Doctor Strange: This Marvel film was probably the biggest thing this season in terms of coverage and the amount of people who went to see it (obviously). The Doctor Strange character is rather unknown so I was happy to see that people will give lesser-known heroes a try, though the fact that it's all based on brand recognition is kind of a downer. The film had some very interesting visuals at times but nothing I would say is necessarily groundbreaking on any level.
Arrival: Denis Villeneuve is a newer talent that has now, year after year, proven himself as a terrific director and worthy of being selected for the Blade Runner reboot. I didn't love this film like his others, but it was a smart, subtle science fiction film that would've fit right into the catalog of slow burning, creative sci-fi films of the 1970s.
Amy Adams was effective in her lead role and I'm now very excited to see what she does in Nocturnal Animals. The cinematography isn't as jaw-dropping as in Sicario, but it is sweeping while being reined in, and while there were elements that felt reminiscent of his previous work (the muted and dour color scheme of Prisoners and one dream sequence felt right out of Enemy), it stands on its own and is far better than the majority of the alien invasion films of the past, focusing on a perspective rarely ever given a proper treatment which is that of communication with the aliens.
In keeping with that, I enjoyed how the film communicated story information to the audience; it does it in a not totally unique but very intriguing way which pays off in the end. Arrival is an innovative and fresh science fiction film that I would recommend to most everyone. 7.5/10 stars.
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: While I was excited as anyone to revisit the nostalgia and wonder of the Harry Potter series, I can't say this film delivered on that monumental promise. This year was one of disappointment for fans, as the abysmal Cursed Child play also was released this year and was panned by critics and die-hard followers alike, and I can't say this film makes up for that. Eddie Redmayne is very charismatic and quirky in his lead role as Newt Scamander, so he was one redeeming quality. The cast is stellar, and I have to say, I was surprised by the quality of acting from Dan Fogler and Alison Sudol (better known by her stage name Fine Frenzy), as Fogler is known for dumb comedies and Sudol for her music career. However, their love story was incredibly rushed and odd.Katherine Waterson, Colin Farrell, Ezra Miller, and Samantha Morton are fine actors in their other works, but here, they all turn in one-note performances that I could predict where they would go from the moment they appeared on-screen. The resolution of the plot is very schlocky and rushed, and a lot of the acting, except for the lead four characters, if very wooden and/or the characters are one-dimensional. Like why would Jon Voight's son who is running for office (played by Josh Cowdery) belittle a bunch of religious protestors who are potential voters by calling them "freaks" to their faces?
The movie is kind of cute and fun but that's about it. It's nice for kids, and I tried to remind myself the original Potter films aren't particularly subtle or objectively great, either and this one really is more for families. I appreciated some of the humor and fun cameos (by Ron Perlman and Zoe Kravitz, especially), but the constant name-dropping of Potter lore and the very rushed and convenient climax (with some destruction scenes more reminiscent of a lazy summer film) made Fantastic Beasts a let-down. 5.8/10 stars.
Allied: Robert Zemeckis, like Ron Howard and Steven Spielberg, has been hit-or-miss as of late and is no stranger to schmaltz. With this, I appreciated a totally fictitious story set during a historical event (something you don't really see a lot, funny enough), but overall the story isn't interesting enough to fill the whole two hours. Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard have decent chemistry and there are some well-done scenes of tension (there's a small battle towards the end, a scene with a Nazi SS officer in Casablanca, and a scene involving a phone booth early on that were all serviceable as suspense sequences), but the cast is failed by a poor script.There's also a strange aside that Brad Pitt's character has a military sister (played by Lizzy Caplan), who is in an open lesbian relationship in 1940's London with Game of Thrones' Charlotte Hope, which didn't add anything to the story and felt very off as homosexuality was illegal in the U.K. at the time. The score is bland, the story is alright but very predictable, and the "tragic" ending is pretty lame- as it was hard to really connect with the characters all that much- but it was somewhat relieving that Allied's mystery and the final set-piece avoid the tired gun-fights and explosions so often seen in mainstream action/war climaxes these days. 5.8/10 stars.
Rules Don't Apply: I was expecting this to be just the run-of-the-mill Oscar bait film released on Thanksgiving (like Allied), but, although that may have been its intention, it was surprisingly funny and quirky and I appreciated that, even at his old age, Warren Beatty can still deliver an above-average performance (his adaptation of Howard Hughes is more comedic than Leonardo DiCaprio's but still exudes a lot of pain in the latter half), and uses more modern editing techniques to milk more humor out of the film. Lily Collins and Alden Ehrenreich have a nice little romance and they do have a pretty realistic argument at the film's "climax," though it's washed out by an overbearing and unnecessary score that could have been absent from that scene. Overall, the acting was good, the music was fine (the original song which shares the film's title was surprisingly sweet and touching), and the humor was better than expected. Rules Don't Apply may not break all the cliches of an Oscar bait film, but it has enough of a heart to actually be worth a viewing. 6.5/10 stars.(Images: Wikipedia)
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