ask, the answer is yes; Gary Oldman does indeed deserve the Oscar for best actor. If you didn’t know it was him, you probably thought it was some old guy from the same lineage as Mr. Churchill himself; but Oldman’s brilliant performance combined with some fantastic makeup really helps him disappear into his role. Oldman is definitely the star of the show, but the performances from Ben Mendelsohn as King George VI and Kristin Scott Thomas as Churchill’s wife Clementine were also surprisingly great. Mendelsohn is pretty much awesome in everything he does, and I really enjoyed the moments where he would have very personal talks with Churchill. I wished that Kristin Scott Thomas had more screen time to flesh out the relationship between her and Winston, because I thought it added a much needed dynamic to the film.

When it comes to the story and the pacing, I would say it kind of drags a bit in the first two thirds of the movie. It’s not terribly slow or boring, but there did seem to be some parts that were kind of filler-y. I understand that most of the movie is to show how much Parliament didn’t agree with Churchill’s ideas, but after a while it did kind of feel like it overstayed its welcome. I thought that the third act of the film was fantastic though, as it really portrayed Churchill on a more personal level. That again is due to the scenes that he shared with those closest to him, as it really humanized Churchill.

In terms of presentation, there are definitely times when I felt like the director Joe Wright was kind of just showing off. It’s a beautiful looking film for sure, but there are also times when it felt a little bit too embellished, with creative ways of cutting scene to scene and so on. While those things aren’t necessarily bad by any means, I also felt like it didn’t exactly fit with the tone of the film. However, Wright really nails down a lot of the aesthetic, and most of my complaints were small nitpicks.

Regardless of whether or not Gary Oldman wins the Oscar, there’s no denying that he is one of the greatest actors of our generation and in my eyes, the most versatile actor Hollywood has ever seen. While this movie can definitely be pegged as an Oscar-bait film, Oldman really carries this movie with his powerhouse performance, but not without the help of a pretty great supporting cast.

Grade: B/79

“The Shape of Water” Review

Guillermo Del Toro’s newest film The Shape of Water is an unconventional romantic drama that tells the tale of a mute woman who falls in love with a fish guy. Yep, you read that right. If you haven’t heard any of the Oscar buzz around this movie, then know that it has a really good chance of winning best picture. This film has all the hallmarks of something that Hollywood would love. It is beautifully directed, acted, and tells a very poignant message that is reflective of our current times and political climate. This is easily the most progressive movie I’ve ever seen, and it couldn’t have come out at a more relevant time.

There is definitely an undeniable charm to this film. GDT is an excellent director and filmmaker; he has a very imaginative eye for cinema and all his previous movies have shown that. The setting of this film, coupled with great music from Alexandre Desplat, really conveys a sense of wonder and magic in every shot. Sally Hawkins is absolutely wonderful in her performance as the main character. She is able to show a lot of her emotions even though she can’t utter a single word, and there’s one specific scene where I was really impressed with her performance.

As much as I am heaping praise upon praise on this movie, I ended up not really liking it. That all comes down to one thing: this movie made me uncomfortable. I understand that it’s basically like a Beauty and the Beast type movie for adults, but a lot of the scenes made me uncomfortable watching. Many of the antagonists are very one-dimensional, and similar to my review of characters in Three Billboards, they are very much caricatures of stereotypical characters. It was hard for me to buy into the romance between Sally Hawkins and the fish man, mostly due to the animalistic nature of the fish. It was difficult to be invested in both characters, even though Sally Hawkins was fantastic in her role.

I very much wanted to like this film. It’s beautifully directed and created, but I couldn’t buy into the story or the characters. It’s a bit too preachy at times, but ultimately the main thing was that I felt uneasy during most of the movie. The story is really out there and didn’t do it for me. I think some people will absolutely love this movie because they will love the romance between the two, but I just couldn’t get into it. However, I’m glad to see that GDT is always doing his thing and continues to make unique and original movies. I look forward to seeing what’s in store for him next.

Grade: C/62

“Star Wars: Episode VIII: The Last Jedi” Review

Woops, a bit late to the party reviewing this one. While I assume that everyone on the planet has already seen this movie, I’ll continue to refrain from spoiling the movie and give a broad review of my impressions.

Never in my life could I imagine a post-Disney acquisition Star Wars movie be so divided amongst fans. Critics praise this movie as the next best Star Wars since Empire Strikes Back (a title they also gave to The Force Awakens), yet the average moviegoer and die-hard fan outright hated this movie.

Based on what I was hearing among my friends, I found that the people who disliked the movie the most were people who were big fans of the franchise. I personally do not have a deep attachment to Star Wars, although I definitely preferred it over Star Trek as a kid. I felt like my neutral stance on the franchise would help me enjoy the movie more, because of all this talk about how The Last Jedi “betrayed the franchise.” I went in with utmost curiosity and undecided expectations. I watched The Last Jedi the Monday after opening weekend, and it took me until now to write my review because…well…I didn’t much care for it at all.

Let me get one thing straight: this movie is nowhere near as bad as the fans made it out to be. The fact that this movie has a 52% on RT from the users is kind of baffling to me. I’ve definitely seen worse movies this year that did not have any rating as low as The Last Jedi. However, this movie also definitely does not deserve the high amount of praise that the critics are giving it. I guess I’m in the middle of the road when it comes to this movie, although slightly leaning more towards agreeing with the fans. I didn’t think this movie was very good. At this point, I’m glad I held off on writing this review because so many articles have been written ad nauseam about the pros and cons of the movie, so I can just briefly go over it. I didn’t like the plot; I felt like it went nowhere, and I felt like Disney couldn’t help themselves but “Marvel-ize” the movie. There were so many untimely jokes from characters who typically wouldn’t say something humorous, so many unnecessary one-liners, and so many attempts to shift back and forth between serious and light-hearted. Some movies can make it work, but this one definitely did not.

I also felt like this movie was a 2.5 hour long Dragon Ball Z episode. Random people get random powers that the average Star Wars moviegoer wouldn’t understand, and things just happen to progress with no reasoning behind it. I’m normally the type of viewer to look past plot holes and not nitpick; I feel like it’s a waste of time and I’d rather have the director tell me a story without me trying to actively deconstruct everything. However, I definitely felt like there were some plot holes in this movie that were unavoidably noticeable.

My biggest criticism is very similar to my biggest praise for this movie. The one thing I always knock Disney for is that they always play it safe with their movies. When it comes to Marvel movies or The Force Awakens, Disney naturally finds that playing it safe will be the most profitable, and that it’d be better for them to make money with most people having been fed their fan service than do something daring and creatively bold. That’s the one thing I really admire about The Last Jedi. Rian Johnson really laid it all out with this movie, and subverted a lot of fan expectations by drastically changing up the story. That definitely led to the huge backlash from fans, but the fact that Disney signed off on it made me wonder if there’s a space in Disney’s catalogue of franchises to do more bold things like this in the future (which will remain to be seen seeing the strong negative reaction from fans). However, I ultimately wasn’t a fan of most of those decisions because I felt like they didn’t strengthen the story. My biggest criticism was that Johnson established a lot of really interesting themes with this movie, but in the end ultimately backpedaled on a lot of them and try to make it somewhat familiar with Disney’s formula for movies. They definitely should have doubled down on a lot of the things they introduce in the movie, but the slight backtracking near the end made me a bit disappointed.

Overall, this isn’t a great movie. I wouldn’t even say it’s good. I can see how people would like it though, and that’s fine. Again, I think it deserved an unrealistic amount of praise and criticism from both sides, but ultimately what came of it was a mediocre, middle of the road film. Some of my friends had drastically changed opinions upon further rewatches, but I have zero intentions on rewatching this movie again.

Grade: C+/66

“The Disaster Artist” Review

“Oh hai Mark.”

These were the words from a film that eventually spawned a massive cult following. Decades later, people are still watching The Room religiously, a film that has been given the honorable title of the Best Worst Movie Ever. I had the privilege of watching this with some of my friends for the first time a few weeks ago to prep for The Disaster Artist, and I can indeed confirm that it is the Best Worst Movie Ever. There is a tangible charm and passion put into this movie, even though it has such terrible writing and acting. It’s simultaneously hard to watch and to look away from, and whether or not it was Tommy Wiseau’s intention to create a comedic masterpiece, it’s here to stay.

Because of its legacy, we have been given the gift of an adaptation from the book with the same title, The Disaster Artist. This movie highlights the making of The Room along with the growing friendship between Tommy Wiseau and his friend Greg Sestero. There has been some debate as to how accurate the book describes the making of The Room, as Tommy Wiseau originally said it was 40% accurate and then saying it was 99.9% accurate; but nevertheless it was interesting to see just exactly what the heck was going on in the making of such a crazy film.

James Franco, who directs and stars as the enigmatic and alienish Tommy Wiseau, does a fantastic job here. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if he gets an Oscar nomination. He has all of Wiseau’s weird mannerisms and accent down, and he is constantly entertaining whenever he is on screen. Tommy’s friend Greg, played by Franco’s brother Dave Franco, does a decent job as well. There were some parts where I felt like his acting felt kind of bad, but I couldn’t tell if it was intentional because the character he’s playing is a bad actor or not. Either way, it wasn’t outright distracting but his acting did fall flat sometimes. Alison Brie (who I absolutely adore) plays Dave Franco’s girlfriend in the movie, but kind of pops in and out of the movie and doesn’t really add as much to the plot than I thought she would. I would have hoped for her to have a bit more of a role, or not be included in it at all. None of that really seems to matter in this movie, since Dave Franco really steals the spotlight and does a great job carrying the movie.

Making a movie like is definitely difficult in that there is a large expanse of things to cover. Because of that, the movie sometimes has to jump forward quickly thus making the pacing a bit rough at times. It wasn’t ever frustrating, but there were moments where I wish they had developed a bit more on a certain aspect of the story before going to the next part. It’s a minor critique, because it’s definitely hard to try and fit everything in a relatively short movie, clocking in at 1 hour and 43 minutes.

Movies about making movies are pretty rare to come by, so I think regardless of whether you found The Room to be absolutely agonizing to watch or utterly hilarious, it provides a very unique perspective on the moviemaking industry and how hard it is to get started. Beneath the outright hilarious movie is a heartwarming tale about friendship, pursuing your dreams and never giving up. It’s unexpectedly inspiring and really makes you both sympathize and cheer on Wiseau and Sestero. As much as I’d like to know how authentic the portrayal of the movie was to real-life events, it was all in all a very entertaining movie. For those of you who have not watched The Room, I’d recommend gathering a bunch of friends together and enjoying how good/bad it is. It’s not necessary to watch it before The Disaster Artist, but it’ll make you appreciate some of the jokes a lot more.

Grade: B+/81

“Logan Lucky” Review

Director Steven Soderbergh returns from his brief retirement from filmmaking with Logan Lucky, a movie that is very similar to the films that made him popular, the Ocean’s Trilogy.

Based on all of the movie news websites that I follow, everyone seems to really love Soderbergh’s work, more so than other directors. I’m not entirely sure where this infatuation comes from, but I certainly haven’t seen enough of his work to really make a well informed opinion on it. I’ve enjoyed all of the movies that he has directed, and that sentiment is the same with Logan Lucky. I noticed that there’s kind of a disparity between critics and regular moviegoers on this movie, in that critics absolutely loved this film, whereas everyone else thought that it was just okay or good. I think if you go in with the right expectations, it makes for a really fun and entertaining movie.

The best way for me to describe Logan Lucky is that it’s the redneck version of Ocean’s Eleven. There’s an ambitious heist involved, and that heist requires the uniting of a bunch of misfits and quirky characters. The George Clooney/Brat Pitt Combo here is replaced with Channing Tatum and Adam Driver, who are brothers that have a history of doing heists together. Both actors have great performances and are equally goofy as they are charming. This was also probably my favorite role I’ve seen from Adam Driver. But when you talk about performances in this movie, you have to talk about Daniel Craig’s role in the movie. He is by far the star of the show, because of his incredibly weird accent that seems to shift between awesome and questionably bad at times. I loved his eccentric behavior and it really shows that Craig has a bright future after his time with the James Bond franchise is over. Riley Keough and the rest of the cast is great as well, as they bring a dysfunctional family dynamic that is both believable and funny.

As far as the movie goes, the first two acts are pretty much standard fare but very well done. It’s really the third act that is quite unconventional and unique, of which I will not reveal here. However, I will say that it has the potential to put some fans off, but I found it to be an interesting take on a heist movie. The characters in the movie really tie everything together, and was what kept me engaged throughout.

I think if you go into this movie with the expectation of having a good time and not listen to the critics’ insanely glowing reviews of this film, then chances are you’ll have a great time. I thoroughly enjoyed this movie and hope that they’ll return to these characters some time down the road.

Grade: B+/82