Movie review: "The Beguiled"

dir. by Sofia Coppola
Allegedly, Sofia Coppola was drawn to remake The Beguiled by a desire to gender-flip the narrative, to make it an examination of the experience of white women during the American Civil War. I've not read the source material or seen the prior adaptation, but by reputation it's a sleazy bit of Southern Gothic pulp, and reversing the emphasis of that to a feminine viewpoint seems like a challenging undertaking, especially when attempting to build on sexual repression and boredom, which are inherently difficult emotions to represent on screen.

Coppola's effort is intriguing and occasionally strikes a resonant note, but her efforts to make the material more dignified and respectable have sapped it of all life, and the new film's needlessly brief 93-minute runtime comes at the expense of necessary context which would have greatly enhanced its intuitive storytelling. There's some merit in expecting the audience to bring prior knowledge to project onto the film, but combined with the flatness of the direction here, it's resulted in an often dull viewing experience whose merits are largely subjective to the point of invisibility.

Movie review: "Baby Driver"

THROND'S CHOICE
dir. by Edgar Wright
Edgar Wright spent the 2000s slowly rising to superstar status. Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, and The World's End established him as a powerful voice in action comedy, and despite leaving the project in 2014, Marvel still built on his script for their Ant-Man film. However, he hasn't had a directing credit since 2013, and so when his follow-up to The World's End was revealed, it was a big deal.

This new film, Baby Driver, has a strong claim to being his very best to date. A very different film from the "Cornetto trilogy," it repurposes genre tropes around a thrillingly unique premise and perhaps an even stronger sense of style than Wright's prior works, and excepting the very occasional overwritten line, it's thrillingly idiosyncratic and beautifully stylized, boasting sublime action and some of the most satisfying rhythms of Wright's entire career.

Movie review: "Okja"

dir. by Bong Joon-ho
Okja is not only the successor to Bong Joon-ho's excellent 2014 film Snowpiercer, but also Netflix's first stab at the festival circuit. The streaming service had made stabs at art films previously with Beasts of No Nation as well as numerous Sundance acquisitions earlier this year, but Okja's position in the Competition for Cannes's Palme d'Or was a big enough deal that its very inclusion proved controversial.

It's an absurd controversy, frankly, as a film is a film regardless of where it's viewed, and Bong's reputation is enough to have earned that Competition slot on its own. Indeed, Okja's environmentalist moralizing suits it to film festival awards just as well as its exciting spectacle suits it for widespread popularity, and it's no surprise that many were immediately won over. Unfortunately, as exciting, funny, and technically accomplished as Okja is, it's all brought down by heavy-handed, one-sided moralizing which at times borders on manipulative.

Movie review: "Wonder Woman"

THROND'S CHOICE
dir. by Patty Jenkins
It's odd to consider that it took three years for Warner Bros. to continue its DC Extended Universe after premiering Man of Steel in 2013. Last year's Batman v Superman and Suicide Squad arrived with the intention of competing with Marvel's own cash cow, but both premiered to largely negative reception, and the DC films became associated with a forced bleak tone and poor editing. And yet, the latter also showed Warner Bros. changing course, as last-minute reshoots attempted to add more humour and create a lighter tone. (I haven't actually seen either film, so I can't attest to either's quality.)

Wonder Woman is DC's second film to have been released since Batman v Superman's critical failure, and as significant as its status as the first female-starring superhero movie in over a decade is, almost as notable is that this is the first genuinely optimistic film in the DCEU. Not coincidentally, it's also a massive step up for the franchise, an earnest, big-hearted, and even inspiring movie which is as funny and exciting as the best of Marvel's offerings and which fully understands why these heroes are so beloved. If this is what DC's offerings are gonna be like from here on out, I'm all in.

Movie review: "Alien: Covenant"

dir. by Ridley Scott
When Ridley Scott first returned to the long-decaying Alien franchise with Prometheus, the results were controversial, and the film itself suffered from numerous script deficiencies in spite of its ambition and intriguing thematic questions. As a prequel to Alien, Prometheus wasn't especially serviceable, containing very few references to the film it was allegedly attempting to add context to. However, despite eventually devolving into dumb thriller territory, it was a film with a clear vision, even if it failed to resolve any of its philosophical questions, and a sequel ought to have refined the film's rough edges and added more clarity to Scott's vision.

Instead, Alien: Covenant sees the director halfheartedly rehashing his 1979 original while forgetting what made that movie special, and even his attempts to continue the philosophical musings of Prometheus come across as half-formed doodles above all else. Covenant doubles down on its predecessor's script issues while refusing to answer any of its questions, and while Scott retains some of his astonishing visual sensibility, it's embellished by bad CGI and pandering visual references to the original. The result is an asinine slasher film with a shaky thematic core, and it's yet another nail in the franchise's coffin.

Movie review: "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2"

BEST NEW FEATURE
dir. by James Gunn
Despite their acclaim, the films of the Marvel Cinematic Universe are fundamentally corporate products. They're expensive, rarely challenging, and formulaic, and their more unique entries are usually only weird by the franchise's own standards, as was the case with the first Guardians of the Galaxy in 2014. However, as it's become more and more reliably successful, the franchise has begun experimenting with its formula: Captain America: Civil War revolved its sprawling spectacle around a thoughtful storyline which bordered on autocritique, whereas Doctor Strange spruced up its familiar origin story with a pinch of psychedelia.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 doesn't have the first film's consistency of humour or momentum, but it retains much of what made its predecessor so charming, and adopts the strengths of both of its "phase 3" bretheren. If its character drama doesn't reach the heights of Civil War, it's still one of the thornier entries in the MCU, and its visuals even surpass the benchmark of Doctor Strange to set a new high point for the series. If sequels are expected to be bigger and bolder, Guardians 2 also takes the much more admirable route of being weirder.

Thoughts on: "The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild"

(Played on Wii U)

97 on Metacritic. That's unhealthy. Scores that high breed unmanageable expectations, and they indicate a uniformity of opinion which could make it hard to find a review to identify with if you're less fond of the game. Going into Breath of the Wild, I was unable to shake the expectations which the absurdly glowing reviews had bestowed upon me, and all of the claims that it "rejuvinated" the series had little meaning for someone like me who thinks that 2011's Skyward Sword is one of the best Zelda games to date, and who prefers a guided experience to a free open world. 

So while I still don't consider this the greatest of the Zeldas, it says a lot about its quality that I still loved it in spite of those biases. Spoilers will follow.