Terrible Plan! Movie Reviews

What I liked: Baby Groot is the best thing about this movies. If you have seen the trailer with the extended conversation between Rocket the raccoon and baby Groot about when to push the detonation button, you have seen the best of the movie and if you're pressed for time, can probably leave it at that. If you have more time you could expand your viewing to include the opening fight scene, with some pretty awesome alien smashing action, rainbows, and classic rock music, and the concluding fight scene, which involves baby Groot, explosions, and Pacman. If you really want to branch out you can watch a fight scene in the middle that mostly involves about 100 mercenaries being beaten by a raccoon in the woods. I liked that Rocky has moved on from his boxing career to being an intergalactic criminal, it really seems like a step up. I predict that in the next movie he will be the underdog in a boxing match with an alien and will make an incredible comeback to win. I liked that the bad ...

What I liked: For a movie based on what is in essence a fictional encyclopedia, this movie has a surprising amount of plot. Not great plot, but more than I usually get from reading an alphabetical reference book. I liked the dopey sidekick, his facial expressions were great and he was the only one who acknowledged that what happening on screen was not actually normal. I liked that the president led the tiny army of US wizards to their tiny battle in a subway. So as military victories go, this was not one for the history books, for many reasons. But it did lend more meaning to the phrase Commander in Chief. I felt like Dr Who was once again a bow tie wearing socially awkward guy who lives in a box that is bigger on the inside. Some of the creatures were cool but the CGI didn't quite make them alive. I liked the sloth monkey, I don't really know who it was or what it was doing but I would support a slothmonkey planet of the apes crossover. I like that the guy from SWAT has fina...

What I liked: There were lots of things to like. I like the Amazons. I like that they jump off cliffs and do flips and shoot 5 arrows at once. It does become rapidly apparent that they should upgrade their arsenal but doing flips with a mini gun is a) not a cool looking as doing flips with a sword and b) pretty dangerous. That's probably why the Terminator and the Punisher don't do flips. They just stand there. And they don't have fun split skirts. Yet. Wonder Woman has some pretty awesome fight scenes. My personal favorite involves her taking down a tank. The one at the end is bigger but the tank is cooler. I like the way they used her lasso of truth. It is a pretty effective interrogation tool but also quite handy in a fight and it doesn't look too cheesy. But possibly better than Wonder Woman's awesome fight scenes is her character. She is full of idealism and hope. The recent trend with superheroes is to humanize them by giving them massive character flaws. Wo...

What I liked: By far the best part of this movie is the zombie sharks. Undead vengeful pirates? I've seen those before. At the rate this franchise burns through them I think they must have gotten them at a wholesale closeout bargain. But zombie sharks, those are new. If they didn't smell so bad I bet more people would use them. I also liked the ghost pirate ship that ate other ships. It kind of looked exactly like this bug. I was impressed by the structural integrity of the bank at the beginning. Clearly the foundation was poorly constructed but whoever was responsible for the walls did a phenomenal job. I liked the visuals of the island of stars. There was a scene involving a revolving guillotine which had some funny imagery. Admittedly nothing about that sentence sounds amusing, but just trust me. What I didn't: I went to see this movie with friends and had pretty low expectations for the 5th installment of a film franchise based on a 15 minute ride. My low expectatio...

What I liked: This was a great movie. The message is inspiring and important. The characters are delightful, more so because they are real people who accomplished real important things. They were relateable. All of the kids were adorable. Unlike Imitation Game which came across as a one man program, I felt like this movie did a good job of capturing the immensity of the efforts depicted: the space program and the civil rights movement. I laughed many times. I was touched by some of the moments. I unexpectedly found myself trying to explain the 1960's, segregation, and the civil rights movement in whispers to my Chinese roommate. This both emphasized the absurdity of the segregation laws and was a little unnerving. What I didn't: We got to the theater a little late so the only seats were in the front row. I wouldn't recommend watching it IMAX style. Once again this fits in the category of things that really never should have happene d so obviously I didn't like the pe...

What I liked: I liked the suspense, I liked the acting, I liked that I got to watch it. I liked that the captain was really good and took care of his crew. The pirates were terrifying but I also liked that the movie made them more than just scary, it worked for me more than the little bit of scene of the captain getting dropped off to go to the boat in the beginning. I thought they did a good job of conveying the Captain's shock at the end. I was glad when I looked up the main pirate actor and found that he was not actually as malnourished and terrifying as he looked in the movie. What I didn't: I am concerned about the boats fighting pirates with water cannons. I also am not sure what the crew's plan was if they caught up with the pirates' boat. The pirates weren't that clever, at the latest when the navy seals got on the radio the pirates should have known something was up. I didn't really care for the part where the Captain jumps in the water, it seemed very...

What I liked: What impressed me first about this movie was the really long shots. The camera zoomed around between rooms, up and over cars, and all over taking really long shots. That gave it a good feeling of being an on stage musical where your eye follows the movement of the action across the stage. The film's commitment to being a musical sky rocketed when it included a tap dance number. Followed by a random existential dance sequence. Most of the costuming at the beginning was clearly very musically too: bright colors, flippy skirts, bloomers. The story itself was fairly good and I thought they did a good job of capturing the decisions around making compromises and incremental progress toward one's dreams. The last song, the reprise of the piano solo that has been woven through the whole film, was really good and captured the feeling of what it if. I also really liked seeing the LA scenery I got to enjoy on my recent trip.  What I didn't: The commitment to full on musi...