The 88th Academy Awards: Predictions

Tonight is the big night! The Oscars! I follow the Oscar buzz all year round and thus I find it really fun to find out who the winners are. I meant to get this out earlier, but oh well. Better late than never, right? This year has been especially controversial as it's the second straight year with an all white lineup in the acting nominations. This apparently makes the Oscars racist, despite the fact that a Mexican won best picture and director last year and that same Mexican has a great chance of doing winning both those awards again this year. People are also choosing to ignore the fact that Lupita Nyong'o won best supporting two years ago and is one of many non-white individuals that have carried home statues in the past. Yeah, I think it's a bunch of bull crap. Anywho, with that small rant out of the way, it's time to give you my annual predictions as to who I think will win. And of course, I will also give my picks as to who I want to win. If my predictions are wrong, that's okay. That just makes things more interesting. It's fun being surprised on Oscar night! In case you are wondering, my order here is the order in which the nominations were announced. Let's begin!

Original Song:

Nominations:
-Fifty Shades of Grey - "Earned It" - The Weeknd
-Racing Extinction - "Manta Ray" - J. Ralph & Antony Hegarty
-Youth - "Simple Song #3" - David Lang
-The Hunting Ground - "Til It Happens to You" -  Diane Warren & Lady Gaga
-Spectre - "Writing's On the Wall" - Sam Smith

Will Win:
-Youth - "Simple Song #3" - David Lang

Should Win:
-Racing Extinction - "Manta Ray" - J. Ralph & Antony Hegarty

I don't know why "See You Again" wasn't nominated here. It was nominated in all the other pre-cursors and won most of them. And for good reason, if you ask me. Oh well. You can never predict what the Oscars are going to do in this category. As far as what will win, I'm leaning towards the song from Youth, but Gaga could very well pull it off. Personally I like the Manta Ray song out of this group, but as long as that horrid Bond song doesn't win, I'll be content.

Cinematography:

Nominations:
-Carol - Ed Lachman
-The Hateful Eight - Robert Richardson
-Mad Max: Fury Road - John Seal
-The Revenant - Emmanuel Lubezki
-Sicario - Roger Deakins

Will Win:
-The Revenant - Emmanuel Lubezki

Should Win:
-The Revenant - Emmanuel Lubezki

Love or hate The Revenant (personally I'm on the love side of the argument), you gotta have mad respect for what they pulled off with the cinematography. That had me in awe for the whole movie, especially knowing what lengths they went to in order to make the movie look and feel genuine, like using all natural light in every shot. Apparently all the Oscar people agree with me here, because this is a guaranteed winner. Sorry Roger Deakins. Maybe next time.

Documentary Short Subject:

Nominations:
-Body Team 12 - David Darg & Bryn Mooser
-Chau, Beyond the Lines - Courtney Marsh & Herry Franck
-Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah - Adam Benzine
-A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness - Sharmeen Obaid-Chindy
-Last Day of Freedom - Dee Hibbert-Jones & Nomi Talisman

Will Win:
-Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah - Adam Benzine

Should Win:
- n/a

I'm not going to lie, I haven't watched any of these short films. Nor do I really have any idea which one is going to win. They all sound fascinating, now they just need to make them available to watch for crowds outside New York or Los Angeles so I can check them out. In terms of my prediction, I read a few accounts from people who actually saw them and apparently Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah is our winner, but I feel the Academy is unpredictable when it comes to these.

Documentary Feature:

Nominations:
-Amy - Asif Kapadia & James Gay-Rees
-Cartel Land - Matthew Heineman & Tom Yellin
-The Look of Silence - Joshua Oppenheimer & Signe Byrge Sorensen
-What Happened, Miss Simone? - Liz Garbus, Amy Hobby & Justin Wilkes
-Winter on Fire: Ukraine's Fight for Freedom - Evgeny Afineevksy & Den Tolmor

Will Win:
-Amy - Asif Kapadia & James Gay-Rees

Should Win:
-n/a

Well now this is embarrassing. I haven't seen any of these feature-length documentaries, either. I almost saw Amy, but never got around to it. I like documentaries. I just don't usually seek them out in the theaters. But one of these days, I'm going to start watching these award-winning documentaries. I'm serious with that. As far as the winner, yeah Amy is winning. I'm pretty confident with that pick. I don't even need to read what other people think to determine that.

Costume Design:

Nominations:
-Carol - Sandy Powell
-Cinderella - Sandy Powell
-The Danish Girl - Paco Delgado
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Jenny Beavan
-The Revenant - Jacqueline West

Will Win:
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Jenny Beavan

Should Win:
-Cinderella - Sandy Powell

I had my reservations when it came to Cinderella, but when it came to production design and costume design, it was a heck freaking yes. It didn't get nominated for production design, but it got the costume design nomination, so I have to give it a shout-out right here. I hope it wins. But Mad Max is taking home the Oscar here as I'm certain will be the case with a lot of these smaller awards.

Sound Editing:

Nominations:
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Mark Mangini & David White
-The Martian - Oliver Tarney
-The Revenant - Martin Hernandez & Lon Bendeer
-Sicario - Alan Robert Muray
-Star Wars: The Force Awakens - Matthew Wood & David Acord

Will Win:
-The Revenant - Martin Hernandez & Lon Bendeer

Should Win:
-Star Wars: The Force Awakens - Matthew Wood & David Acord

Can we give something to Star Wars? Even if it's just one of these sound awards? I'm not really the best judge at sound editing, but I just want Star Wars to win something and Star Wars does have good sounds in it. Like they don't use real light sabers to make the light saber sounds, if you know what I mean. And BB-8? Exactly right? But I suppose I'll settle with nature sounds winning because I'm pretty sure The Revenant is taking this one home.

Sound Mixing:

Nominations:
-Bridge of Spies - Andy Nelson, Gary Rydston & Drew Kunin
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Chris Jenkins, Gregg Rudloff & Ben Osmo
-The Martian - Paul Massey, Mark Taylor & Mac Ruth
-The Revenant - Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montano, Randy Thom & Chris Duesterdiek
-Star Wars: The Force Awakens - Andy Nelson, Christopher Scaabosio & Stuart Wilson

Will Win:
-The Revenant - Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montano, Randy Thom & Chris Duesterdiek

Should Win:
-Star Wars: The Force Awakens - Andy Nelson, Christopher Scaabosio & Stuart Wilson

Yeah, did you hear what I just said? I want Star Wars to win something at the Oscars and they do pretty good in the sound department. But yeah, The Revenant I think is winning. Although don't be surprised if these sound awards once again goes to Mad Max.

Makeup & Hairstyling:

Nominations:
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Lesley Vanderwalt, Elka Wardega & Damian Martin
-The 100 Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared - Love Larson & Eva Von Bahr
-The Revenant - Sian Grigg, Duncan Jarman & Robert Pandini

Will Win:
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Lesley Vanderwalt, Elka Wardega & Damian Martin

Should Win:
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Lesley Vanderwalt, Elka Wardega & Damian Martin

Both Mad Max and The Revenant would be well suited for this. I mean, Leo got attacked by a virtual bear and they had to make that look convincing with dang good makeup. Plus, they had to make the whole cast look like 1800's fur trappers. But yeah, Mad Max is taking this award home, too, and when push comes to shove I'll take Mad Max. I mean, they had a whole cast filled with post-apocalyptic wasteland characters. Half the cast was covered with make-up to make that look convincing. Although it would be kinda entertaining if the third movie here with the super long title took this home.

Live Action Short Film:

Nominations:
-Ave Maria - Basil Khalil & Eric Dupont
-Day One - Harry Hughes
-Everything Will Be Okay (Alles Wird Gut) - Patrick Vollrath
-Shok - Jamie Donoughue
-Stutterer - Benjamin Cleary & Serena Armitage

Will Win:
-Ave Maria - Basil Khalil & Eric Dupont

Should Win:
-n/a

Once again, I haven't seen any of these. They showed them to the Oscar voters and to a very limited audience in New York and Los Angeles. But if these somehow show up online somewhere I'm totally down for watching. I enjoy short films. I'm picking Ave Maria to win. But I feel like any of them could.

Animated Short Film:

Nominations:
-Bear Story - Gabriel Osorio & Pato Escala
-Prologue - Richard Williams & Imogen Sutton
-Sanjay's Super Team - Sanjay Patel & Nicole Gridle
-We Can't Live Without Cosmos - Konstantin Bronzit
-Word of Tomorrow - Don Hertzfeldt

Will Win:
-Sanjay's Super Team - Sanjay Patel & Nicole Gridle

Should Win:
-Sanjay's Super Team - Sanjay Patel & Nicole Gridle

Hey, look! I've seen one of these short films! Sanjay's Super Team showed up in front of Pixar's The Good Dinosaur and it was adorable and touching. In fact, it was better than feature length Pixar movie that followed it. Of course I want it to win! And I feel it will. Animated shorts by Disney and/or Pixar usually own this category at the Oscars. Although I haven't seen the other four, so I guess that's not completely fair for me to give my personal judgment.

Animated Feature Film:

Nominations:
-Anomalisa - Charlie Kaufman, Duke Johnson & Rosa Tran
-Boy and the World - Ale Abreu
-Inside Out - Pete Docter & Jonas Rivera
-Shaun the Sheep Movie - Mark Murton & Richard Starzak
-When Marnie was There - Hiromasa Yonebayash & Yoshiak Nishimura

Will Win:
-Inside Out - Pete Docter & Jonas Rivera

Should Win:
-Shaun the Sheep Movie - Mark Murton & Richard Starzak

Of course Inside Out is winning this category. I will be in utter shock if it gets upset. And no I'm not complaining because I loved the movie. But if you've been following my reviews this year, you'll know that I've been head over heels for Shaun the Sheep Movie ever since I've seen it. I like how the Oscars keep nominating these stop motion animation movies. It's a shame that no one goes and watches them, so I'm glad the Academy notices them. But one of these days, I do hope they get an actual win. Same thing goes with these Studio Ghibli/GKIDS films. They need a win. And to be honest, I nearly chose When Marnie was There as my favorite over Shaun the Sheep Movie. Go see it if you haven't! So, so, so good!!!!

Actor in a Supporting Role:

Nominations:
-Christian Bale - The Big Short
-Tom Hardy - The Revenant
-Mark Ruffalo - Spotlight
-Mark Rylance - Bridge of Spies
-Sylvester Stallone - Creed

Will Win:
-Sylvester Stallone - Creed

Should Win:
-Sylvester Stallone - Creed

Yeah, this one is easy. Five great performances. Don't get me wrong. But Sylvester Stallone's performance in Creed was honestly one of my favorite, if not my absolute favorite, performance of the whole year. I've loved the Rocky movies my whole life and Stallone totally knocked this out of the park in Creed. I'm glad the rest of the world agrees with me because he's been winning everything this year and thus is almost a guarantee. Glad to see Tom Hardy finally get an Oscar nomination. But his win can wait.

Actress in a Supporting Role:

Nominations:
-Jennifer Jason Leigh - The Hateful Eight
-Rooney Mara - Carol
-Rachel McAdams - Spotlight
-Alicia Vickander - The Danish Girl
-Kate Winslet - Steve Jobs

Will Win:
-Alicia Vickander - The Danish Girl

Should Win:
-Jennifer Jason Leigh - The Hateful Eight

I don't get this category. I really don't. Winslet, Vickander, and Mara were definite lead roles. Not supporting roles. You can even argue that for McAdams as well. Jennifer Jason Leigh is the only true supporting role out of the five. I'd vote for Vickander if she got in for Ex Machina instead of The Danish Girl. It almost happened. But it didn't. She's winning and I'm going to be happy for her. But my vote would be for the woman who stole the show in Tarantino's The Hateful Eight. Jennifer Jason Leigh. What a performance. Kate Winslet has upset potential and I'd be fine with that. I loved Steve Jobs and she was great in that!

Visual Effects:

Nominations:
-Ex Machina - Andrew Whitehurst, Paul Norris, Mark Ardinton & Sara Bennett
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Andrew Jackson, Tom Wood, Dan Oliver & Andy Williams
-The Martian - Richard Stammers, Andrew Langlands, Chris Lawrence & Steven Warner
-The Revenant - Rich McBride, Matthew Shumway, Jason Smith & Cameron Waldbauer
-Star Wars: The Force Awakens - Roger Guyett, Patrick Tubach, Neal Scanlan & Chris Corbould

Will Win:
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Andrew Jackson, Tom Wood, Dan Oliver & Andy Williams

Should Win:
-Star Wars: The Force Awakens - Roger Guyett, Patrick Tubach, Neal Scanlan & Chris Corbould

Okay, if we're not going to give Star Wars the sound awards, can we at least give them the award that was made for blockbusters? And for crying out loud, shouldn't we give praise to J.J. and crew for returning Star Wars to practical effects? Please? Pretty please? I feel Mad Max will take this home as well and I'm not complaining too much at that. Although I do have to make sure to give an honorable mention to The Martian as well. Superb visual effects! And that bear in The Revenant that mauled DiCaprio? All visual effects. That alone almost deserves the Oscar as well.

Film Editing:

Nominations:
-The Big Short - Hank Cowin
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Margaret Sixel
-The Revenant - Stephen Mirrione
-Spotlight - Tom McArdle
-Star Wars: The Force Awakens - Maryann Brandon & Mary Jo Markey

Will Win:
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Margaret Sixel

Should Win:
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Margaret Sixel

Definitely no complaints for me here on this one. Mad Max is in fact my second favorite movie of 2015 because it's the absolute perfect action movie. Not the type of movie that usually wins this many awards, but hey, I'm not complaining. And if you go back and watch all these action sequences, it's the phenomenal editing in the movie that makes it so good. I'm not joking. If I could only pick one award for Mad Max to win, it would be editing. Although these are five great movies here, so I won't be too mad if it gets upset.

Production Design:

Nominations:
-Bridge of Spies - Adam Stockhausen, Rena Deangelo & Bernard Henrich
-The Danish Girl - Eve Stewart & Michael Standish
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Colin Gibson & Lisa Thompson
-The Martian - Arthur Max & Celia Bobak
-The Revenant - Jack Fisk & Hamish Purdy

Will Win:
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Colin Gibson & Lisa Thompson

Should Win:
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Colin Gibson & Lisa Thompson

Another Oscar in the bag for Mad Max and yet another one that I'm not complaining at. Although it would be nice to see Bridge of Spies and The Martian to take something home and this would be the perfect category to do that in, but they did create a post-apocalyptic wasteland with Mad Max, so yeah.

Adapted Screenplay:

Nominations:
-The Big Short - Charles Randolph & Adam McKay
-Brooklyn - Nick Hornby
-Carol - Phyllis Nagy
-The Martian - Drew Goddard
-Room - Emma Donoghue

Will Win:
-The Big Short - Charles Randolph & Adam McKay

Should Win:
-The Big Short - Charles Randolph & Adam McKay

Is it the best adaptation we're voting for here or the best screenplay that was adapted? Does that make any sense? I can't say I've read the original source material for any of these, so if it's the first one than I'm out. But if we go with the latter, then I pick The Big Short. Such a clever, funny, witty screenplay that managed to turn a subject that I knew nothing about into a fascinating movie. And yes, it's definitely going to win this award. It's been winning here in all the pre-cursors. In general, The Big Short has been coming on strong in the last month, so wherever it's nominated in, it has a shot to win or spoil. 

Original Screenplay:

Nominations:
-Bridge of Spies - Matt Charman, Ethan Coen & Joel Coen
-Ex Machina - Alex Garland
-Inside Out - Pete Docter, Meg LePauve, Josh Cooley & Ronnie del Carmen
-Spotlight - Josh Singer & Tom McCarthy
-Straight Outta Compton - Jonathan Herman, Andrea Berloff, S. Leigh Savidge & Alan Wenkus

Will Win:
-Spotlight - Josh Singer & Tom McCarthy

Should Win:
-Inside Out - Pete Docter, Meg LePauve, Josh Cooley & Ronnie del Carmen

We're judging screenplays here. That's what I had to remind myself when picking my favorite. Spotlight is the definite winner here, especially since the Academy is going to want to give the movie something and it's been winning all the pre-cursors when it comes to original screenplay. But that Inside Out screenplay. Dang that was good. So clever and sharp from beginning to end. Ex Machina would be my second pick here. But I do love Spotlight, so I won't be upset.

Original Score: 

Nominations:
-Bridge of Spies  - Thomas Newman
-Carol - Carter Burwell
-The Hateful Eight - Ennio Marricone
-Sicario - Johann Johannsson
-Star Wars: The Force Awakens - John Williams

Will Win:
-The Hateful Eight - Ennio Marricone

Should Win:
-The Hateful Eight - Ennio Marricone

I love music and there were a lot of amazing scores last year. All five of these are fantastic. But there is one that definitely stands head and shoulders above the rest. Such an easy pick as there's a dang good reason why The Hateful Eight has been winning everything when it comes to score. From the second this movie began, the score just blew me away and it never let down. The Hateful Eight was very average for Tarantino standards, but the score was great. Tarantino himself is a moron when he's on stage, so let's hope hope Ennio Marricone is actually there to accept this award.

Foreign Language Film:

Nominations:
-Embrace of the Serpent - Colombia
-Mustang - France
-Son of Saul - Hungary
-Theeb - Jordan
-A War - Denmark

Will Win:
-Son of Saul - Hungary

Should Win:
-n/a

I've not seen any of these foreign films. I know. Bad me. But I've heard nothing but praise for both Son of Saul and Mustang and thus it wouldn't surprise me to see either of them winning. But I'm going to lean on the front-runner taking this award home. Son of Saul.

Directing:

Nominations:
-Adam McKay - The Big Short
-George Miller - Mad Max: Fury Road
-Alejandro G. Inarritu - The Revenant
-Lenny Abrahamson - Room
-Tom McCarthy - Spotlight

Will Win:
-Alejandro G. Inarritu - The Revenant

Should Win:
-Lenny Abrahamson - Room

It's hard to argue against Inarritu with this one considering what he pulled off with The Revenant, which is why he is taking home his second straight best director Oscar. George Miller could play spoiler here if Mad Max wins all the awards that I believe it will. But when I think of this year's directors, I immediately think of the man who took a young boy in Jacob Tremblay and got perhaps the best child performance ever out of him. But not just that. He got everyone to buy into the premise of Room and made it one of the most emotional and engaging movies of the year that really made you think about life in general and what it means. I really enjoyed Room and this was the movie where I gave all the credit to the director.

Actress in a Leading Role:

Nominations:
-Cate Blanchett - Carol
-Brie Larson - Room
-Jennifer Lawrence - Joy
-Charlotte Rampling - 45 Years
-Saoirse Ronan - Brooklyn

Will Win:
-Brie Larson - Room

Should Win:
-Saoirse Ronan - Brooklyn

Sorry, I'm not stoked over this group of ladies. I hated Cate Blanchett's character in Carol. I didn't think J-Law deserved an Oscar for the bland movie Joy. Charlotte Rampling was okay in 45 Years. And the star of Room was by far Jacob Tremblay, not Brie Larson. Brie did good in it, but I wasn't blown away by her performance like many others were. I wanted Tremblay to represent Room. That leaves us to the one and only deserving performance of the bunch of them. My girl Saoirse Ronan, who I've loved for a long time now. She was incredible in Brooklyn. Brie has been winning everything thus far, so she's taking the Oscar home. But I'm hoping for the upset here.

Actor in a Leading Role:

Nominations:
-Bryan Cranston - Trumbo
-Matt Damon - The Martian
-Leonardo DiCaprio - The Revenant
-Michael Fassbender - Steve Jobs
-Eddie Redmayne - The Danish Girl

Will Win:
-Leonardo DiCaprio - The Revenant

Should Win:
-Leonardo DiCaprio - The Revenant

It's about freaking time! I honestly believe that Leo is one of the best actors in Hollywood right now. He selects his movies very carefully and always completely loses himself in his characters. He's one of the most recognizable and popular actors in the business, but yet every time without fail I see his character he's portraying in the movie and not him. Even if the movie itself isn't great, Leo always gives 150 percent. He should be winning his second or third Oscar right now. Not his first. Oh well. And no, I don't think this is just a lifetime achievement award. Even if he had already won two or three Oscars, I'd still vote for him because what he did in The Revenant was mind-blowing. And yes, he is winning. He's won literally everything so far.

Best Picture:

Nominations:
-The Big Short - Paramount Pictures
-Bridge of Spies - Dreamworks
-Brooklyn - Fox Searchlight Pictures
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Warner Bros.
-The Martian - 20th Century Fox
-The Revenant - 20th Century Fox
-Room - A24 Films
-Spotlight - Open Road

Will Win:
-The Revenant - 20th Century Fox

Should Win:
-Mad Max: Fury Road - Warner Bros.

It's a three movie race right now between The Revenant, The Big Short, and Spotlight. The Revenant is the current favorite and so I'm playing it safe here with my prediction. But Spotlight was the big favorite before The Revenant came on the scene, so don't be surprised if it comes back and wins. But right now I actually think Spotlight is third. If there's going to be an upset for best picture, I think it comes from The Big Short. I'm not ready to call it. But it's close. If you ask me, all eight of these movies are actually really good. I think the Academy did a good job this year in picking the best picture candidates. Yes, Star Wars was my favorite movie of the year last year, but its award was $2 billion at the world wide box office. Better that than a little golden trophy, right? However, with Star Wars not in the mix, my personal choice definitely goes to Mad Max, although Spotlight is pretty close behind.

Risen Review

Just over two weeks ago, the movie Hail, Caesar! was released. The movie as a whole lacked a whole lot of substance, but I bring it up here because the premise centered around a group of filmmakers making a religious movie back in the 1950's that told the story of Christ from the prospective of a Roman soldier. Now in the same month as Hail, Caesar! we get an actual movie about the story of Christ told from the prospective of a Roman soldier. I find that to be a rather hilarious coincidence. What are the chances of two separate groups of people sitting down and both making a movie with this unique premise and releasing it in the same month? I love it! Moving on, Risen is the first of four major religious movies coming out around this Easter for Christian audiences to choose from and as a Christian I feel a special obligation to review these movies because other critics aren't the best judge of these types of movies, if you know what I mean. They almost always end up on the rotten side of the tomatometer, even if they are good movies. Take this one for example. It's currently rotten at 59 percent, but I'm going to recommend it because I thought it was pretty good!

When it comes to making a movie about the life of Christ these days, I do think it's important for a studio to go about things in a new or unique way simply because this is a story that has been told in movie form over and over ever since movies began to be made. I don't mean to say that studios should change the story completely by telling something that didn't happen. That's what the movie Noah did with the story of Noah in the Old Testament and it was a disaster. I'm just saying that if yet another movie about Christ is to be made, they need to bring something new or unique to the table. The life of Christ as told in the four Gospels is very rich and deep. There's a lot of information that can't all be told in an hour or two, which means that there are a lot of different angles or focuses that can be used while still being true to the story that happened. But if you make the exact same movie that has already been made a hundred times, it's a little redundant. This is one reason why I enjoyed Risen. It tells the exact same story that we all know, but does so in a unique way that feels fresh. How would an average Roman soldier react to these events? This is an intriguing premise that is pulled off in a very real, human way.

I should mention that this is not a spoiler review. I'm not going to reveal what happens. But at the same time, I will dive a little deeper into the story than I usually would simply because everyone knows the basic story of Christ's death and resurrection. Even if you're not a Christian, it should come as no shock to you that, spoiler alert, Christ gets killed. Then he rises again, meets with his apostles and disciples for a final time, and ascends to heaven. We all know that story. If you don't want my insights as to why I enjoyed this specific portrayal, then you are more than welcome to exit this review and go check it out on your own. That won't offend me. Just know that I enjoyed this and recommend it. If you are interested in my insights without having seen the movie, then lets continue. First off, this movie begins where most depictions of Christ leave off. The resurrection. That's what this movie is all about. One of the first scenes of the movie shows Christ dead on the cross. The Roman soldier that we follow (Clavius is his name) is given the charge to break the legs of the people on the cross to speed up the crucifixion process, which was a very common practice. When they get to Christ, they realize it's not necessary because he is already dead. Clavius then gets a good, long look at the Christ before moving on and that's our setup.

The whole point of this movie is the journey that Clavius goes on and it's a very interesting journey that is very relatable. I do get frustrated with Christian movies that paint everything as black and white, which is not the case with life. If it was, I'm in a lot of trouble because I've made a ton of mistakes that would put me on the black. There is a lot of gray area and I really liked this movie for showing that. The movie starts with Christ already dead, so we don't get to hear what he stated on the cross in this movie, but one statement that I've always been fascinated with is the following: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." He's talking about the Roman soldiers there who really didn't know what they were doing. They crucified a lot of people in that time period, many for claiming to be the promised Messiah. This wasn't new to them. They really didn't realize what they were doing. Often it's easy to point at all the followers of Christ as "good" and everyone else as "evil." But is this actually fair? Is it possible that there were some believers that rebelled against what they were taught? Is it possible that there were some Roman soldiers who would've followed Christ had they been given the opportunity? Absolutely!

Ultimately, that's what this movie is about. Clavius is a good man. He just happens to be a Roman soldier. You could argue that some on the Roman side, like Pontius Pilate, had more of a knowledge of what was going on, yet allowed Christ to be crucified anyways. Clavius is not one of them. He's just following orders. "Go break the legs of the people that were just crucified." Okay. "Please let me have the body?" Okay. "The body is gone. Go find it!" Okay. That last one is a big focus for this movie. The idea of the resurrection was a very foreign idea, even to the followers of Christ. More on that in a bit. But how would the Romans react to this? They did their best to seal up the tomb and even put guards there to protect it. Yet the body is gone. Are they all going to actually believe that he rose? Probably not. It would be easy to steal the body and spread rumors that he rose as promised, especially when they find out that the guards got drunk. But even the guards' actual story would seem hokey. "Two angels showed up and rolled away the stone." "You were probably hallucinating." "You're probably right." Can't you just see a conversation like this happening? So now we start a manhunt for this body led by Draco Malfoy and Voldermort's brother (Tom Felton and Joseph Fiennes) and that is really interesting because this becomes a crime drama of sorts.

Speaking of those two, both of them did a great job in this movie, especially Joseph Fiennes, who plays Clavius. A lot of Christian movies have really cheesy acting that brings the movie down, especially our Kendrick Brothers movies, but this is the opposite. Joseph Fiennes makes this movie and his reactions to various events is very real and human. He's just trying to do his best to be a good Roman soldier, but then he sees things that are very contradictory for him. The movie could've taken the instant covert route and suddenly make him the ultimate hero, but it really doesn't. Instead he becomes very conflicted and confused. If you've grown up thinking one way and suddenly you see evidence that perhaps you may be wrong, you're usually not going to simply jump ship and throw away everything you've known. This was one of the most real stories of faith that I've seen recently. You can probably guess who he interacts with in the second half of the movie and I won't spoil how those interactions go, but I absolutely loved those conversations. And Tom Felton as co-lead in this movie was also great. He goes through a very different journey in this movie than Clavius, but I think this is the most human and relatable that Tom Felton has been. He's very good at playing the jerk in his movies, even with his post-Harry Potter career, but that's not really the case this time around.

And then we have the depictions of our classic New Testament events surrounding the crucifixion and resurrection. I have to say that this was all pretty great. Sure, there were a few odd little things here and there, like nails only in the wrists and not in the palms or Christ's final ascension looking like a bird exploded into the sun, but for the most part this felt very real and accurate. In this sense, I have to give praise to the set designs and costume designs for making this actually feel like 33 A.D. Jerusalem as well as the close attention paid to the historical details of the time. Most adaptations do fine in making you buy that you're back in that time period and even when they don't do great, you give them a pass and focus on the story they're telling. This really sold it, though. It really gave the feel that, despite a few little odd quirks, this is how things would've gone down. Along these lines, I also have to give praise to the look of Jesus himself. A lot of adaptations portray Jesus as this person who really sticks out like a sore thumb because he looks like an American living among the Jews and Hebrews. I have reason to believe that the actual Jesus blended in very well with the people around him and thus is why many people had a hard time believing him because he looked like one of them. Jesus in this movie definitely looked like Jesus, but he also blended in very well with the crowd, which I really appreciated.

Finally I have to give a lot of praise to the portrayal of the apostles in this movie. It's easy to look at the label of apostle and immediately assume that Jesus selected the 12 most spiritual and dedicated men of the that time period that were perfect from day one. That's how they're often portrayed. What is often overlooked is the fact that all of these men went through a lot of progression before they became the standout people that they are known for. Jesus' death was an especially trying time for them. These were still essentially brand new converts. After Jesus called them to be apostles, only three years had gone by before he died. Jesus warned them of his death and resurrection, but they really didn't fully comprehend what he meant until afterwards. Many doubted. Some denied him. Judas even betrayed him. These were imperfect men who felt lost right at his death, which is probably the big reason why Jesus came back to them. They needed more instruction. After he left the first time, they went back to fishing. Jesus came back to tell them to go feed his sheep. Go teach the people. The second half of this movie is all about the apostles and this is how they were portrayed and I loved it. Yes, Clavius fits in this, but I told you I wouldn't tell you how he does, so I will let you find out for yourself.

Will this go down in history as one of the best movies about the life of Christ? Maybe not. I don't know if this is going to be your movie tradition every Easter for the next 30 years. I will admit that there were times during the first half of the movie where I got a little bored. But we live in a day where faith-based films are on a huge high in Hollywood and when compared to this modern group of faith-based films, I honestly think that Risen is one better ones that has been made. This is not preachy. This doesn't portray things as black and white. It's not full of cheesy acting or poorly written dialogue. As a Christian, I do appreciate the good intentions of some of these studios, but as a critic of film I have to admit that a lot of them aren't that great. But this one is different. It's a well-made film that not only has an interesting premise, but has amazing execution, especially when it comes to the tone and feel of the movie as well as the acting. It's a great story of faith that I honestly appreciated. And it focuses on an aspect of Christ that doesn't get enough attention in my opinion. The resurrection. Most movies about Christ include the resurrection, but many times it's an afterthought or tacked on at the end. How many times do we get a movie that focuses solely on the resurrection? Exactly. That's what Risen is and I definitely recommend you seeing this Easter. I give Risen an 8/10.

The Witch Review

I first heard of The Witch just over a year ago as it debuted at the Sundance Film Festival in January of 2016. A friend of mine attended Sundance that year and said The Witch was the scariest movie she'd ever seen. This immediately intrigued me. An indie horror film that is genuinely terrifying? That sounded great! If you've read any of my recent horror reviews, you'll know that I'm actually a fan of horror movies. Good horror movies. But that's the thing. Good horror movies are hard to come by. Horror movies are a dime a dozen these days and most of them are piles of crap. I'll dive into the reason for that in a bit, but needless to say the ratio of bad horror to good horror these days is like 20 to 1. Thus I'm on a constant search for good horror and when I come by one, I'm ecstatic. The Witch felt like a winner from the moment I heard about it. It just took a long time for it to actually arrive in normal theaters. But man was that worth the wait. You know those moments where you wait a super long time for a movie to arrive and when it does, it's cinematic gold? Yes. This was one of those moments.

If you're not a crazy movie nerd like myself and you haven't heard of The Witch because you don't follow the film festivals like I do, then let me educate you. The Witch isn't a monster movie or a supernatural horror. I suppose if you're being super technical you could classify it like that, but this is more of a period piece horror movie. Or a historical horror movie. It's set in Puritan New England in the 1600's where witchcraft was actually a serious problem. As far as the specific events and characters in this movie, this is purely a work of fiction, but the inspiration for the movie comes from actual journal entries or court cases from back in the day. People back in that time period were hung for witchcraft. They didn't take it lightly and I'm convinced that they weren't just a bunch of buffoons making crap up. Crazy stuff happened. In The Witch, we follow one specific Puritan family who lives on a farm way outside of town by a really creepy forest. They are trying to be the best they can be, but stuff just happens. I'm not going to give much of the plot away at all because there's a lot that happens and I want you to experience it on your own, but needless to say some sketchy stuff is going on with the kids, who are at various ages and genders, as well as some sketchy stuff going on in the forest. And it's pretty intense.

The great thing about The Witch is that it doesn't follow all the stupid horror cliches that plague modern-day horror. I'm talking about jump scares, gratuitous violence, crazy monsters or demons killing everyone, and all that nonsense. You see, these movies are really easy to make and are super cheap. Many that you see cost less than $10 million and in most cases less than $5 million. In fact, the first Paranormal Activity only cost $15,000 and made nearly $200 million worldwide. That's a phenomenal profit and is the exact reason why we got like a hundred more of those. Because in many cases, money is all that matters. Most of these movies don't make as much as Paranormal Activity made, but if they can just get an opening weekend of like $5 to $10 million and hold well enough to make just $15 or $20 million total, that's a profit and a sequel will be in the works. They don't care if everyone hated their movie. They made money. They'll usually hire cheap, no-name actors that are desperate for work; write up some quick, lame script; and add in a whole bunch of jump scares and/or tons of blood and gore and boom! You've got yourself a movie and you're going to make yourself some money.

This is why horror movies these days frustrate me. Story, acting, and film making in general are completely thrown out the window in favor of a quick cash grab. I was sitting in the theater watching all these trailers for these upcoming horror movies and it just made me sick. But then the trailers ended and our movie started and I was able to take a deep sigh of relief that The Witch was exactly the movie I thought it was going to be. If all you care for in a horror movie is a bunch of cheap jump scares, you're going to be bored with this movie. If you want to know what an actual good horror movie is like, then go see this because they get it right. See, a good horror movie will actually have a good story with real suspense and horror along with some good acting and good film-making. Things that most horror movies neglect. But not The Witch. Because it was an indie movie released at Sundance. There was no guarantee that they would actually make money. In fact, when they were making this, there wasn't even a guarantee that a studio would purchase the movie and give it a theatrical release. Even when A24 did purchase it for just $1 million, they were initially planning on forgoing a theatrical release. This is why I like indie movies. The focus is on making a good movie that they hope people will enjoy because there is no guarantee they will make any money.

Now to the specifics with The Witch, which yes, I've been beating around the bush a bit up to this point. I'm trying to speak in more general terms because I don't want to give anything away. This is a movie I want you to experience without knowing much about. But anyways, this is a slow build. Something happens at the beginning to make us very unsettled and then we just spend time with this family on the farm. Two things here that genuinely terrified me. Walking through the woods at night and waiting for something bad to happen. Yes, I love the outdoors. I really do. But I could not live in the outdoors like this. Camping is one thing. There's always people with you. But if I were to live in the country like this, there would be times where I would be all alone in the middle of nowhere at night and I just wouldn't be able to take it. And then there's those terrifying moments in life where you know something is amiss, yet you can't do a single thing about it and instead you're just forced to sit there alone in your house or even with family and friends and wait it out, hoping and praying that you'll be okay. See, these things are terrifying just on their own and this is what this movie plays off of. There's no need for jump scares or tons of blood and gore. That's not what this movie relies on to be terrifying. Yes, there is blood and gore in this movie, but only when it's necessary for the plot. They don't rely on it to scare you. And there's only one jump scare in the movie and it's not done as a gimmick, either.

The other areas where this movie excels at are the technical aspects of the movie as well as the acting and dialogue. Like I said earlier, this is a period piece. Doing those convincingly requires good set design as well as good costume and makeup. But it needs to happen naturally. We need to feel that we are back in that time period and that's exactly what happens. When the movie begins, it feels like we are in the 1600's and it keeps that way the whole time. Along those lines, the characters speak like they did back in the 1600's. The dialogue was very old-fashioned to the point where it almost threw me off. But it grew on me as the movie went on and pretty soon I loved it. Then they mentioned that some of the dialogue was taken directly from journal entries and court cases, which made it even better. Then we have the cinematography. This did a great job of setting the tone. In addition to a lot of amazing shots, the lighting and color schemes make this a very dim, haunting movie. A lot of browns, grays, and off-whites are used. When we get bright color, which doesn't happen very much, it's done on purpose to make something stand out. Then we have the score. And holy cow is this score good. The music is timed perfectly to totally creep you out. But it also knows exactly when to stop. There's a lot of drawn-out moments where this is no music at all and these are even scarier moments. When the music does come back, it's never over the top, which is fantastic.

A separate paragraph is necessary to talk about the acting and directing in this movie. Everyone is phenomenal in this. And when I say everyone, I mean everyone. Yet I knew none of them going in. The best I can give you is that the father in this movie played Amycus Carrow in the last few Harry Potter moves. Who? Exactly. These are new faces and I hope this movie propels them to stardom because they deserve it. The parents are very Puritan and religious. Their reactions to the stuff that happens is very raw and emotional. When conversations are had, those conversations are amazing because of how much honest emotion there is. And the kids. Wow. Just, wow. They never really tell us their ages, but we have an older daughter played by 19-year-old Anya Taylor-Joy, who I'm guessing was 18 when they were filming. She's the star of this movie and knocks it out of the park. Yet the best performances in my opinion were the younger three. We have the young teenage boy and the two youngest who look like they are only like 6 or 7. Maybe younger. I don't know. But with them, I have to give a ton of credit to the director. It's one thing to direct talented adult actors. It's another to get these types of performances out of child actors. Speaking of director Robert Eggers, this is his feature-lenght directorial debut. Man, what a debut!

And finally, I have to talk about the meat of this movie. No spoilers here. Just principles. Witchcraft. This is nothing new. Witches have been portrayed in Hollywood quite a bit. Most witches in Hollywood have a fantasy element to them and thus are fun to use in fictional pieces or dress up like on Halloween. That's not this movie. Remember that I said this is not a monster movie like some horrors. This is pure, historical witchcraft. This is not a religious movie, nor is it a Satanic movie. This is an honest movie that doesn't take sides and doesn't hold back. Satanic rituals happen. People do horrible, disturbing things because of these Satanic rituals. And that's why this movie works so well. Yes, the buildup is excellent. But if the meat of the movie felt hokey and fake, this wouldn't have had the same impact it does. The fact that it feels so real and is based on actual accounts make this disturbing and unsettling. Yes, horror movies use the "based on actual events" as a cheap gimmick all the time, but this is an instance where it wasn't just a gimmick. It felt real. People were hung for witchcraft back in the 1600's. Just read about the Salem witch trials or other similar events. This was no joke for them and after watching this, you'll know why.

There's more elements to this idea of witchcraft that I want to discuss, especially after hearing who endorsed this movie, but now is not the time. See the movie then we can talk spoilers privately. Just know that overall I really appreciated The Witch for going against the really annoying and trashy horror cliches that give the genre a bad name. I like the horror genre and it's because of movies like this. Instead of using cheap jump scares and other stuff like that, this is a slow-building horror movie that uses cinematography, production design, music, acting, and story to deliver a horror movie that is actually genuinely creepy and unsettling. The subject matter it dives into is very honest and real, thus is a movie that will probably stick with me for a long time. I can't recommend this to everyone because of how disturbing it gets, but if you are a fan of good horror, go see this movie. Give them your money. I want this movie to make a decent amount of money so that Hollywood can see that they don't have to keep using cheap, stupid, horror gimmicks in order to make money and instead they can focus on actually making a good movie. I liked this even more than last year's It Follows and given time I can see this being on the same level as 2014's The Babadook, which was one of my favorite movies that year. Thus my initial grade for The Witch is a 9.5/10.

Deadpool Review

Seven years ago, the character of Wade Wilson as Deadpool made his theatrical debut in the movie X-Men Origins: Wolverine. There are many reasons why that movie was hated by most, but one of the big ones was how they portrayed Deadpool in the movie. The common nickname for Deadpool is the "Merc with a Mouth." Yet in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, they sewed his mouth shut. When you introduce a character best known for his talkative, fouth-mouthed, wise-cracking, fourth-wall-breaking nature, the one thing you don't do is sew his mouth shut. That's like the stupidest thing you could ever do. It's a good thing Fox listens to their fans, though, because ever since they totally mutilated the popular character, they've been on a mission to make things right. It's been a long process, but about two years, some test footage was "leaked" on the internet of a new Deadpool movie that actually did justice to character and fans went crazy. This time in a positive way. Doing Deadpool right is a risky thing to do, but apparently the reaction to the test footage gave Fox the confidence to go forward with the project because it wasn't too much longer after that when the movie Deadpool was officially green-lit and put on the schedule for 2016. And now it's here. And yes, it's pretty awesome!!

I'm just going to come right out and say this. Before you go see Deadpool, know what you're getting yourself into. This is definitely a movie that's not for everyone and it's certainly not for kids. There's a lot of superhero movies out today that do a fantastic job of appealing to both adults and kids. I love superhero movies. That should be no secret. But a lot of my young nephews love them, too. The cross-appeal is fantastic. But this movie is adults only. Don't take your kids. And look at the parents guide for this movie before seeing it yourself if you are on the fence about it. I'm not going to spend a ton of time diving into the rating or the content of the movie, but they don't hold back at all. They take advantage of being able to do whatever the heck they want and they have a lot of fun with it. This makes this a very unique movie superhero movie that I was actually super excited for. Probably a lot more than I should've been given the nature of this movie, if you know what I mean. But it's not the foul-mouthed, raunchy superhero movie that got me excited. In fact, I was hoping that they didn't get too carried away with that aspect. I was excited for a superhero movie that broke the fourth wall all the time and rose the stakes with the action. And it totally delivered!

So let's talk about the humor in this movie. The one thing that I was worried about is that all the humor in the movie would be poop jokes and sex jokes. I'm not a fan of that type of humor because it just doesn't make me laugh. There's a reason why you rarely see me review a raunchy comedy. I skip them. It's not because of the rating. It's because of the humor. Some of these are even able to pull off the PG-13 rating because they avoided the f-bomb enough and they avoided the nudity. Yet I still skip them because I find the humor tasteless and unfunny. Or if I do see them, I'm usually just not impressed. A great example of this comes from the TV side of things. Modern sit-coms. Most of them are TV appropriate as they avoid the f-bomb and nudity, but so many of them are nothing but sex jokes or toilet humor for the entire episode. Sit-coms in the 90's were hilarious because they were clean AND funny. Nowadays they just can't help themselves and so there are very few modern sit-coms that I just don't even give the time of day. So yes, back to Deadpool. Overall I was super excited, but I was worried that they would get too carried away with toilet humor. Thus I was nervous about that aspect of the movie. But to my pleasant surprise, they weren't as extreme on that level as I thought. There was a ton of honest, genuine humor. I laughed. A lot. Sure, there was plenty of toilet humor that I rolled my eyes at, but for the most part I was laughing my head off from start to finish.

No, I'm not going to compare Deadpool to the Marvel movies in terms of the style of humor, but strictly in terms of how often I laughed, this is on par with Iron Man or Guardians of the Galaxy. Chris Pratt in Guardians has his timing just perfectly. Same thing with Tony Stark in the Iron Man movies. Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool is the exact same. He's just a very funny person in this and all the humor is just spot on. As an actor, Ryan Reynolds sometimes gets a bad rap. Personally I've never hated the man's acting skills. He's just had a consistently terrible choice of movies. I've always felt that if he found the right role, he would shine. Well guys, he's found it. Ryan Reynolds was born to play Deadpool. He's just perfect in this role and absolutely hilarious. Most of the humor comes with how often Deadpool breaks the fourth wall. Not only does often stop and talk to the audience, but there are so many pop culture references in this. The movie pokes fun at Ryan Reynolds, it pokes fun at some of the roles he's had, it pokes fun at the Studio, it pokes fun at the Superhero phenomenon that has taken over our day, it pokes fun at other things and actors in Hollywood. And it doesn't stop. From beginning to end it is joke after joke after joke. And one of the best moments is actually the post-credits scene, so don't you dare leave when the credits start!

Humor isn't the only thing that this movie got right. They actually took the time to make a good movie. The story was a simple revenge story, so nothing super deep or creative, but there was a ton of serious, dramatic emotion. I don't want to give a ton of this away, but Wade Wilson is a very broken man. He doesn't consider himself super and he definitely doesn't consider himself a hero. He does find a girl that is just perfect for him, but before too long he is given a life-threatening diagnosis that leads him to make a very poor decision to trust the organization that eventually turn him into Deadpool. In addition to being very powerful, he is also extremely ugly and that leads him to an even worse decision to not return to his girl because of his new self-image issues. This adds a depth to the movie that I did not see coming. I expected to laugh and have fun. I did not expect a great, emotional drama to go along with that. Ryan Reynolds, in addition to pulling off the humor of Deadpool perfectly, also does an amazing job with the dramatic side of things. And the chemistry between him and his girl, played by Morena Baccarin, is great. Speaking of gutsy moves, it was definitely risky to do this movie in the first place. It was even riskier to spend so much time in this male-targeted movie on romance. But it totally works!

There are a few things I want to nit-pick at with Deadpool. The first is that this is an origin story. We've seen so many origin stories in the last five years that they've become less interesting. With Deadpool, this was definitely a thing that they had to do. Fox screwed up so bad with Wade Wilson in X-Men Origins: Wolverine that they had to spend this movie retelling the story of Wade Wilson the right way. No way around that. And they did do it in a clever way by starting the movie in the middle of the story then doing flashbacks to his origin throughout the first half. But it still didn't completely hide the fact that I was less interested in the first half of this movie than the second half. The story, while emotional, moving, and funny, was also super simplistic. This was in part a good thing because there are plenty of superhero movies that are too crowded or try to do too much, but at the same time this was a basic revenge story and that's certainly something that has been done plenty of times. Speaking of that revenge, the villain in this movie is good. Ed Skrein pulls off an amazing performance as this villain, which is especially impressive when considering he just came off that recent Transporter movie, but we don't really dive into his character at all, so I can't call him a great villain.

I hope you don't get too angry at these complaints. Sometimes when a movie is being called the best thing since sliced bread and I don't give it a perfect score, people yell at me as if I hated it. That's slightly annoying. Don't be one of those people. In fact, this experience reminds me a lot of my experience with Guardians of the Galaxy. Hilarious movie. Great characters. Lot's of fun action. Very re-watchable. But it suffered a bit because it had to spend time introducing these brand new characters we didn't know and they couldn't introduce the ultimate villain in the first movie. So I didn't call it the best Marvel movie. But it was still a good movie. And with how well they did at introducing their universe, it means the sequel has a good chance of being even better because they have those aspects completely out of the way. Same thing with Deadpool. They had to re-tell his story the right way. And I don't know who Wade Wilson's arch-nemesis is, but whoever it is, he or she can't be introduced and killed off in the first movie, so they had to start small. But all this means that now that this setup movie is out of the way, they have even more freedom in the next movie to jump right into the action and have a ton of fun.

So yes, I did have a lot of fun with Deadpool. It was a surprisingly well-rounded movie. Not only was it laugh-out-loud hilarious from start to end, especially with all the fourth-wall breaking they did, but it was a way fun action movie. Perhaps not as crazy and insane as last year's Valentines action hit, Kingsman: The Secret Service, but I still had a lot of fun. On top of the comedy and the action, this also has a good amount of emotion to this as it about a broken man in Wade Wilson that has a lot of newly-found self-image issues after what he just got turned into and this makes for a surprisingly well-done romance story. Yes, Deadpool suffers a bit from origin-story-itis, but that just means that they have room to make amazing sequels as they did a brilliant job of setting up this new Deadpool world. There's a lot of big superhero movies coming out this year. Namely we have Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, Captain America: Civil War, X-Men: Apocalypse, Suicide Squad, and Doctor Strange. That's a pretty dang good lineup. As such, there's a good chance that I will end up enjoying some of those movies more than Deadpool, but that's okay. We don't have to live in a world where everything is either amazing or horrible. We can have just plain good. And that's what Deadpool is. It's a good movie. My grade for it is an 8/10. 

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Review

If I'm being perfectly honest, I'm not a huge fan of Pride and Prejudice. I know I'm not the target audience, but I do know plenty of guys who are Pride and Prejudice fans, so I figure I should start a Pride and Prejudice review by letting you know that. I did actually sit down once and watch the six-hour version of Prejudice and Prejudice once. I told myself that I needed to do that so I can form my own opinion, but man that was possibly the longest six hours of my movie watching career. If I were to sit down and write a review of that, there would be plenty of positive things to say about it, but six hours of pure romance drama is a little more than I can handle. That was about five years ago. Since then I still haven't been courageous enough to give the much shorter Keira Knightley version a shot. One day. But when I first heard that they were doing a movie that added zombies to the Pride and Prejudice story, my face lit up like a little schoolboy. I didn't even care what the reviews were on the movie. I expected them to be bad (and they were), but I just wanted this to be a fun, guilty pleasure movie. That's not asking too much is it? Apparently so, because this movie was a bore.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is actually based on a novel written by Seth Grahame-Smith, who also wrote Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, which was adapted into a movie back in 2012. Just looking at the titles of those two stories, you can get an idea of this guy's writing style. They should translate into fun horror comedies where you can just sit back and enjoy. I never actually saw Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, so I can't comment on that movie. I also haven't read the book Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, so I can't compare this movie to the novel. I just know that I wanted a fun horror comedy. In fact, a zombie romance movie does exist. It's called Warm Bodies and it was released on the same exact weekend three years ago. Personally I thought that movie did a great job of balancing fun zombie action with believable romance and great comedy. I laughed, I was touched, and I had a ton of fun. That's all I wanted from Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. I didn't expect much. I just wanted a good balance between zombies and romance with some good laughs. That balance here is the problem. It's way off. Thus while the premise of the movie is a good one, the execution was just terrible and this instead comes off as a big mess.

The movie actually starts off really promising. We get some sort of introduction about how all of this zombie stuff started and I didn't really follow any of that, but who cares. We're in 19th Century England and there are five Bennett sisters who have a mother that is trying her hardest to get them all married off and there are zombies to deal with. That's all I need to know. The movie actually starts off with Mr. Darcy and man this guy is a boss. I don't know if he's a Mr. Darcy that all the girls are going to fall madly in love with, but that's okay. He's just an ordinary dude that cares more about fighting zombies than all this romance jazz and thus he comes off as a very down-to-earth, relatable Mr. Darcy. And the opening scene with him is him walking into a room, detecting a hidden zombie, and beating the living bejeebers out of it was so awesome. That schoolboy grin that I got when this movie was announced was huge during this scene. Then we get introduced to this super boss group of Bennett sisters who aren't just dainty females searching for husbands. They are trained warriors and when there's zombies around, they totally own. At their first dance in the movie, everything is going all hunky-dory with this romance stuff and then zombies show up. All the Bennett sisters pull up their dresses a bit to reveal their hidden swords and they just go to town on the zombies. I was loving life.

In talking about how great Mr. Darcy was in this movie, I also have to mention how awesome his eventual female counterpart is. Elizabeth Bennett. She's also not super invested in this romance stuff and she sure as heck is never accepting a man who demands her to put down her swords when she gets married. That sucks for Matt Smith, but is a huge plus for Mr. Darcy because he is also a zombie fighter. The two were like meant for each other. I don't know why they took the whole movie to figure this out. They should've just noticed that each is a super boss zombie fighter, realized that they have a ton in common, and hook up so we could spend most of the movie watching them fight zombies as a super boss zombie-fighting couple. But no. More on that in a second. Back to Elizabeth Bennett. Or more specifically now, Lily James as Elizabeth Bennett. This sister is on a role right now. Last year I called her the best Cinderella I've seen and now this year I'm calling her the best Elizabeth Bennett. Not only is she so gorgeous, but she's also way down-to-earth and relatable. I feel like I could walk up to her and just be her friend. The fact that she's a super boss zombie fighter makes her even better. She pulls that off so perfectly. Not only would she be perfect in any other live-action princess movie, but this girl could transform into a believable action star. After seeing this movie, I totally want that to happen now.

So yes. This movie started off super strong and I totally believed that I was going to go against the grain with this movie and give it a positive review despite all the crap that has been said about it. That's what I wanted to do. But then the middle of the movie happened. Holy fetch this was a train wreck. We started off with some amazing zombie sequences, but then I swear that this movie went like an hour without any zombies at all. Or when they did show up, they showed up in weird, random spots where they probably shouldn't have shown up. Instead the movie spent a ton of time trying to do justice to the Pride and Prejudice part of the story. This is not inherently bad. But if they were going to go that route, this needed to be done with great precision and fantastic writing. I'm fine with building up a story. I'm fine with waiting a while before introducing our monsters. But man was this bad. The idea behind Pride and Prejudice is more than just a love triangle. It's like a love web. We have a fairly decent-sized group of sisters and we have several males that are introduced that are trying to win their hearts. We go through a lot of drama and a lot of guys hunting after the same girl before they all settle down. There's a reason why the most praised version of this movie is six hours long. There's a ton of story. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies tried to cram it all into 45 minutes before we transitioned into the zombie story. Because it was so poorly done, it ended up being super boring.

Not every second is bad in this middle sequence. The aforementioned Matt Smith from Doctor Who is one of our many males introduced to win the sisters' hearts and he provides some great comic relief as he steals every scene he is in. In fact, he does so good that I wish he were cast as our other lead male opposite Mr. Darcy. Mr. Bingley I think? Whatever his name is, he's the dude who ends up with Jane and the actual guy who played him was nothing more than a pretty face. His acting was bland and his character felt useless. If Matt Smith were playing him, though, that would great! There were also a few other non-Matt Smith scenes that kept my interest. One such scene is when Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth get into an all out fight after his first proposal and quite honestly that might be the most entertaining scene of the whole movie, especially when Matt Smith walked in and saw the aftermath of a destroyed room. I wish more of the movie had the uptempo feel of that scene. That would've been great. Instead we got a great beginning, a mostly boring middle with a few fun scenes scattered throughout, and a really lame ending. Like seriously. I don't want to talk too much about the end, but the whole movie is building up to what you think is going to be an epic zombie fight and literally nothing interesting happens. So much potential with this and it was completely wasted.

I do want to talk about the zombies real quick. I've heard the opinion that the only good zombie movie you can do is an R-rated zombie movie. I disagree. Warm Bodies and World War Z are two great examples of PG-13-rated zombie movies. So it is possible to great with either style. But you have to commit to one way or the other. This movie decided to go for the graphic, disgusting, gruesome zombies with blood and gore splattering everyone when you killed them. But it wanted to do so in a PG-13 movie. Thus zombies didn't show up nearly enough and when they did, most of the attacks were done off screen. We'd see a zombie running at a character, then for the attack we'd either have a shot of that character attacking something or go to fist person zombie mode, then we'd get a shot of the dead zombie on the ground. It wasn't entertaining and it was poorly edited. I could tell they wanted to make this R, but they also wanted the teenage audience to show up on Valentine's Day, so they tried to the R-rated style in a PG-13 movie and it clashed big time. And like I said, there's not satisfying final battle in this movie. There's actually a mid-credits scene that teases a sequel. While I won't spoil that, I will say that this mid-credits scene should've been stretched out for 10-15 minutes and been our final battle. But no. And now that sequel will never happen because this movie was a box office bomb.

In the end, if you want to watch a zombie romance movie this Valentine's Day, I'd recommend that you stay home and re-watch Warm Bodies. That movie is essentially Romeo and Juliet with zombies except with a different ending and they do a great job of balancing zombie action with a believable romance and great comedy. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is a great idea, but overall is a very poorly written screenplay that fails to succeed at either of those three. Sure, there's a few sequences of fun zombie action. But they are all in the opening act where the movie didn't hold back. Some of the characters had good romantic chemistry. But most of the Pride and Prejudice part of this movie is very rushed and poorly done, yet it takes up most of the movie. They didn't find a good zombie/romance balance and I think a big part of the problem was that they were trying too hard to keep this movie PG-13, so they shied away from most of the zombie stuff and went about things in a very poorly done style when they did include it. Comedy is there in the movie. I laughed at several moments, but not enough to call this an actual comedy. The acting is great, especially Lily James and Matt Smith. So there is plenty of good, but overall this movie is just wasted potential. My grade for it is a 6/10.

Hail, Caesar! Review

The Coen Brothers have been doing this movie thing for quite some time. A when they make a movie, they make a movie. As in they often direct, write, produce, and edit their movies. Typically their movies are pretty darn good, as well, as they are know for movies such as Fargo, The Big Lebowski, No Country for Old Men, and True Grit. So when it's announced that they are making a new movie, that's something to be excited for. However, it's worth noting that on a personal note, I didn't quite let myself get too excited for this movie. There were some people that had this movie as their most anticipated movie of the entire year or one of their most anticipated movies. That wasn't me. Yes, I was excited, which is why I had it on the good side of my 2016 movie preview, but I had my expectations tempered a bit because the Coen Brothers' last outing, Inside Llewyn Davis, left something to be desired for in my opinion. They also helped write the screenplay for Unbroken, another movie that I was disappointed in. So I knew very well that despite everything they've accomplished, they're not infallible. I'm glad I went in with my expectations tempered because this is an outing from the Coen Brothers that I really just don't get.

Hail, Caesar! is a movie that is set in the 1950's and is essentially about a day in the life of a film studio back in the day. This is not a true story of an actual studio or movie. All the names of actors, directors, movies, studios, etc. are completely fictional, but there are a lot of parallels to the actual 1950's with the types of movies and situations with the actors and whatnot. Thus the movie is an homage to old film, which is cool. There are several movies within this movie that are followed, the main one being Hail, Caesar!, a biblical epic that tells the story of the life of Christ from the vantage point of a Roman soldier. They are almost finished filming this movie when the lead actor gets drugged and kidnapped. This is the story that was advertised a lot in the trailers and thus I thought the movie was going to be an uptempo, comedic thrill ride where some of the cast and crew go on a big search to get their star back. No, this is not really the case. Comedic, yes. Uptempo? No. Thrill ride? No. This is actually a slow, drawn-out movie where the tone is all over the place and the focus doesn't really seem to be there. In fact, we bounce around quite a bit showing several different movies that are in the process of being made and the central character is a guy who is head of the studio and is trying to juggle a whole bunch of things, both with his work and with his personal life.

I don't want to just totally tear this movie apart, so lets start with the good. The look of the movie was very good. Being that this was an homage to old film, this definitely had the look and feel of an older movie. The color schemes in the movie were great as were the costume designs and set designs. It felt like I was watching an old 50's movie. On top of that, the great Roger Deakins was out cinematographer and he was great as always. There were a lot of great shots in this film and great camera work. Some of the edits in the movie were a little jolting, but overall all the technical aspects of this movie were spot on and this was a well-designed movie. I was also completely glued in to the first half of the movie. I loved the fact that we were watching a film about a film. We would be watching a scene that felt like it was an actual movie from the 50's and then we heard the directors voice and suddenly we noticed that we were on a set. This was a lot of fun. Then the directors would give advice to the actors or the actors would forget a line or mess up somehow. Then we jumped to another movie set and did the same thing. Or we would cut to Josh Brolin's character, who was the head of the studio and we saw him doing a bunch of behind the scenes work to make sure everything is running smoothly. It started off a lot of fun.

But then we kept going. The individual scenes were a lot of fun. There were a lot of great performances by a lot of people who were spot on with acting like they were actors from back in the day. But before too long I was realizing that the movie was just dragging on. It appeared that the Coen Brothers were having fun paying homage to the 50's, but they forgot to include a plot for us to follow. I thought when George Clooney that we were just going to focus on that storyline, but that was only a part of the movie. And honestly I didn't think that storyline was all that interesting. The idea behind it was good. But they didn't do much with it. Halfway through the movie, I started to get bored. There was nothing to follow and no one to care too much about. It was almost like a skit movie where a bunch of different, random skits are strung together as one movie. Then we got to a point where I was still waiting for things to pick up. I was wanting the movie to go somewhere or dive deep into a storyline or start to get emotional. Nothing. Suddenly a thought struck me during one specific scene. Are we about to end? No we can't end right now. We still haven't... oh. It's over. The movie just... ended. What?!?!?! Did that really... just... wow!

From a fairly young age, I was taught the format that stories follow. This is like basic English class stuff with that bell curve and all? We get introduced to our characters, then some sort of conflict begins. This leads to the rising action and at the peak of the curve is our climax. Then we get the falling action followed by the resolution and end stuff. I'm botching all of that terminology, but hopefully you have that picture in your head. I didn't feel like Hail, Caesar! followed that. Instead of the movie being like a bell curve, it felt like a straight line that was going for a while and just abruptly stopped. I sat there during the end credits and during the drive home feeling like I missed something. Like there's some sort of deeper meaning and hidden story within the story. I didn't find that. I don't know what the point of the movie was. I couldn't find any real strong themes. What was the goal of the Coen Brothers with this film? What were they trying to say? I really don't know. Some movies you do have to watch once or twice to fully understand things. I get that. Maybe if I watch it again, then I will pick up on more things or I'll discover a new movie within the movie. I don't know. Right now I just feel confused. Not at the plot. I know exactly what happened. I'm just confused at what the point of this movie is.

I'm not going to call this a bad movie. It isn't. The movie is an homage to old film and that I thought was cool. The cast in this movie is huge and they all do a great job. Most of the cast, like Scarlett Johansson and Jonah Hill, felt more like cameos, but still. Their segments were good. The three main actors that we actually followed were Josh Brolin, George Clooney, and Alden Ehranreich. They all were great. The comedy was fantastic as there were several laugh-out-loud scenes. All the technical aspects of the movie were spot on. So there's a lot to love. But as a whole, I don't know what the point of this movie was. I couldn't find a solid theme or a purpose for the movie. It just felt like a day in the life of an old 1950's film studio with little substance and I kinda found it boring. Honestly this is exactly how I felt about Inside Llewyn Davis. I felt that movie was just a week in the life of a struggling 60's folk singer with little substance. Yet some people called that movie the best movie of 2013 and one of the best this decade. So perhaps I'm missing something with this movie. Maybe I need to spend more time thinking about it. Maybe I need to watch it once or twice more. I fully admit that. Perhaps my opinion will change over time, but initially my grade for the movie is a 6.5/10.

Movie Preview: February 2016

Thanks in part to some very strong December holdovers and expansions (namely Star Wars: The Force Awakens, The Revenant, and Daddy's Home), the first month of the year was quite a success as it became the second straight January to earn over $1 billion at the box office. Now we're onto February, which is historically one of the lower-grossing months of the year as it actually has to rely on its own new releases as opposed to holiday holdovers. Generally the first two months of the year aren't where studios release their biggest films, thus is why this time of year is typically known as the dumping ground for Hollywood. However, recently Hollywood has learned that movies can actually make money in February as The LEGO Movie was a huge hit just two years ago and last year had three movies released this month that went onto make over $100 million at the domestic box office. This revelation added to the fact that it is Valentine's Day this month has made it so this February is actually fairly busy as there are several titles that should appeal to a lot of people. So let's dive in and take a look!

February 5th - 7th-

First up this month is a movie that probably would be getting a lot of Oscar buzz if it was released at the end of the year instead of the beginning. Hail, Caesar! is that movie. Joel and Ethan Coen are two of the most well-known filmmakers as they have written and directed many beloved films for movie fans such as No Country for Old Men, Fargo, The Big Lebowski, and the True Grit remake. Not only are they known as great directors, but they've also done a whole lot of producing, writing, and editing for a huge number of films. All this work has earned them a whopping 14 Oscar nominations. Hail, Caesar! is the whole package for them as they wrote, directed, produced, and edited the movie. They also had Roger Deakins on board as the cinematographer and a huge cast that includes Josh Brolin, George Clooney, Alden Ehrenreich Ralph Fiennes, Scarlett Johannson, Tilda Swinson, Frances McDormand, Channing Tatum, and Jonah Hill. Like I said, the Oscars would be all over this if this was released at the end of the year. We'll see if it can pull off what The Grand Budapest Hotel did at last year's Oscars. The movie is a comedy about the making of a 1950's movie called Hail, Caesar! and what the crew has to do when their lead star goes missing.

It wouldn't be February without a romance drama would it? Even better, a Nicholas Sparks movie? This year's edition is The Choice, which is the 11th Nicholas Sparks movie. They started with A Message in a Bottle in 1999 and have been almost an annual thing since 2010. I don't need to really tell you what the movie is about. Boy meets girl. Boy and girl fall in love. Boy and girl experience a falling out that almost causes their relationship to end. Boy and girl overcome whatever problem and live happily ever after. That accurately describes every Nicholas Sparks romance drama ever made. The difference is the leader actors and a slight variation in the setup. This year's boy and girl are Benjamin Walker and Teresa Palmer. Typically these movies have had a good track record at the box office, especially the ones that actually get released around Valentine's Day. But the last two have actually completely bombed. Are people finally getting tired of these movies or is a resurgence in store this month?

Speaking of romance dramas, arguably the most popular movie or book in the genre is Pride and Prejudice. Most girls you talk to know and love this story and for good reason. This month the story is back on the big story. This time around there's a huge twist, though. All you have to do is look at the title to know what it is: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. This comes from the same author that penned Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter and is another ridiculous action comedy that will obviously appeal more towards the male gender than the female gender. Do females really want to see a movie that adds zombies to their beloved story? Targeting males this weekend does pose two major problems. The first is that most guys will be preoccupied with Super Bowl 50 this Sunday, which will affect this movie much more than the other two this weekend as people don't necessarily rush out to see a Coen Brothers film on opening weekend and a Nicholas Sparks movie appeals more to teenagers and females. The other problem is that the male audience are probably much more interested in next weekend's Deadpool than this. At the same time, though, this does have a built in audience because of the book which could give it a chance to beat out the other two this weekend.

February 12th - 15th-

The second weekend of February houses both Valentine's Day and Presidents in the same four-day weekend, which will make this a very lucrative weekend, especially with the three movies that are on the table. The biggest of these three is none other than Fox's highly anticipated Deadpool. A while back, Deadpool test footage was "leaked" onto the internet. I put that into quotation marks because you wonder if that was secretly done on purpose to see how audiences would react. Well, purposely done or not, people nearly lost their minds with how excited that made them, which gave Fox the confidence to move forward. Deadpool is a very popular comic book character in Marvel comics and a very unique one at that. Not only does he break the fourth wall all the time, but he's also a very foul-mouthed, raunchy superhero. Doing him justice requires a very strong R, hence the hesitation for the studio. R-rated superhero movies don't usually go over too well in the box office. There's a reason most are only PG-13. It's very risky to go higher, but Fox is taking that risk and based on reactions from fans, it's looking like a nice reward will be in play. This will help many erase the bad memory of X-Men Origins: Wolverine's version of Deadpool, which is a big part of the reason why many didn't like that movie.

The weekend's second release is another highly anticipated movie and that is Zoolander 2. Looking at the numbers, it might not seem like a Zoolander sequel is a great idea. Zoolander only made $45 million at the box office, it's been 15 years since it's release, and reviews weren't that great in the first place. However, since its release Zoolander has become a bit of a cult classic as its audience has grown quite a bit in the last 15 years. So a sequel actually does make sense and many people are excited. It will definitely have competition from Deadpool, but the movies are different enough that they both should play well. The whole crew is back for this sequel as Ben Stiller is on as director and star again and Will Ferrell and Owen Wilson join him as co-stars. There's also several newcomers to the cast as well as a huge list of big cameos that should make this a very fun outing for Zoolander fans.

The final release of the weekend is a very timely comedy called How to Be Single. Valentine's Day is usually a great day for people that have a significant other, but it can be a depressing day for those who are single. Hollywood always gives movies around this time for the former, but rarely is there a movie that panders to the latter, which is what this comedy is. It's a comedy that where a bunch of people need to learn how to be single in a world with a constantly changing definition of love. This is a premise that could work very well, but yet it is a raunchy comedy that is definitely targeted towards adults and not teenagers, which could limit its potential on this Valentine's Day weekend. Raunchy comedies do have a good track record as of late and this has a great cast led by Rebel Wilson, Dakota Johnston, and Leslie Mann, all of whom are fairly popular as of late. It just has a lot of competition to fight through, so we'll see how this all shapes up.

February 19th - 21st-

Valentine's Day holdovers will most certainly dominate this third weekend, Deadpool especially. But three more movies will make their way to theaters this weekend, giving people plenty of options. First up is Risen. In the last couple of years, faith-based films have been doing very well. At around this time two years ago, Son of God, God's Not Dead, and Heaven is for Real all did amazing. Having faith-based films in the market isn't enough anymore to get huge box office results as there have been plenty of failures. These studios need to give people unique, quality films in order to convince people to keep coming out, which is what Risen is attempting. The story of Christ has been told a thousand times. But Risen is taking a unique angle as it tells the story of the resurrection of Christ from the angle of a Roman Soldier who doesn't believe in Christ. This specific angle is one that hasn't been explored too deeply, so this definitely could attract an audience. Ralph Fiennes' younger brother Joseph Fiennes, who recently has been put in the media spotlight for being cast as Michael Jackson in an upcoming TV movie, is the star here. Tom Felton will co-star with him as the two will be out to disprove the rumor of a resurrected Messiah.

Next up we get a biopic of a very important figure in sports history. Race tells the story of track and field legend Jesse Owens as he competed in the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, Germany. He was a black athlete competing on the world stage during Hitler's reign in Nazi Germany. A few years back, the movie 42 was another sports biopic tackling similar themes as it told the story of baseball legend Jackie Robinson. That movie played very well both with critics and at the box office, so there is potential here. Although sports dramas of late haven't been the biggest box office drama. Disney struggled to find an audience with both Million Dollar Arm and McFarland, USA despite positive reviews, the latter being released at this same exact time last year. We'll see if Focus Features can have better luck here with Race.

And finally, we have a horror movie that wowed audiences at Sundance in January of 2015 and that is The Witch. Getting praise at Sundance doesn't always equate to huge box office numbers, though. Last year's other big Sundance hits, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl and Dope, only earned $6.8 million and $17.5 million respectively. Brooklyn was another big Sundance hit from 2015 and even with a few huge Oscar nominations (best picture and best actress), it's only managed to get to $30.8 million. Most general audiences won't see The Witch as a Sundance hit they need to see. They'll just see it as another horror movie and with so many being released recently, it might be hard for The Witch to find an audience, especially with no name brand attached to it. Last month The Forest and The Boy both barely cracked $10 million in their opening weekends. If The Witch can get to that mark, that'll be a win. It'll have to rely on positive word of mouth to earn its money, which could be the case. This is a horror movie that goes back to witchcraft in New England in the 1600's, which isn't your typical backdrop for a horror movie these days.

February 26th - 28th-

In the final weekend of February, we start with a big-budget fantasy adventure that could have a bit of a rough ride and that is Gods of Egypt. The production budget for this movie is reported to be $140 million, which means it hopes to have a box office run similar to that of Clash of the Titans, another movie about ancient mythical gods. Although the Greek gods like Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades are probably more recognizable than what this movie is presenting, so it's at a disadvantage there. Gods of Egypt has also received a fair share of backlash for casting mostly white actors and actresses to play ancient Egyptian characters, so that's another disadvantage. Finally, the marketing has been strong, but people don't seem to treating this is as a movie that they really need to see in theaters. All this equates to this movie having a huge uphill battle to climb, which will be especially hard with how crowded March is. I'm guessing that this will need a lot of help from international markets in order to make a profit, which is actually where the aforementioned Clash of the Titans made most of its money, so it's possible that could happen here as well.

Speaking of sports dramas, we have two in two weeks this month as Eddie the Eagle hits theaters a week after Race does. Neither seems to be in for a super box office run, but Eddie the Eagle seems to be the lesser of the two as it's a movie about Great Britain's first ski jumper, Michael "Eddie" Edwards, to enter the winter Olympics. It's a much less intriguing story than Jesse Owens running in the Olympics during Nazi Germany. How many people interested in a movie about a ski jumper? On the flip side, though, what the movie does have going for it is the cast. Taron Egerton broke out in a huge way last February as he starred in Kingsman: The Secret Service. He plays the lead role of Eddie in this movie. He'll have Hugh Jackman as a co-star, which also helps. Although it remains to be seen if Egerton can be a box office draw after just one huge hit and Jackman isn't immortal when it comes to the box office as he starred in two huge duds last year in Chappie and Pan. Fox did purchase a Super Bowl spot to advertise this movie, so they're certainly hoping for the best.

As our final wide release of the month, we have the crime thriller Triple 9. This movie boasts quite the big cast which includes, but is not limited to, Casey Affleck, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Anthony Mackie, Aaron Paul, Norman Reedus, Woody Harrelson, and Kate Winslet. Triple 9 is a heist movie where a gang of criminals and corrupt cops plan to murder a certain police officer in order to pull off a huge heist. A lot of craziness will ensue with double-crossing, revenge, and greed playing a huge role it what will be quite the action-packed movie. Adults wanting a straight-up action movie don't have a whole ton of options this month, so with this premise in mind added to the loaded cast, this one has the potential to become a bit of a sleeper hit. But potential is the big word there. A lot of action movies, especially ones with a strong rating, come and go without being noticed, especially when it comes to the beginning of the year. Something like Kingsman: The Secret Service is more of the exception than the rule and Triple 9 seems to be targeting even more of a niche audience, which will definitely limit it's potential.

Netflix is becoming even bigger right now as straight-to-Netflix is becoming a popular platform to release both new TV shows and new movies. Thus it's definitely worth mentioning the straight-to-Netflix release Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny as the final movie this month. Recently TV shows like Daredevil and Jessica Jones became huge Netflix releases. Fuller House is an example of another highly anticipated TV show that will be debuting on Netflix this month. On the movie front, Beasts of No Nation is an example of a major movie that debuted on Netflix at the end of last year and was thought to be a huge Oscar contender (although it got completely snubbed). This year there will be several movies debuting on Netflix as both Netflix and Amazon were at the Sundance Film Festival this past month purchasing movies. A sequel to the huge 2000 hit Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon has been in talks for a while now and recently the Weinstein Company made a deal to release the sequel on Netflix. The initial idea was to release it in IMAX theaters in addition to Netflix, but a lot of theaters dropped out of that. It still might get a small theatrical release, but the streaming service release is the big draw here. Different director and mostly different cast with this sequel, but it does bring back star Michelle Yeoh, so there is a connection there.