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Booksmart (2019) – Brilliant

Released: 11th July
Seen: 24th July

20 years ago, the coming of age comedy American Pie hit cinemas. While it wasn’t the first movie to be about a bunch of teenagers deciding to reach some form of major milestone before graduation, it was certainly the one that everyone thinks of when it comes to modern teen sex comedies. Every one since has followed the basic premise of a group of friends who believe that they need to do something big (usually have sex) before they go off to college where everything will be very different. Of course, on the way to accomplishing this big goal, these movies would then have a bunch of wacky adventures. It’s a formula that’s worked in films like Superbad and a myriad of straight to digital films that no one ever saw. The problem with these films is that some of them didn’t age well, and usually all focussed on guys wanting to have sex and turned the female characters into background features. So what if we took the basic story structure of these films, let women be the leads and maintained the comical vulgarity while also being progressive while we do it?

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The Lion King (2019) – The King Is Dead

Released: 17th July
Seen: 17th July

The first film that I have any memory of seeing in a cinema is the 1994 animated classic The Lion King. While my memory is a little sketchy (because I was 6) I still remember how enthralling it was, this glorious creation that was chock full of drama and laughs and bright glorious colours that just seemed to leap off the screen. I remember the legendary stampede and my mother crying at Mufasa’s death. Truly it was the film that started me on a journey to loving cinema and of all the movies that I could’ve seen as my first theatrical experience, I’m glad it was that one. Now, here we are, 25 years later and I’m angry and bitter and hate everything and have to watch as the first film I remember seeing is slowly sucked dry right before my eyes and all I’m left with is a withered husk of a film… I’m not going to be happy during this review, just so we’re clear.

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Stuber (2019) – Stupid… I know, I KNOW

Released: 11th July
Seen: 11th July

Did you know that the only reason that Reece’s Pieces are a thing right now is that they agreed to be a part of the movie E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial? Turns out that the producers of the film actually tried to get M&M’s but the Mars Company said no. I want it noted that by this point in history, Spielberg had made Jaws, Close Encounters and Raiders of the Lost Ark so saying no to him for this kind of deal should’ve probably ended in someone being fired. Anyway, Reece’s said yes, became a part of movie history and saw their sales skyrocket. Now, why am I reciting this well-known piece of history? Because I genuinely want to know exactly who the hell signed off on the use of Uber in this movie because I’m fairly confident that person used to work for the Mars company and was desperately trying to make amends and bet that a movie from the director of Fubar would be just as good as a movie by the director of Raiders. I want to meet this person, I’m sure they regret many decisions.

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After (2019) – 50 Shades Of Bland

Released: 4th July
Seen: 4th July

In April of 2013, Anna Todd released the first chapter of a story titled After onto the website Wattpad. Wattpad is a website known mostly for fan fiction and in Anna’s case, she was big into One Direction. This would prove to be good for Anna because One Direction was still really big at the time, indeed probably at the peak of their collective career. So this fanfiction would focus on Harry Styles, the heavily tattooed member of the well-loved boyband, and create a tale where Harry Styles was a college boy who broods and has a bit of a dark side to him who would end up falling for the sweet innocent Tessa. The book was a huge hit on Wattpad, netting half a billion reads for the 99 chapters of romance between a member of One Direction and some girl who could be you, dear reader. Now, there was a time when this would be the end of the story. The Fan Fiction would stay online, net the writer some credibility in the internet space and we’d never have to talk about it on this blog because it would be unfair to be incredibly critical towards fan fiction which is normally written by bored people with a few hours to kill and a little fantasy they want to imagine… but then After just had to go get turned into a book, change the name Harry Styles to Hardin Scott (for obvious legal reasons) and become enough of a hit that someone had to make a movie out of this book because if Fifty Shades could turn into a hit franchise, surely this one will be a major hit too.

*sigh*

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Annabelle Comes Home (2019) – No Dolls Allowed

Released: 26th June
Seen: 3rd July

The Conjuring universe never seems to know when to stop trying to grow. With seven movies out since 2013, the low budget horror series has become a staple of horror cinema and really resurrected the haunted house genre. It’s been stumbling a bit lately though, with last years The Nun making a lot of money but getting savaged critically (I was mostly OK with the film, but I was also really early into my critical phase) and thisyears The Curse Of La Llorona which not only did badly with critics but it’s the lowest earning film in the franchise. Sure, it still made over $100million on a budget of $9million but that movie is a sign that maybe this style of horror might not be working as well… it’s certainly getting to the point where we’re beginning to see the cracks in this franchise thanks to the repetition, which leads us nicely to Annabelle Comes Home.

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Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019) – My Peter Tingle Is… Tingling?

Released: 1st July
Seen: 1st July

STOP READING THIS REVIEW IF YOU HAVEN’T SEEN ENDGAME. Right now, if you haven’t seen it… well, tell me what it’s like under that rock of yours, and second go and see that movie so that you’re as caught up as you can get because we’re going to talk about major spoilers from that movie since they make up a large amount of the foundation for this one. Again, I’m going to make the assumption that from this point on you are officially caught up on the major events of Avengers: Endgame and that I can spoil that movie like it was milk left under hot lights in summer. OK, let’s do this.

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Child’s Play (2019) – This IS The End, Friend

Released: 20th June
Seen: 20th June

In 1988, a horror icon was born. Poking fun at the popularity of Cabbage Patch Dolls, Child’s Play showed us what would happen if one of those cherubic collectable toys ended up being possessed by a vicious serial killer who needed to put his soul into the body of a young child. The film was a box office success, pulling in around $44 million worldwide on a budget of only $9million. It spawned four theatrically released sequels and two VOD releases with the most recent one, Cult of Chucky, getting released two years ago. There’s also a TV series coming out on Syfy next year that’s currently being called Chucky and will bring back the legendary serial killing doll. It’s a series that has a loyal fan base who have followed the series from day one and it’s easily in my top 5 favourite horror franchises. I enjoy the series so much that I have even defended the much-maligned Seed of Chucky, which I still feel is an underrated gem that just happened to come out at the exact wrong time. Basically, the franchise is pretty much perfect as it is and doesn’t need a remake… but thanks to some fun legalese where the Child’s Play name isn’t owned by the creators of the franchise (because intellectual property law is fun and not at all pointlessly convoluted), MGM didn’t need to get permission to reboot the franchise that’s still alive and kicking and so now here we are with Child’s Play (2019)… because remakes of classic 80’s slashers never go horribly wrong, except for every single time they remake a classic 80’s slasher.

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Men in Black: International (2019) – Men In Blech

Released: 13th June
Seen: 18th June

In 1997, the earth was saved by the legendary Men in Black. It was a film that blew audiences and critics away with its elaborate effects, clever script and terrific leads. It destroyed the box office that year, only being beaten at the box office by the juggernaut that was Titanic and to this day there probably hasn’t been an alien comedy that could compete with it, not even its own sequels which just did worse and worse at the box office. The last one, Men in Black 3, was released 7 years ago to just above average critical praise and didn’t even make its budget back domestically so you would think that might be the sign to retire the black suits and move on… I mean, you might think that but then you remember that Hollywood is a sadistic bastard that enjoys flaying horses years after they’ve stopped neighing and so now we have Men In Black: International or as it probably should be known “Men In Black: Look, we hired the people from Thor: Ragnarok so that means we’re just as funny as Thor Ragnarok, right?” but I’m guessing that probably wouldn’t have fit on the poster.

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Trixie Mattel: Moving Parts (2019) – She’s the MVP heading up to bat

Seen: 17th June (Sydney Film Festival)

Possibly the most popular thing that I’ve ever done on this site would be the recaps of Drag Race. This doesn’t surprise me, that show is obscenely popular and the fans will read literally anything that has to do with their favourite show. While the show itself is now justifiably labelled a phenomenon, there are a few of the queens who have really taken what the show gave them (a platform to dive from) and used it to its full potential. Easily one of the most popular queens from Drag Race is the Barbie Doll-esque skinny legend herself, Trixie Mattel. Known for her big blonde hair, love of bright pink outfits and the darkest sense of humour that has ever come from someone wearing a giant pink wig and a pink Barbie doll dress. She has become an icon, a legend, a star the likes of which we’ve seen several times before but she does it while in heels and making jokes that would make George Carlin go “Bitch, too far”. She makes albums, she’s a Funko pop (which I own, no judging allowed) and now she has her very own documentary following her life on the road during a tumultuous time in her career.

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The Dead Don’t Die (2019) – Zombie Or Not Zombie

Released: 24th October (General Release)
Seen: 17th June (Sydney Film Festival)

It’s been said before, I shall say it again, there is no element of pop culture that has been used more often than the Zombie. Maybe Jesus has been used more often, but not by much. Everything nowadays has a zombie element to it. One of the most popular TV series right now is a Zombie show, every 4th game released has a zombie mode in it, you can buy zombie-shaped slippers for crying out loud. Zombies are everywhere nowadays and they’ve been done in so many ways that a truly original take on them is almost impossible to find. The last real original Zombie movie I saw was one called Anna and the Apocalypse; I never got around to reviewing that film but it was a Christmas Zombie Musical Comedy set in England and it’s every bit as glorious as that combination sounds. I bring that film up because it’s a great example of what happens when you have several film ideas (a Christmas film, a zombie film and a high school musical comedy) and make them work together. The Dead Don’t Die however is what happens when you have several film ideas, smash them together violently, hold them together with Scotch tape and present it as a complete work. Weirdly, it kind of works… kind of.

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