leebutler Action, Adventure, Review, Thriller

Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning – Part One (2023) – Mission Possible

Released: 8th July 2023
Seen: 29th January 2024

At this point, the Mission Impossible series exists for one reason and one reason only, to basically make the entire world believe that Tom Cruise is the most badass human being alive. Sure, there’s a story, espionage, action and comedy that appeals to the masses and delivers high-octane thrills as needed but its principal job at the moment is to help launder the image of a man whose entire life is so intertwined with the evil that is Scientology that he needs people to ignore that and focus on the cool stunts that he can perform. It’s kind of a neat trick because normally it works, normally Tom Cruise movies open so big and make such a splash that we talk about how he saved cinema or something like that. So what does it take for a Mission Impossible film to underperform like this one did? I mean, mostly it was just bad luck with the strikes and people not going to the movies as much but it’s also a case of diminishing returns.

Continue reading “Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning – Part One (2023) – Mission Possible” →
leebutler Documentary, Netflix, Review

The Greatest Night In Pop (2023) – We Are In Awe

Released: 29th January
Seen: 29th January

In 1985, one of the most undeniably iconic images in pop culture was created in the middle of the night, just after the American Music Awards. That image was of the inside of a small recording studio in LA where 45 of the greatest musicians of the day (and also Dan Akroyd, for some reason) stood around a collection of microphones to sing a song to try and help world hunger. The image of these legends together is iconic, it’s been parodied dozens of times and earnestly recreated almost as many. The song that came from that legendary night is one of the highest-selling songs of all time, taking in millions to try and help those in need, while also being truly inescapable for decades to go. There was never anything quite like We Are The World and there will probably never be anything like it again, and the documentary The Greatest Night In Pop makes it clear how the song’s existence is something of a minor miracle.

Continue reading “The Greatest Night In Pop (2023) – We Are In Awe” →
leebutler Action, Comedy, Review

Role Play (2024) – Playtimes Over

Released: 12th January
Seen: 25th January

Role Play Info

A simple concept done well will almost always be a recipe for a great time in a film, at least in terms of a film that can be easily enjoyed by the masses and provides a solid hour and a half of entertainment. You don’t need major stars or fancy locations or anything like that, just a simple idea that can provide a good thrill ride for a few hours. If done well you can make something magical, but if done wrong then it feels like you failed at doing something so incredibly basic that the only rational response is to point and laugh at the failure… but in the case of Role Play, that would imply that there was something funny going on and that just doesn’t seem to happen here.

Continue reading “Role Play (2024) – Playtimes Over” →
leebutler Biography, Biopic, Drama, History, Music, Review, Romance

Maestro (2023) – Play Me Off

Released: 20th December 2023
Seen: 15th January 2024

With the Oscar nominations being announced just a few days ago, the time has come to tackle the annual tradition of playing catch-up on every nominated film that I somehow managed to miss throughout the year. Sometimes a film just isn’t released down here before the nominations (That’s happening with over a dozen films that I could see), sometimes a film is released but falls past the radar of must-see (how the hell was I meant to know that The Creator would be an Oscar nominee) and sometimes a film just seems like it’s going to be something I’m going to hate trying to review and because this is an unpaid hobby I avoid it until absolutely required… my dislike of biopics put Maestro firmly in that category and while I can admit it’s great, it’s still not my cup of tea.

Continue reading “Maestro (2023) – Play Me Off” →
leebutler Comedy, Drama, Review, Romance, Sci-Fi

Poor Things (2024) – RICH!

Released: 18th January
Seen: 23rd January

Yorgos Lanthimos is one of those directors who you can guarantee will deliver a film that’s so different from everything else in the cinema that it’s hard to describe it as anything other than “A Yorgos Lanthimos Film”. Even when he does something close to a regular period piece like in his last film The Favourite there is something just beneath the surface that creates a strange experience. He’s one of those filmmakers that we’re lucky to have because he keeps things interesting and allows the audiences who see his work to experience something truly unique. Once again, with his latest film Poor Things, Yorgos has delivered something truly fascinating to behold.

Continue reading “Poor Things (2024) – RICH!” →
leebutler Comedy, Drama, Review

The Holdovers (2024) – Hold On

Released: 11th January
Seen: 17th January

Making an original Christmas film is an art that seems to be lost. Sure every year there’s the requisite retellings of A Christmas Carol that everyone tries to tell but an actual enjoyable film that captures a Christmas spirit is hard to come by. The last truly great one that I can think of might be Violent Night, which falls into that category of “What if we took something wholesome and made it say fuck while it bled out”, it’s just not easy to pull off but when you can make something that captures a very specific element of the Christmas season you get something kind of special, and The Holdovers definitely captures something kind of special.

Continue reading “The Holdovers (2024) – Hold On” →
leebutler Horror, Review, Thriller

Night Swim (2024) – Sinking Feeling

Released: 4th January
Seen: 16th January

A big discussion that’s been going on lately concerns film length, how films nowadays seem unable to be under 2 hours and how a lot of films that go for 3 hours or more don’t really need to waste that amount of audience time. What this whole issue comes down to is the idea that certain stories only really need a certain amount of time to tell them properly, Some films need 3 hours to explore every little crevice of their story, others can handle the story in 90 minutes. Then there are short films that often prove how effective they can be with only a couple of minutes, there’s even an entire channel dedicated to films that only last for 5 seconds long because that’s all they need to get the job done… Night Swim is one of those films that probably should’ve stuck to being a short 4-minute film instead of trying to take its general idea and stretch it forcibly into 100 minutes.

Continue reading “Night Swim (2024) – Sinking Feeling” →
leebutler Comedy, Horror, Review

Destroy All Neighbors (2024) – There Goes The Neighborhood

Released: 12th January
Seen: 15th January

At the start of this year, I put up a list of the best films of 2023 and top of that list was something called Cocaine Bear, a film that to this day delights me with its simple direct fun. Honestly half the time I go see a movie that’s what I go for, something that’s just uncomplicated fun that can be enjoyed without much thought at all. Horror comedies tend to be probably the best genre for doing this because often they are so heightened in their stupidity that even the average ones can be good enough for a fun time, especially when they embrace their own insanity and do something unexpected. This is why Destroy All Neighbors is such an enjoyable time, although it probably isn’t going to end up topping this year’s best list.

Continue reading “Destroy All Neighbors (2024) – There Goes The Neighborhood” →
leebutler Action, Comedy, Crime, Drama, Netflix, Review, Thriller

Lift (2024) – Drop It

Released: 12th January
Seen: 15th January

Lift Info

It’s become something of a joke lately that Netflix keeps producing so many films that they can’t even properly advertise them all, but it’s also probably for the best that they don’t because a lot of them are strangely forgettable garbage that’s just kind of created so that Netflix has a library of films that will never be taken away from them. What’s weird about this is that Netflix spends an absolutely jaw-dropping amount on films that, at best, will spend an eternity sitting in their digital library where they aren’t really designed to turn a profit. These are blockbusters that are made without the intention of getting blockbuster profits, a strange phenomenon that would maybe be OK if it led to fun enjoyable films… but it doesn’t, it leads to content like Lift. 

Continue reading “Lift (2024) – Drop It” →
leebutler Drama, Review

Society Of The Snow (2024) – We Live In A Snowciety

Released: 4th January
Seen: 7th January

In 1972 the Old Christians Club rugby union team boarded a plane in Uruguay, along with several family members and supporters, with the intent of getting to Chile to compete against an English rugby team. Part of this flight required a trip over the Andes mountain ranges, a trip that in normal conditions would be perfectly doable but the weather was bad enough to make it impossible to see. The details of how the crash happened are far too complicated to put in the opening paragraph of a film review but the core point is that the plane crashed in the snow-covered mountains, the 45 passengers and crew on board were effectively lost in the snow and debris. 

Continue reading “Society Of The Snow (2024) – We Live In A Snowciety” →