Joy Ride (2023) [review]

Friday, 7 July 2023 StarrLeave a comment

It’s been an exciting time for Asian representation in Hollywood cinema. We’ve been seeing more actors of Asian descent portray more types of characters than past decades have chosen to depict, and we’re getting to recognize a much larger number of familiar Asian faces portraying them as well!

A few months ago, I was invited to an early press screening for Joy Ride, the upcoming directorial debut from Adele Lim, who has previously written for Crazy Rich Asians and Raya and the Last Dragon. The trailer first crossed my social media feed via this tweet from Phil Yu, aka Angry Asian Man:

Fuck yeah! JOY RIDE. I am absolutely here for the Asian American women-led raunchy comedy. pic.twitter.com/mWLfK5xuwc
— Phil Yu (@angryasianman) March 17, 2023

I don’t usually seek out raunchy comedies, but modern entries in the genre have been getting really fun with this nugget of an emotional core that has been increasingly better-executed than past generations. To see one led by an all-Asian and all-woman cast is really exciting, and the trailer looked funny! Would we get something like Girls Trip for millennial Asians?

TL;DR Yes! Joy Ride is such a fun ride from start to finish. It is packed with laughs, save a beat at the end where we explore its emotional core to incredible success, and manages to avoid relying on Asian-American comedy tropes that have become tired.

This cast is stellar, and I was so excited about the cameo appearances from other Asian actors who I recognized from Marvel, a favorite HBO show, Crazy Rich Asians, and more. In a time when there is validity to the complaint that certain Asian actors become popular and get cast in “everything” or will often appear in movies and TV shows together, it’s really nice to see just how many Asian characters we have been getting recently in movies and TV and the increased diversity in just the casting of these characters. And don’t worry, with 2 Broadway musical actresses in main cast, we do indeed get a bonkers musical number.

Honestly, I went into this movie thinking it would be a pretty shallow roadtrip movie with some toilet humor and too many jokes about Asian diaspora that are overdone, in my opinion as someone who has been in the Asian culture space for a long time. But I was really pleasantly surprised that this movie managed to be so irreverently funny while still having a strong emotional core, touching on Asian-American identity in a way that felt fresher than I’ve seen in a while in addition to topics like internalized racism, cultural barriers, sex positivity, artistic expression, queer identity, family dynamics and expectations, and more. And it does so while still showing some truly unhinged moments that I could not believe my eyes at.

Also, if the think pieces and blog posts are any indication, many people only venture out to the movie theater for huge action movies and/or to avoid having a big franchise storyline spoiled during opening weekend. I had forgotten how much fun it is to watch a comedy with a full theater laughing together. I’ll admit you may get annoyed about not being able to hear some dialogue over particularly raucous laughter but it really enhances the experience when you’re able to let loose and laugh out loud at a comedy versus watching something alone and quietly. Plus, not only did my theater laugh out loud throughout much of the movie, but the emotional beat the end had many of us crying, with the sounds of sniffles and a “girl are you crying right now??” heard from all around me, a very unexpected surround sound experience to get from this movie.

Joy Ride is in theaters TODAY, July 7th. Spoilers below the jump if you’d like to read more thoughts~

Eternals (2021)

Sunday, 14 November 2021 StarrLeave a comment

I have to first confess something before I do my first movie review since… 2017? (Wait really??)

I have not been as interested in Marvel since Avengers: Endgame, which gave me an unreal amount of closure and finality.

You may be wondering if I have watched anything from the MCU since Endgame and the answer is yes, I’ve watched all the things since Endgame but Phase 4 hasn’t held much of my interest. I enjoyed WandaVision and The Falcoln and Winter Soldier and Loki and Shang-Chi (not so much Black Widow) but I’m not invested in this cinematic universe anymore.

So I’ll admit that I thought I was detached enough to not really need to see Eternals.
Until it seemed it would get spoiled for me, and I realized I wanted to see it enough to not want it to be spoiled. Whodathunk, this MCU sucker is still a sucker after all.

Before Eternals‘s release, there was a LOT of buzz. The auteur director fresh off her Oscar win! A star-studded and diverse cast! Including not one but two Stark brothers from Game of Thrones! It’s Phase 4 and we’re working in more comics material, aka things are getting weird! As soon as the hype started, the critiques started coming in, too. Before I bought a ticket, I was hearing a lot about how this movie got the lowest Rotten Tomatoes score of any MCU film ever, how the movie was just being review bombed by people who hate women directors and a diverse cast.

Well. I went to go see for myself. (No spoilers until after the trailer.)

I went in with quite low expectations, given all that I had heard, and came out of the theater thinking it was a decent Marvel movie. My main issue was that it was a bit too ambitious. Eternals is hardly connected to any previous MCU movie. Basically every mention of other Marvel characters or events is in a trailer: Thanos obliterating half of the universe and everyone being brought back, Captain America and Iron Man and the future leadership of the Avengers.

But otherwise, this movie felt like the start of something brand new, with many possibilities for sequels and spin-offs but little tying it to the pre-existing MCU. I don’t think seeing any of the past 12 years of Marvel movies will help you understand this one more. We are introduced to a lot of new characters, including 10 Eternals.

I mention this because with us being 13 years deep into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, building towards bigger and more integrated stories, Eternals felt unusual in that it focused on completely new-to-movie-audience characters, teased even more new characters by the end of the movie (including their infamous mid- and post-credit scenes), and focused on powers and stakes and settings that we have not really touched in any of the past movies or shows.

That being said, this movie had a strong emotional core. I think I cried… 3? times over the course of the film. (True, I cry very easily, but still! I usually don’t cry more than once or twice a movie.) Some early reviews said that this was the first Marvel movie to feature a romance as a primary plotline (versus the many… mediocre at best romances we’ve seen in the MCU) but I actually found the romance in Eternals underwhelming, especially when compared to the much more compelling family relationships between the 10 Eternals. 10 superpowered beings brought together on this messy planet of ours for millennia leads to some interesting dynamics that I enjoyed seeing play out.

My main critique of the movie is that it was too ambitious in what it tried to achieve in a single feature-length film. I’m still not too sure what each of the Eternals’ powers are? The plot was simple but not straightforward and could have used a lot more time to flesh out the stakes, the context, all of these brand new characters.

Speaking of these characters, I really did love how diverse this cast is! Lauren Ridoff, the deaf actor who plays the first deaf MCU superhero, and her standout performance as speedster Makarri have led to an increased interest in learning American Sign Language. Brian Tyree Henry and his character, Phastos, represent many things to many people, not least of all as a man who didn’t have to lose weight to be a superhero. Salma Hayek was moved to tears upon her own realization that her Ajak is a brown face in superhero suit on the screen. Gemma Chan and Kumail Nanjiani and Don Lee are representing Asian actors in ways that are still not yet often seen in Hollywood.

And I would be remiss if I didn’t mention how stunning this movie is. Marvel has cast many different directors with distinctive styles to helm their movies, and although I haven’t seen any of Chloé Zhao’s movies before, it had an immediately recognizable visual style that sets it apart from the rest of the MCU. To be honest, sometimes the visuals felt too grandiose, so as to almost feel unreal, almost fake, even though Zhao opted to shoot on location in lieu of green screen. At times, these beautiful visuals were distracting in how long the camera lingered on them. In a movie where time is scarce and we didn’t have enough time to get properly situated in the world of Eternals, some of the scenes felt too indulgent. Sure, the scenes are gorgeous, every frame a painting, but some of them don’t have enough substance to support them, in a film where we really needed a bit more support to this story.

Phase 4 is getting weird, folks. As we drift farther from the watered down, more palatable comic storylines of Phase 1 and into the cosmic, multiversal narratives, I’m curious to see how the next years of Marvel movies play out. I’m not sure I feel as invested as I was a few years ago before Thanos snapped half of the universe away, but it’ll be a fun ride.

Marvel Studios’ trailer for Eternals

The Dark Tower (2017) | review

Friday, 4 August 2017Thursday, 3 August 2017 StarrLeave a comment

Thanks to The City Vault for sending me to this early screening!

Note: I have not read the The Dark Tower book series, nor have I seen… any Stephen King movie? Or read any of his books? (Horror is not my thing. I am a scaredy cat.)

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There has been SO MUCH HYPE for this much-beloved epic book series to come to life on the big screen, but there has also been so much strife for this film to actually come to fruition. Stephen King fans have been waiting with bated breath for a movie that they knew could never match the fantastical world crafted over nine books that is the link between all of King’s other novels.

the-dark-tower-overlook — Recognize the hotel in the picture frame?

To put it in perspective for people unfamiliar with the source material: You know how there are theories that say things like all Pixar movies are in the same universe? That’s what The Dark Tower is to Stephen King novels, on a Lord of the Rings-esque scale. So… it’s a big a** deal.

The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.

I learned that The Dark Tower movie is meant to be a sequel/continuation of the books, so fans who are expecting a faithful adaptation of the Gunslinger book will be disappointed. There is no man in black fleeing across the desert to open the movie; that war is done when the film begins.

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The Gunslinger (Idris Elba) is the standout star of this film. He channels so much of that Man With No Name energy that Stephen King based the character on with this immense gravitas in his eyes and his voice and his posture. And while it’s obvious, it is very worth mentioning how freaking cool he is with his forged-from-Excalibur guns.

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I’m sure the books have a lot more backstory on Roland, the last of the Gunslingers, but we don’t really know what his deal is in the movie. Why is he the last? What do you mean guns forged from King Arthur’s Excalibur? Why is he able to resist the Man in Black’s magics, and why is this not a bigger mystery to either of them?

Gunslinger's no look shot — I just really love Idris Elba, okay, he deserves more, always

Speaking of the Man in Black, Matthew McConaughey plays the villain I never knew I wanted him to be all these years of watching his career grow from the rom-coms I loved him in to an Oscar-winning actor. He has this eerie stillness to him, a complete control of the situation, and a psychopathic way of getting in people’s heads while having zero empathy for them.

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Despite all of that, the Man in Black in The Dark Tower falls victim to the same fate as many blockbuster movie villains: A poorly fleshed out motive and a, there, uncompelling foil to our protagonists. Walter (as his real name is, apparently) is this all-powerful man with at least hundreds of minions at his fingertips. He has magic that allows hims to stop bullets and tell people to stop breathing and do some straight-up Matrix-type stuff. But why? Why does he want the Dark Tower to fall? Why does he want to allow hellish creatures into the universe? And my personal beef when it comes to magical powers is always: What is the limit of these powers? (Still mad about Elsa’s vague but frighteningly limitless ice powers…)

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Tom Taylor‘s Jake Chambers showed a lot of very real emotions for the anchor of this story: he’s frustrated that no one is taking his dreams seriously, he’s mad at his stepfather for wanting to send him away to get help, he’s terrified of the monsters in his dreams coming after him in real life, he’s disappointed that even the heroes of his dreams aren’t what he expected, he’s sad about having lost his father.

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Unfortunately, with Jake, we are literally only TOLD that he has great powers, but we really aren’t shown this. Before he crosses through a portal, he has to fight off some kind of demon in the woodwork of the house and, apparently, the reason he is able to do so is because he has mega-strong psychic abilities? But we see no real indication of this until we’re told that he has these powers. It’s not like Harry Potter talking to a snake or Anakin Skywalker using the Force to win a race. We really don’t get an inkling here, and it’s a rather big failure to show, not tell by the movie, since it is the reason that Jake is important as a character in the context of the events of this story!

TL;DR The movie falls short of the epic potential it promises, and does some strange and unnecessary showing without telling. (Indicative of some strange editing decisions, maybe?) It also leans a bit too much on the fish-out-of-water humor to get by. It’s still a good time to watch, but I don’t feel compelled to watch a sequel or even the potential TV show to come based on this film.

But it is a lot of fun to watch Idris Elba and his revolvers.

The Dark Tower is in theaters today. Spoilers below the trailer.

A Family Man (2017)

Friday, 28 July 2017Thursday, 27 July 2017 StarrLeave a comment

A version of this review originally appeared on Punch Drunk Critics.

A Family Man movie poster

I never know quite what to expect when I watch a Gerard Butler movie. He’s been an opera phantom, a Spartan king, a Secret Service agent…
I do, however, know almost exactly what to expect when I watch a movie about a man struggling to balance his work life and his family life.

There’s nothing wrong with A Family Man. It’s just that it’s pretty predictable: Dane Jensen (Gerard Butler) is a headhunter, the kind that has become very successful by occasionally treating ethics like suggestions and being on his phone all the time. It’s a character we’ve seen before, in this type of movie, and from Gerard Butler, where he is a bit of a douche-bro gunning to run the company when his ruthless boss, Ed Blackridge (Willem Dafoe) announces his retirement. Despite us seeing that he does care for his family, we are introduced to his dynamic with his oldest son via telling him to run with him on account of getting fat. The kid is in elementary school.

As it turns out, Ryan (Maxwell Jenkins) isn’t getting fat; he has cancer. The timing is unbelievably inconvenient for Dane, who is competing with equally ambitious Lynn (Alison Brie) for the top spot at work. Despite how tired it is to watch a dad fail at juggling increased responsibilities at work with his increased responsibilities at home, Jenkins really shined as little Ryan, who wants to be an architect. My favorite scenes are the ones of Butler and Jenkins exploring Chicago architecture together, quietly enjoying iconic buildings together. These moments are really sweet and really help to draw you in emotionally as a viewer.

Again, there’s nothing particularly wrong with the story or the movie, but I had a few issues with it. First, Alison Brie’s talent is basically completely wasted. I don’t know if her scenes were cut from the final edit of the movie, but she is hardly in it. You have to assume that Lynn is also very ambitious only because she is the person competing with Dane for Ed’s job, but we don’t really see any sign of her ambition. All we know is that her opinion of Dane and his team of bros is fairly low because of their sketchy methods, although she does admit that Dane is the hardest worker at the firm. Willem Dafoe also didn’t have very much screen time, but he was able to do a lot with the little that he had because his character was simply written to be a much more dynamic and to have more weight in his scenes. It just seemed like a really big waste of Alison Brie.

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Second, the movie is just too long. There is really no need for this story, which has been done so many times and doesn’t really bring anything new to it, to be a nearly 2-hour picture. The pacing itself was actually fine, I didn’t feel it dragged too much at any point, but it could’ve been snappier. Maybe it’s the movie forgot about the great acting talents it had in Brie, Molina, and Dafoe and tried to shoehorn them in. While I love those actors, I don’t think the overall story would have suffered very much without them, and that’s pretty unfortunate.

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Third, and this is a personal grievance, but I felt tricked by this movie because I thought something VERY SAD had happened but it wasn’t quite what I was led to believe. I was so relieved through my TEARS because I only had set so many feels aside for this movie, so this moment really went deep into the reserves, and then it turned out I misunderstood the whole scene. Watch and let me know if you felt similarly emotionally manipulated or if I am just foolish (and salty).

The performances from the cast are really quite good considering the kind of overdone premise, and the beautiful scenes of father and son admiring architecture together are enough to make you want to visit Chicago in person to see it all for yourself. I just wish there was a little more of what was lacking and a little less of what we have more than enough of in theaters these days.

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A Family Man comes out in US theaters today, June 28.

Baby Driver (2017) + Edgar Wright Q&A

Tuesday, 27 June 2017 StarrLeave a comment

Thanks to Sony Screenings for allowing me to see Baby Driver before its release and to Edgar Wright for a great Q&A session afterwards!

Movie poster for Baby Driver starring Ansel Elgort, Kevin Spacey, Lily James, Eiza Gonzalez Jon Hamm, Jamie Foxx

A few weeks ago, I was able to attend a really special advanced screening for Edgar Wright‘s latest film, Baby Driver, made special because the director himself was available afterward to answer questions! I’ll go into more detail about the Q&A after I talk about the movie itself (spoiler alert: Jake Tapper moderated!) so let’s get right into it!

Honestly, the reason this movie was on my radar was because I follow Ansel Elgort on Instagram and he promoted the movie. When Ben and I first saw the trailer, I was like “???” and Ben was very interested until the title appeared on the screen, at which point he went, “Aw, what, the title is Baby Driver are you serious I wanted to watch this movie, too…”

Baby Driver is about a getaway driver named… Baby, and he’s played by Ansel Elgort, whose incredible charm I had somehow underestimated despite following him on social media. (The boy has a great smile.) He listens to music on a variety of iPods virtually constantly because the car accident that killed his parents also left him with debilitating tinnitus – the permanent ringing in the ears that, in some people, can drive folks mad. He helps Kevin Spacey‘s Doc drive in his various heists because he owes Doc money from stealing from him in the past. The other members of the heist crews always change, leading Baby to meet characters like Bats (Jamie Foxx), the batsh*t crazy one eager for a fight, Buddy (Jon Hamm), the cool and easy-going one who is in love with Darling (Eiza González), the beautiful and troublemaking member of the lovebird duo.

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I’ll just say outright that the story and its progression are just okay, but it is very easy to forgive because this movie is not a movie.
It is an incredibly fun, nearly 2-hour-long, beautifully-styled music video.

Baby getting ready to drive in Baby Driver

The movie does not exist without the soundtrack. We listen to whatever Baby is listening to and that frames our experience of the film, just as it frames Baby’s experience. There’s a great one-take long-shot of Baby walking down the street to get coffee while listening to music, but of course, and the sounds in the background begin to sync up with the instrumentals and beat of Bob & Earl’s “Harlem Shuffle”. During the Q&A, I actually learned that this scene is a bit of a lyric video, where the lyrics of the song playing can be seen in the background! I hadn’t noticed at all, but there is graffiti that shows the lyrics, and when Baby walks back over, the graffiti has already changed to reflect the new lyrics.

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That’s the way the entire movie feels. It is how the movie was written in fact: Edgar Wright listened to The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion’s “Bellbottoms” and imagined a car chase scene every time he listened to it, praying for years and years that it wouldn’t be used in a car chase scene by another director before he could use it as the soundtrack for the opening heist scene.

Awesome car chase scene

The moments of the movie hit the beats of the songs. High-action moments come with high-action beats, and slower, more intimate moments are accompanied by slower jams.

So don’t get caught up in the dialogue. Don’t get caught up in “why would they do that”? Don’t get caught up in the things that usually break a movie.

This isn’t just a movie. It’s a highly-stylized, super fun series of music videos that tell a large story. And it was so much fun. And it was so well-done.