Film – Page 37 – Movie Meister Reviews

July 17, 2022July 22, 2022 leebutler Review

The Black Phone (2022) – Call Me Anytime

Released: 30th June
Seen: 17th July

In 2005 Joe Hill, son of Stephen King released a series of short stories in a book titled 20th Century Ghosts. One of the stories contained in that book was a little something called The Black Phone, a ghost story involving a basement, a boy and a phone (the plot will be detailed a later paragraph, we’ve got a formula around here and we’re sticking to it) and it had quite the impact, being the first collection of stories Joe Hill released which proved that he inherited his father’s ability to terrify.

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July 15, 2022July 22, 2022 leebutler Review

Blacklight (2022) – Uggh

Released: 10th February
Seen: 14th July

Liam Neeson needs to be stopped, with his latet release Blacklight he has officially worn out his charm as an action star and needs to either take a break or just stop entirely if possible. At one point he was charming as the older lead of an action film, Taken and its immediate sequels were exciting and clever enough that they worked no matter who was in them but the fact it was someone as talented and charismatic as Liam Neeson elevated it. Then he started slipping and just repeating the formula with films like Honest Thief or The Commuter, films that leaned so heavily on Liam’s charm that it was almost inevitable that we’d hit this point. The point where it’s just impossible to give a damn… even if the plot isn’t just another spin on the Taken formula, there’s no more fucks to give.

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July 14, 2022August 14, 2022 leebutler Review

Fire Island (2022) – Party Time

Released: 14th June
Seen: 12th July

Fire Island is a little island just off the coast of Long Island in the state of New York and for decades now it’s been known as a gay hotspot. This little stretch of land is legendary in the gay community for its tea dances (afternoon teas designed for single gay men to meet up in the days when homosexuality was illegal) and its wild nightlife. If there is a long-running show that features gay characters, the odds are good that they will at some point mention Fire Island. Honestly the fact that it’s taken until now for a significant gay comedy that takes place on Fire Island is kind of astounding in itself but now we have one and it’s delightful.

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July 13, 2022August 15, 2022 leebutler Review

Elvis (2022) – Set My Soul On Fire

Released: 23rd June
Seen: 12th July

For years now there has been a conspiracy theory that Elvis Presley isn’t dead. The story goes that Elvis grew tired of fame and of his exhausting schedule and so he faked his own death and went off to live as a normal person. People claim to see him in coffee shops, he works in a little cafe in the middle of the desert, people just see Elvis all the time. I have never subscribed to this theory, I firmly believed for years that Elvis Aaron Presley died on August 16,1977 in his home in Memphis… now I might have to question that because Austin Butler might just be the pseudonym that Elvis chose to perform under one last time.

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July 12, 2022August 15, 2022 leebutler Review

The Lost City (2022) – A Cracking Adventure

Released: 31st March
Seen: 11th July

One of the classic kinds of films we don’t get enough of is the romantic action adventure. You know the kind, films where a guy and girl randomly go to some far off land to try and hunt for some treasure, they exchange witty banter and eventually fall in love all while dealing with some overly hammy villain that’s there purely to raise the stakes. Classics like Romancing the Stone or The Mummy (the 1999 one) are great examples of this style of film. They were fun, over the top, clever and just seem to have fallen by the wayside lately. Well, thank goodness that The Lost City brought them back because they have been sorely missed.

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July 10, 2022August 15, 2022 leebutler Review

Ida Lupino: Gentlemen & Miss Lupino (2021) – Watch This For Mother

Ida Lupino: Gentlemen & Miss Lupino was seen as part of the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival

Ida Lupino: Gentlemen & Miss Lupino Info

In the history of film, there have only been 3 women who have won the Oscar for best director. Only 3, and all of those have been within the last 12 years. This isn’t shocking when you realise that, due to rampant sexism, women haven’t really been able to get a chance to be directors since pretty much the invention of the studio system. Indeed there was a period in the 40s and 50s where there was precisely 1 female director who was a part of the directors’ guild, that singular sensation being the legendary Ida Lupino, the woman who is the central focus of the documentary Ida Lupino: Gentlemen & Miss Lupino (the film taking it’s subtitle from the greeting given at the start of directors’ guild meetings because the room would be full of hundreds of male directors and Ida Lupino)

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July 9, 2022August 15, 2022 leebutler Review

Ice Ice Baby – Hip Hop’s 1st Global #1 (2022) – Stop, Collaborate and Listen

Ice Ice Baby – Hip Hop’s 1st Global #1 was seen as part of the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival

In 1990 the single Play That Funky Music by an unknown rapper known as Vanilla Ice was released to almost no real fanfare, the song just washed over a mass audience who didn’t really care for the attempted cover version of a legendary Funk Rock classic. This would’ve probably been the extent of the Vanilla Ice story were it not for one radio disc jockey named David Morales who decided to play the B side of the record.

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July 8, 2022July 22, 2022 leebutler Review

The Bad Guys (2022) – Duh!

Released: 31st March
Seen: 5th July

It’s been a while since there’s been an entertaining crime caper film out, the last one that leaps out to memory would probably be The Gentlemen and the vast majority of films in that genre tend to fall under the adult rating. Let’s be honest, you’re not going to get your entire family to sit through Oceans 8 or Reservoir Dogs. So it’s nice to see that there are some family-oriented crime capers out there that can deliver on everything people love about the genre without alienating the little ones… plus the fact that all the characters are hilarious anthropomorphized animals in suits and gorgeous gowns is a bonus.

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July 7, 2022July 22, 2022 leebutler Review

Thor: Love and Thunder (2022) – Another!

Released: 6th July
Seen: 6th July

The Thor movies are possibly the franchise in the MCU that’s had the weirdest trajectory. The first Thor movie was fine, a Shakespearean epic that was helmed by Kenneth Branagh who clearly leaned into the overly dramatic elements (quite literally leaning in with half the shots being Dutch angles), the second Thor movie is widely considered one of the worst of the MCU and kind of felt like it would be the end of the Thor movies as we know them… and then out came Ragnarok with its bold colour palette and love of 70s heavy metal music, turning Thor from the insanely serious character he’d been up to that point into a jovial jokester frat bro that everyone came to love. Since Ragnarok went so well, thanks in large part to the work of writer/director Taika Waititi, Thor: Love and Thunder decides to just take what worked about Ragnarok and do it all again. It’s not a bad plan but there are some diminishing returns.

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July 6, 2022 leebutler Review

Lightyear (2022) – To Infinity And Beyond-ish

Released: 16th June
Seen: 4th July

In 1995 the film Toy Story was released and began what can only be called a revolution in what an animated film could look like. It was truly the first of its kind, a feature-length 3D animated film that effectively marked a moment where the medium itself changed forever. That sweet funny little film about a bunch of toys who came to life will go down in history as a landmark film, showing the potential of the 3D animated technology that was so new at the time.

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