Halloween kills

I was a big fan of Halloween 2018 and have been really excited for this film ever since. In fact, I decided to watch the entire franchise for the first time in anticipation and it definitely got me more excited for the film and as a result, I thought this was a good but flawed film.

Starting with the positives, just like the first film, the best thing about this film is james Jude Courtney as Michael Myers. He is fantastic in portraying this evil killer. The way he walks, his presence, his brute force, he is the best portrayal of Michael Myers and seeing Michael Myers causing chaos and mayhem is such a delight. I also like his burnt disfigured mask.

The overall performances of the rest of the cast are really good as well. Now with how some of their characters are utilized, I will talk about that is a different section but the actors give a standout job. I also appreciate that this film brings back several original characters into the franchise.

Now there's one character I really want to talk about and that is Dylan Arnolds character Cameron. Now before in the last film he felt like a pretty meh character who I didn't care about and for whatever reason, the moment he appears in this film, he feels like better, more established character with a bit of an arc and that made me care about his character. He knew he did wrong in the last film and in this film, this is sort of like his redemption story and I enjoyed it. I'm not sure if I'm on an island with this thought but we'll see.

There's also several great flashback sequences that take place 40 years ago and it feels like it. The aesthetics, the camerawork, the way the characters talk and look, it feels like a sequence that was made in the 70s and part of me wonders of it was deleted footage from the original film. I don't know but if it's not, they did a great job at making that sequence.

Now let's talk about the big one. The kills!!! This film has some of the most creative and best kills I have seen in any slasher film but what I loved most about the kills is that it made me fear Michael Myers. I've never found Michael that scary of a character but after this film, I definitely fear him now. These kills are brutal and gory and make michael a force to be reckoned with.

And finally I do like the setup for the 3rd film and the possible direction they could take Michael in.

Moving onto the mixed aspects now and the big thing is this is Michaels movie. He gets the most screen time and is this films main focus. Now whilst I enjoyed that side of it, Michael isn't really an interesting character to watch for an entire film. We're just watching him kill people. Literally that's it. He's not got much of an arc, if he is with other people, it's not for long because they're dead after ten seconds so as this films main lead, he's more of an exciting villain than lead character.

Also I avoided all the trailers for this film and was surprised by a lot of what happened but I know some of the trailers revealed quite a lot so a lot of people may be disappointed or may find this film predictable.

Now let's talk about the negatives, the big problem with this film is ultimately it's a filler film. There's no overall story. There are plotlines and subplots but unlike the first film, there's no story or progression of plot. Instead it's essentially Michael stalking the streets killing people and yes you can argue it's a slasher film and whilst I did enjoy the slasher element, what made me love the first film was the story and this film has no story.

Another way the last film was so good was the characters. They helped the story and plot progress and unfortunately the characters in this film either barely any further development or are really badly utilized. Even the characters who are brought back are not used to the best they could have been. Instead they either have nothing to do or they make really bad decisions.

And that will bring us to my next negative: the decisions the characters make are incredibly frustrating to the point where you think they want Michael to kill them. Have these people never seen a horror film before? It really bugged me that so many characters decided one of the best to do is to split up. Even the characters who live together.

And finally the mob subplot I think was very poorly executed. I love the idea of it but execution is a big deal and it comes off as very cartoonish and goes in a direction that felt completely unnecessary but also has a big plothole within the plot.

But overall, I did enjoy this film. I heard reactions that this is one of or the worst Halloween film (clearly no one has seen Resurrection) and one of the worst films of the year and I think those claims are very exaggerated. For me, this is a middle of the road Halloween film that is not the best nor the worst. Just in the middle.

⭐⭐⭐

No Time To Die

I'm gonna confess, I am not a bond fan at all. In fact before I had no interest in seeing this film but I decided to eventually just for how hyped up it was so I watched all the Daniel Craig films to prepare for it and I'm gonna say it right now, I loved this film.

Kicking off with the positives, the best thing about this film is you feel it's a massive blockbuster spectacle filled with size and scope. This also feels like the blockbuster we have waited for this entire year and I kind of feel all the delays and anticipation worked in this film favour as it felt needed for the cinematic experience.

Moving right along, we've got to talk about Daniel Craigs performance and I think this is his best performance as James Bond. It's well documented Daniel Craig wasn't happy with the final result of Spectre which he originally intended to be his last film and I think you feel it in this film. He feels more committed to the role and more determined to appeal to the fans and within that, he gives his best and most versatile performance probably since Casino Royale.

The rest of the cast are really good. Rami Malek is a welcome addition to the franchise though I will have some further thoughts with his character, Lashana Lynch and Ana De Armas are also great additions to the cast and even some of the returning cast members are still as great and memorable as they were before.

As this is a james bond film, you've got to talk about the action and for me, I thought the action was fantastic and extremely versatile throughout the film. There's fights, gunfire, car chases and explosions all throughout and its great to watch. There's also a great one shot sequence during the 3rd act and that was impressive to watch. Some of the aesthetics during the action is also really well done. One scene has Bond surrounded by fog and avoiding gun shots and that scene was probably the most atmospheric sequence. Not only did you feel the tension but whilst being a wide open space, it feels very claustrophobic.

I also liked the location settings throughout the film as well. Not only are they beautiful to look at, they feel environmentally fitted for the action especially for the opening action sequence.

And for something different, I really liked some of the sound mixing for the film. An explosion happens and you hear muffled sound and ringing, you hear characters on coms with each other and you hear how distorted their voices are. It makes it more realistic for the context of the film.

There's also some nicely added humour that felt organic and never felt forced. This is probably the funniest of the Daniel Craig Bond films.

But finally what I feel is this films biggest strength is it's reliability on previous films to complete this films story and how it ties it's central theme of humanity to James Bonds character arc. By the end of the film, how Bonds arc and culmination of his series comes to an end, you feel emotion and it feels like an earned conclusion. In fact, I don't think there was any other way to end his era during this film.

However this film isn't perfect so let's move onto the mixed aspects of the film and these aren't necessarily good or bad, these are things to keep in mind. First this is a very long film, 163 minutes so if you can handle this runtime, absolutely see it in the cinema but if not, maybe wait til it's available to stream.

Second thing is despite this being a nearly 3 hour film, some characters don't appear as frequently or as much as you may like. In particular, there were at least two characters for me I would have liked to have seen more of.

Lastly is the films central villain. Now I enjoyed Rami Malek and the villain in general I felt was good but at the same time, I felt some more development was needed to make him more memorable.

Moving onto the negatives, the main thing is the pacing. After the opening sequence, the films slows to a halt and drags quite a bit during the first act so I wish they found a way to speed things up a bit.

And as a final nitpick, one minor character felt very out of place tonally within the film to the point where I found the character to be very annoying.

However despite those two negatives, I honestly loved this film and it was a complete surprise for me. I've seen it twice now and I think this is my favourite film of the year so far. That's how much I loved it.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings

Sorry for how late this review is. I had a lot on when Shang Chi came out and when I finally had time to review it, I couldn't remember much about it so I watched it yesterday to refresh my mind and now I'm glad I did because now I'm certain it's a great film but slightly flawed.

Starting with the positives, the best thing about this film is the action. This film probably has the most versatile action in any MCU film. There's hand to hand combat, martial arts, CGI fights and it's all filmed so well. You can see some actors are doing their own stunts and it's really impressive to watch.

I also really enjoyed the cast. Simu Liu, Awkwafina, Michelle Yeoh, Tony Leung and more, they all play great roles and all have standout moments, especially Simu Liu. I'd never heard of him before he was cast and now I'm excited to see him carry on the character of Shang Chi. And how can you forget Ben Kingsley. This man is fantastic and a true breath of fresh air and I want him to be in more MCU films.

I also love, despite the MCU being around for over a decade, there's still room for world building with other heroes and there's plenty with Shang Chi especially when we get to a section of the film where we see the exploration of the East Asian culture and how they fight and survive. It's a part of the film i'd like to explore more in the future if Shang Chi is lucky to get his own franchise.

Now let's talk about the villain, The real Mandarin or just Wenwu to make it easier. What a strong and complex character he is. He has a really strong character arc and is developed really well. You can sympathise with him and while you don't agree with his motivations, you believe that he believes what he's doing is right and how they conclude his arc ultimately feels like the best way to do it.

Now I'm not the biggest fan of slow motion because of how goofy it can look at times but this film has one of my favourite uses of multiple slow motion scenes as it helps us see how the featured characters are feeling, the emphasis portrayed on their face and I thought that was a really good touch.

And finally I loved the 3rd act, the final battle. Without going into spoilers, the final battle goes from small stakes to high stakes the moment the big threat is realized, our characters achieve their goals and realize their destinies and it features one of my favourite team up tropes.

Moving into the mixed aspects and the only thing is the humour. Now this is a very funny film and I was laughing an awful lot. But the reason it's mixed for me and this is actually a mixed negative is whilst a lot of it works, it causes the film to become inconsistent with the pre established tone. This film works better as a dark character study and I'd rather see a version of this film where there's no humour and is instead played all serious throughout the entire duration.

Now moving onto the negatives and staying in line with the humour, whilst it does land a lot, there are certainly moments where it feels really forced and is misplaced at times. There's at least two moments where there's really interesting exposition being given and it gets cut off for humour and it just doesn't feel right.

And along those same lines, the film does suffer with some familiar MCU tropes and whilst I do love these tropes, once again they feel forced.

Also what was Abomination doing in this film? He had no purpose at all. I wouldn't mind if he was a different character but considering he was established before and is set to reappear in the future She Hulk series, I expected him to have a bigger role and you can literally edit his scene out and it wouldn't affect the film at all. His appearance feels like a gimmick for the trailer to bring in audiences if I'm perfectly honest.

Finally and this is a nitpick, there seemed to be a script issue with the continuity of the film. What I mean by this is Awkwafina's character on two occasions struggles to understand Chinese but then there's other moments where she's spoken to in Chinese and she seems to understand what's said to her. It's a small thing but it did bother me.

But besides that, I did love this film and I'd love to see a sequel made which I'm sure will be done and this is a film that MCU fans will really enjoy.

⭐⭐⭐