Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore Review

I remember when it was a huge deal every time a new entry in the Harry Potter franchise was released, whether it be book or movie. The books were first released when I was in Elementary School. The final book came the summer after my senior year in High School. It was such a magical experience going to Barnes and Noble at midnight on the release of a new book. I was 12 years old when the first movie was released in theaters and going to that theater with my friend was one of the most memorable theatrical experiences I’ve had. And then it was so fun going to the midnight showings of each ensuing movie, which at that time period was an absolute party and riot waiting in line for the whole evening, bringing games and snacks to keep yourself busy while you waiting.

I also remember being in college and seeing the release of “The Deathly Hallows: Part 2” in theaters. On the drive home I think my friend was complaining at certain changes that were made to the finale, which was understandable. But I was overcome with emotion because it felt like it was truly the end of an era.

Then the Fantastic Beasts movies came out.

Oh boy.

As a friend of mine always says, never believe Hollywood when they say something is the final chapter. And when you have access to a world that is as expansive and popular as the Wizarding World, you find ways to continue, but it’s been a very bumpy and messy ride to say the least. A Broadway show called “The Cursed Child” was released. And while my theater friends claim the show itself is incredible, I read that book version of what the play is and that is an ugly nightmare that felt like an atrociously written fan fiction. J.K. Rowling, our beloved creator of this particular fictional universe, has potentially proven that she caught lightning in a bottle because none of her ensuing works have panned out. And she won’t shut up on Twitter as she’s constantly bullying and harassing the transgender community.

And, of course, there’s these Fantastic Beasts film. Which I’ve gotta say that I really enjoyed the first movie. It wasn’t towards the top of my Harry Potter movie rankings. It was somewhere in the middle. But it was still a very enjoyable movie that explored a new area in the Wizarding World with some different characters and unique ideas. I was on board with the direction it was heading. Until I felt like I got clocked in the face so hard with the “Crimes of Grindelwald” sequel. Not only was that a massive nothing of a movie that existed solely as a bridge film to set up the next movie, but they did an excellent job of insulting the intelligence of all of us Potter fans by having some massive continuity errors that showed that J.K. Rowling, the screenwriter for the movie, had no idea how well us fans knew her world. Or perhaps she just didn’t care. Some of these continuity errors are actually completely retconned in this new movie, which I find absolutely hilarious as it shows to me that they are completely making this up as they go. Which, sure, that’s always the case when you’re writing fiction. But what I mean is that it doesn’t seem like there’s a plan. The best storytelling often involves having a final destination and at least an outline of what you want to do before you actually do it. When you decide to play a game of telephone with your series and/or aimlessly make things up as you go, the final results aren’t typically going to work out for you.

And on top of all that, there’s even more behind-the-scenes drama as they have fired Johnny Depp as Grindelwald. And I know the Johnny Depp and Amber Heard situation is a giant mess, but if one does their best to objectively look into the facts of the case instead of having a knee-jerk reaction to the media reports, one might come to realize that it’s Depp that’s the victim here with Heard as abuser. Not the other way around. Yet Depp loses his job and Heard still gets her role in Aquaman 2. So there remains an ugly stench about the whole thing. Perhaps its karma that Ezra Miller has now been arrested twice in the last month for assault, with a whole bunch of other additional allegations on top of that? It’s now a double mess watching this movie with Ezra Miller in this movie, Johnny Depp not in this movie, and knowing that Heard and Miller both have major roles in upcoming DC movies.

Yet it’s important to note with all of this behind-the-scenes drama that I’m not in a position to want to boycott any of these movies. Sure, the Depp/Heard, Ezra Miller, and J.K. Rowling situations are rather gross, but there are so many others who worked so hard on these projects to give us all quality entertainment. It’s not fair to them to get punished for things beyond their control. Which is why I still gave this movie a fair shot and tried my hardest to enjoy it. When push comes to shove, it’s the quality of the final product that matters the most.

And in terms of the final product, I can sadly tell you that if you did choose to skip this movie for whatever reason, whether it be Rowling’s tweets, Depp’s firing, or just a lack of interest following the atrocities of the second film, you’re not missing anything.

To the credit of this third movie, I do think there was an honest effort to try to take a turn and make a movie that the fans would enjoy. And I can say that almost solely based on the end credits stating that this movie was written by Steve Kloves and J.K. Rowling, based on a screenplay by J.K. Rowling. That’s some curious wording right there. I would be very interested to know more about how exactly everything went down, but initial reports seem to suggest that Rowling had the screenplay for this third movie written very shortly after the second movie was released. And she was the sole credited writer on both of the first two Fantastic Beasts movies, which is an issue in and of itself as writing a screenplay for a movie is a much different task than writing a novel. Two very different skillsets. But yet the fact that this is the first in the Fantastic Beasts franchise to include Steve Kloves as a writer and uses that wording of “Based on a screenplay by…” suggests some massive rewrites to the screenplay after they saw the reaction to the second movie and then read what Rowling had in mind for the third movie. And to that I give them credit for trying to steer the ship in the proper direction. I just don’t think they were successful enough to have completely saved the movie.

In fact, it now just feels even messier in hindsight, even if this specific movie is probably not as bad as it could’ve been. It just screams of conflicting ideas that didn’t quite work out. And as much as it pains me to say this, I think it’s time to drop Rowling from her own universe and it’s time to just end the Fantastic Beasts franchise and try something different. With fresh eyes and a different perspective. And no, I’m not saying end this franchise by making one final film, I’m saying end the franchise right here with this third movie. And given that there’s new ownership at the top of Warner Bros. with them not being owned by AT&T and merging with Discovery, I could realistically see the rest of this franchise being canceled, especially with the atrocious box office receipts so far. And I’m not going to be upset one bit.

But the movie, Adam. The movie. The details of the movie. Yeah, this is not a review I labeled as a spoiler review, so I will try to be somewhat vague with certain thoughts. But at the same time, the movie has now been out for a week, so those of you that were planning on seeing it most likely already have. If you do want to see it and just haven’t been able to yet, feel free to skim this review or come back later. If you’ve already seen it or you don’t care, then proceed. Again, not full spoilers, but I might go in slightly more depth than I would’ve otherwise to fully express what it is that I’m talking about here.

I honestly think in hindsight that the biggest problem that this movie has is that of an identity crisis. It doesn’t know if it wants to be a Fantastic Beasts movie or a Dumbledore vs. Grindelwald prequel. I don’t know what the original idea was vs. the re-writes, but I could see a scenario where Rowling was fully on board with the Dumbledore prequel, but the re-writes made it more about Fantastic Beasts. Maybe I’m completely wrong with that, but one of the many complaints about “Crimes of Grindelwald” was that it nearly abandoned the idea of the Fantastic Beasts, which was one of the more fun and unique elements of the first movie. Regardless of who had what idea, there does seem to be a bit of an overcorrection for this movie while also having it do the Dumbledore story. And the final result is a movie revolving around Grindelwald running to be the head, or Supreme Mugwump, of the International Confederation of Wizards, an election that’s almost completely decided by a fantastical creature called a Qilin that sees into your soul and bows to you if you’re worthy.

There are a number of questions I have about that, but it’s mainly confusing to me that a society of wizards that’s so advanced runs an election that’s so old-fashioned. Sure, the people still decide who they want. But they seem to put all their trust into which candidate this creature bows in front of. And that idea doesn’t make much sense to me. I think the only reason why they included it is that they had to make this a Fantastic Beasts movie. Unnecessary convolution based on fans complaining that there weren’t enough fantastic beasts in the last Fantastic Beasts movie.

And yet I’m not 100 percent sure that this will perfectly satisfy those wanting more fantastic beasts due to the brutal nature of this movie’s introduction. There’s some stuff with Dumbledore and Grindelwald to start the movie off, but then it leads into a very brutal scene where Newt Scamander tries to rescue a mother Quilin and her new baby twins, but has to watch as the mother gets killed and one of the babies gets kidnapped, then killed. Grindelwald uses some dark magic to make the dead baby they kidnapped walk around and do his bidding and thus fool the wizards voting in this election. If you were wanting more fantastic beasts, is this the fantastic beasts plot you were really hoping for? Of course the saving grace in the eyes of the movie is that one of the twins is kept alive and hidden in Newt’s magical suitcase. And they’re trying to eventually get to the point where they can stop Grindelwald from being elected, a thing that Dumbledore can’t do himself due to a blood pact that he made with Grindelwald earlier in life. But it’s still a bit more brutal and dark than it needed to be.

I’m also not really sure if I’m that interested in a fantasy movie where the main plot is revolved around an illegitimate election where one party completely rigs the election to get the supposed support of the people and the main heroes of the movie trying overturn or prevent the votes in order to get the right person in charge. And that’s not a matter of a political opinion one way or the other. It’s just a bit too on the nose. If I’m going to dive into the Wizarding World, I want that to be an escape from reality, not a direct reflection of all the frustratingly maddening political shenanigans that have been happening in the real world. There’s a time and a place for political dramas and documentaries trying to make a point and correct what’s going on, but inside of the Wizarding World is not that place.

But even if we look past all of that, I think there are more issues with the set-up to all of this. It’s a bit of a bumpy ride that I had a hard time perfectly following. Maybe some of that is my problem for not remembering all of the characters from the franchise and what their individual importance is. But my defense is that the movie should do a better job creating memorable characters that I want to follow. Of course I remember Newt Scamander and his muggle friend Jacob. And obviously a Potter fan does not simply forget about Dumbledore and Grindelwald. But there are so many other side characters involved in these adventures that are really hard to keep track of. And the movie seems so excited to have an Avengers-like team up of these characters joining Dumbledore’s first army of sorts in attacking Grindelwald that it forgets that said concept doesn’t work well if one doesn’t have strong connections to these characters.

Maybe I should’ve re-watched the first two movies prior to going into this new one. But I didn’t care to go back and revisit those. I did watch a “Cram It” video on the Fandom Entertainment YouTube Channel where they summarize the first two movies. But all that did is remind me how much of the specifics here have completely disappeared from my memory. And maybe that’s why I didn’t enjoy the whole movie as much as I wanted to or as much as some others have because the connection to these characters is mostly lost on me.

The movie also does a really good job at wandering through a myriad of subplots with many of these characters before we get to this whole election plot that is the main focus. And I couldn’t even spoil this if I wanted to do because the first hour of the movie did a horrible job of keeping my attention. We were going places and doing things. Newt was rescuing his brother from a dungeon thing. I couldn’t remember why his brother was there. I barely remembered that Newt had a brother. We gave Jacob a wand. Why? I don’t know. The only shot of him using the wand in the movie was in the trailer. And it doesn’t work because he’s not a wizard. But they were off doing something with some group of people. And despite the title of the second movie, Grindelwald was forgiven of his crimes for a reason I couldn’t remember. Oh, and did I tell you that the idea of an International Confederation of Wizards is one that was completely lost on me? Am I a bad Potter fan if I have no idea who they even are or why they are that important? Outside the Ministry of Magic in the books, I don’t think the Wizard leadership is explored that much, so now in a third Fantastic Beasts movie and tenth overall movie, I’m supposed to try to care about all of them? And even if I do assume they’re a powerful leadership group of wizards, who are the two other wizards running against Grindelwald in this movie?

There are individual sequences in this movie that work well enough. The sequence right before the election is a fun, fast-paced sequence with lots of magic battles as this group is putting into practice their plan to stop Grindelwald. I can be grumpy that no one ever says the spells they are about to use in this movie. It feels like the movie mostly ignores the rules of magic that the books set in place and just kinda does what it wants, but at least they had sequences that were entertaining scattered throughout. They just didn’t seem connected very well together and the overall direction of the movie with this election plot wasn’t a satisfying direction to go.

The actors all did a good job. Eddie Redmayne has definitely had an interesting career, but I like him as Newt Scamander. Dan Fogler steals most of the scenes he’s in as Jacob Kowalski. Jude Law is again the perfect choice for a young Dumbledore. And even though the firing of Depp leaves a pretty putrid stench, Mads Mikkelsen is the perfect Grindelwald. He makes a solid case that he should’ve been given the role from Day 1. And if we’re inferring a romantic relationship between Dumbledore and Grindelwald, Mads has much better chemistry with Jude Law than Depp did. The two of them actually play it very well as two people who used to care deeply for each other, and still kinda do despite having gone in completely opposite directions. I think if this franchise was specifically committed to being a Dumbledore prequel series from Day 1, that could’ve been an intriguing series, especially with these two actors.

The challenge with that angle is the movie is trying to have its cake and eat it, too. It wants to dive down this rabbit hole, but it also wants to be released in China, which sensors LGTQ content. So they pander to a Chinese audience and dance around the issue for most of the movie and only have a few lines that specifically refer to a thing so they can edit them out for the Chinese release. And that’s not cool. Either commit to the idea or don’t.

But as a whole, this movie is trying to be too many things. It’s trying to please too many people. And even though I appreciate the effort of them trying to do a better job than the second, it just ends up as a big mess. Too much baggage behind this. Not enough intrigue in the movie itself. And of all the directions to take the Wizarding World in the first place, this was probably a long ways down the list among Potter fans and it’s time to cut the losses and do something new. Does the completionist in me want them to officially finish the franchise at the very least? I mean, I wouldn’t hate that. But at the same time, this is a story that we know the ending to. And all that’s left to show is the one thing that we knew about in the first place. And in a way, this movie ends in a fashion that really wraps up everything that it needs to while letting us audiences infer what happens next based on what we already read in the books. I know J.K. Rowling wanted five movies. But we don’t need the final one or two. And based on box office results so far, it doesn’t appear that many people want them, either.

If this is the end of the Fantastic Beasts franchise, it’s kinda sad because it just wound up as a big, giant, ugly mess. A lot of potential completely wasted. But if they decide to continue, then I suppose we’ll cross that bridge when we get there. As far as what else could be done, I feel a film adaptation of “The Cursed Child” is inevitable and I’m dreading that. I’d be fine with ignoring that and doing new stories with the next generation of wizarding children. I’d love to see us do more with the Marauders. And I think it would be great if we told the stories of the original Hogwarts founders. And I think with some of these we could do as HBO Max series instead of movies. All of these sound more interesting to me than a fourth Fantastic Beasts movie, but we’ll see where they decide to go next because this is now a second straight film that just didn’t do it for me.

Grade: 5/10

Everything Everywhere All at Once Review

Just over a month ago I reviewed a little, tiny comic book film that you may or may not have heard of. It was called “The Batman.” It’s safe to say that I was a fan. My claim was that it was a better introduction to Gotham than “Batman Begins” and it challenges “The Dark Knight” for best Batman movie ever made. That’s some ridiculously high praise because those are two of the best comic book movies ever, in my opinion.

What’s the point of me bringing this up? Well, I didn’t say it in my review, but I thought there was a very solid chance that “The Batman” would end up as my No. 1 movie of 2022. Obviously I know better than to make that claim in March, especially since it was one of the first movies of 2022 that I actually saw, considering how empty the year has been in terms of quantity of releases, but I thought we’d be hard pressed to get a movie that connected with as much as “The Batman” did. Sometimes it’s just intuition. Little did I know that “The Batman” would get competition so soon, with almost the next movie I saw in theaters.

And that leads us to this. “Everything Everywhere All at Once.” Now as far as other movies from 2022, if you’ve kept up on my monthly movie previews, you’ll know that it’s been pretty slim selections so far. And I think Omicron in the winter had a big part in why studios have been scared to release movies. That’s changing here real quick, but I took advantage of the lack of theatrical content to catch up on all the remaining Oscar movies in March before the Oscars happened. Plus, I got really sick in March (not with COVID), so going to the theaters wasn’t really an option. But I’ll be catching up on 2022 as fast as I can and will try to at least see a theatrical movie once a week, usually on a Tuesday, so keep tabs on this blog or on my Facebook page for all of that. But when “Everything Everywhere All at Once” hit my local theater after expanding into about 1,200 theaters nationwide this past weekend, I knew I had to see that one as quick as I could, given the very high buzz it’s been getting on Film Twitter. And after seeing it, I knew it had to get a full review because this is something special.

If you’re not as crazy into film as I am and thus you don’t have your finger on the pulse as much as I do, you may have never heard about this one. And that’s totally understandable. But there’s only one thing that I need to say to pique your curiosity about this movie. It’s a multiverse film. Enjoy “Spider-Man: No Way Home”? Excited for “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness”? Well, then this movie could be for you because it’s a small indie film that tackles that same exact subject matter. What if there were an infinite number of parallel realities with different versions of yourself and the world around you? It’s definitely not a new concept. Comic books have been toying around with this for quite some time because it’s a fun way to introduce a whole lot superheroes and supervillains. Some superheroes like The Flash have a large portion of their story centered around this. But what if you took this concept and applied it to the regular, non-superhero universe?

Also not a unique concept. I remember a show in the 90s called “Sliders” that centered around this concept. And there’s plenty of other sci-fi movies and shows that have toyed with this idea. But it’s one that I’m a sucker for. I’m enjoying all of the current MCU multiverse stuff. I’ve enjoyed most of the CW’s Arrowverse that has dove into this quite a bit. I like crazy sci-fi movies that make you think. And I really like weird A24 movies that give me unconventional plots and stories. If you think that Hollywood is out of ideas and will never do anything new outside making an endless number of sequels and reboots, then I implore you to look up the filmography of the studio A24 and starting watching their movies because them alone debunks that complaint. If you’re already aware of A24 and you also enjoy their films, then “Everything Everywhere All at Once” might be one of the most A24 films ever.

I don’t want to get too far into the plot for a couple of main reasons. One, this is a movie that’s best experienced knowing as little as possible. Two, this is a movie that’s really hard to describe even if I wanted to, especially after just one viewing. Try describing the plot of “Inception” to someone after seeing it just once. I remember after seeing “Inception,” my friends and I sat down at a Taco Bell and talked for over an hour… mostly trying to break down what it was that we just watched. That’s the best comparison here. But the basic setup surrounds an Asian American woman named Evelyn who is trying to run a struggling Laundromat with her husband Waymond. Their marriage isn’t going well, her father just arrived from China and he’s a bit old and crazy, and their daughter Joy is trying to get their whole family to accept her new girlfriend. Not to mention they filed their taxes incorrectly and are thus being audited by the IRS, who are threatening to shut their Laundromat down if they don’t get things together.

Lots of stress compounded into one. Not to mention, while at the IRS building, her husband suddenly changes into different multiverse version of himself, an Alpha Waymond, and tells Evelyn that the universe is being threatened by a version of her daughter whose mind is so broken that she’s experiencing all the multiverse universes at once. And yeah, they’ve discovered a way to jump to different universes in the multiverse where they can then obtain different skills that their parallel versions of themselves have.

That’s just the setup and that’s all I’m saying about the plot. I will fully admit that this movie may not be for everyone. As mentioned, A24 is one of my favorite movie studios because I like these movies that go bonkers with really weird and unconventional plots. But I will understand if you come out of this thinking that it was too weird and hard to follow. However, if you like a good challenge and you’re like me and you enjoy A24, then check this out as soon as humanly possible because this is the most bonkers movie I’ve seen in quite some time.

But yet it’s not just bonkers for the sake of being bonkers. Yes, the directing duo here is definitely having a lot of fun throwing everything they can think of at the wall, especially in our massive second act. But I also got the strong feeling that it all has a point to it. Again, I don’t have my mind fully grasped on exactly what that point is. And there may be a lot of things that I will catch on a second viewing. In fact, I’m sure this is a movie where I catch new tidbits every time I watch, even years down the road. But even if I didn’t understand all of the specifics, so much of the craziness also did a good job of building the tension to the point where the emotional release of all that was going on was extremely rewarding. This isn’t just a crazy movie, it’s a really emotional movie with some very strong central themes.

To that point, I think going back to the Nolan comparison is a valid one. And there’s two Nolan films that I would like to bring up in order to paint a picture for you of how I reacted to this. The two movies are “Inception” and “Tenet.” Both of these movies are very wild experiences. Perhaps two of Nolan’s most Nolan-y films in terms of the twisted timelines and mind-bending experiences. But “Inception” is the far superior film because there was so much emotion packed into it. There are phenomenal character arcs and some fantastic resolutions to the crazy story arcs. And a whole of very impactful, meaningful themes that could be taken from it. “Tenet” was a fun movie, but the main character didn’t even have a name. And I feel it mostly missed the mark in terms of saying something meaningful or packing in all of the emotion. And not all movies need that. It’s perfectly fine to have a movie that is simply a lot of fun. If every movie I saw tore me apart emotionally, I might need a break from watching movies.

But nevertheless, in this comparison, “Everything Everywhere All at Once” is most definitely on the “Inception” side of things. And if you know me, you’ll know how strong of a praise that is. “Inception” was my No. 1 film of the entire 2010s decade. And I put it ahead of “The Dark Knight” when I ranked all of Nolan’s filmography. Yes, I need to watch both “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and “The Batman” again. I’m sure I’ll be doing plenty of both before the year ends. So I’m not making a determination on them just yet. But as it stands following one watch of both, I’d put both of them higher than anything we’ve received so far in the 2020s. And I currently would put “Everything Everywhere All at Once” slightly ahead of “The Batman” as my current favorite movie of the year and the decade.

Let’s bring some other comparisons to the mix. Alfred Hitchcock’s “Rear Window.” A man is sitting by his window watching all of his neighbors live their lives and feels like he witnessed a murder while doing so. There are so many plot lines weaved together with this movie and it’s hard to keep track of them all. But what could’ve ended as a bit of a mess in the hands of a lesser filmmaker winds up as a marvelous masterpiece at how everything came together so perfectly. When I first watched “Rear Window,” I went immediately to all the bonus features, dove into everything as much as I could, then watched the movie a second time in that same evening and was even more impressed at how things came together.

Another comparison. “2001: A Space Odyssey.” A mind-blowing masterpiece and the mother of all sci-fi films to date. I spent my whole life hearing all about this movie and finally watched it for the first time at some point early last decade, around 2012 or 2013. I was completely blown away even though I had no idea what I just watched. Upon its 50th anniversary later in the decade, I excitedly showed it to a group of friends, half of whom hated it and it led us on an admittedly fun path of watching all the “Sharknado” movies instead. I learned that “2001” is most definitely not for everyone, but those who connect with it really connect with it and it’s a movie where you understand more and more as you continue to watch.

“Everything Everywhere All at Once” is very comparable to both of these scenarios. Like with “Rear Window,” I wanted to go right back into the theater and watch it again. I didn’t do that because I had other things to do and wasn’t in the mood to spend another $10 on it right at that moment, but if it was a streaming movie, I may have done just that. “Rear Window” was a movie from 1954 that I had on DVD at the moment, so I had the luxury of doing that at that time. But the experience of watching it for the first time was nevertheless the same. A really trippy, complex experience that I wanted to immediately check out again and one that has not left my mind. And like with “2001” not being a movie for everyone, “Everything Everywhere All at Once” is a similar level of trippiness that could completely frustrate and confuse people, but if you connect with this level of crazy, this is a little indie film coming out of nowhere that could wind up as one of your favorite movies.

In diving more into a few of the filmmaking qualities, this is a masterclass in several areas. The first is acting. With the nature of it being a multiverse story, each of our main characters has to play multiple versions of themselves. And they have to make each character believable. Think of “Split” with James McAvoy playing so many different characters who all look the same. He did that perfectly, making each of the characters feel distinct and you could immediately tell who was who. Now take that performance and multiply it by five. Michelle Yeoh as Evelyn, Ke Huy Quan as Waymond, James Hong as the grandpa, Stephanie Hsu as the daughter Joy, and Jamie Lee Curtis as the IRS lady Deirdre all gave performance that are deserving of acting awards. And we better at least have one of them represent during next awards season.

The second area is directing. I don’t always have the best analysis when it comes to directing because most of that is done off-screen in a way that is hard for me to judge. But I do know when you have this many people playing so many different versions of themselves in such chaotic order, you need a captain of the ship that knows how to guide them all and help them do what they need. Because the actors don’t always know how the final product is going to end up. So it’s up to the director to guide them. And this movie has a directing duo that call themselves Daniels. It’s Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert. And man do they direct this movie to perfection. Not just with the actors, but really putting this whole complex thing together.

Along with that comes the screenplay. I would be shocked if they weren’t inspired in at least some degree to the upcoming MCU multiverse stuff to some degree. I don’t know when this was written or when the production started, but to be released right in between “No Way Home” and “The Multiverse of Madness” is either the craziest coincidence ever or one brilliant plan. But either way, the Daniels not only directed this movie, but they wrote it. And whatever their inspiration, they came up with one heck of a multiverse movie that must’ve been quite the insane project to write. They outdid “No Way Home” and have now put a lot of pressure on “The Multiverse of Madness” to deliver.

And, of course, the other major masterclass that’s showcased here is the editing. If this doesn’t win editing awards, then we might as well cancel all editing awards because I will be convinced that people have no idea how to judge that. I’m not the expert myself, but this movie is moving at a million miles per hour with it cutting sequences at a jaw-dropping pace. And yet I don’t feel that any of it was done in a chaotic way. I feel like every scene had a purpose to it and built upon the last scene to help build the story and I imagine it was quite the work to not only shoot all of that, but splice it all together in a way that made it work like it did.

I’m sure there’s much more that I could cover with this movie. But I think I’ve hit all the highlights in a way that feels satisfactory to me following a first viewing. But make no mistake, there’s a lot more that could be discussed here, especially after seeing it more times and taking the time to digest and talk about it over the weeks and months to come. Like with “Inception,” I’m sure the conversation has the potential to progress and evolve in a way that there are different talking points that continually arise. But the biggest obstacle is making sure that enough people see it so that these discussions can actually be had. It’s not a major blockbuster that “Inception” was. It’s a small indie film that has made just $8.4 million as of me typing this. It’s spent two weekends in limited release and just finished its first weekend in a semi-wide release. So the ball is just beginning to roll and it deserves to be rolled a lot further. So if I’ve piqued your interest at all, please make sure to find this and give it a watch as soon as is possible for you, especially if you are a film fan like myself. If it helps, it’s currently at a 9.0 on IMDb and has a 96 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes, with a 94 percent audience score. So I’m currently not alone in liking it. It deserves your attention.

Grade: 10/10

Movie Preview: April 2022

We have arrived in April 2022, which means the year is a quarter of the way through. Always a weird thing to think about with how fast time goes. But things are looking very positive at the box office and we have an abnormally busy April to talk about. Most years, April is that awkward month between March and May, two very popular months of the year for movies. And while it sounds like a broken record to say that things aren’t normal at the moment, we’ve had plenty of strong box office performances of late that suggest people are feeling comfortable coming back to theaters. What makes this current April unique is that studios mostly avoided March, allowing “The Batman” to completely dominate. In fact, they mostly avoided January and February, too, mostly due to Omicron. The consequences of that, as mentioned, is this abnormally busy April that has more attempted blockbusters than is common for an April, which should make this an exciting month. At least for some.

As always, release date information for this post is courtesy of the-numbers.com and boxofficepro.com. The movies that are listed are the ones currently scheduled for a wide theatrical release in the United States and Canada. Said release dates are always subject to change.

April 1 – 3

Sony’s "Morbius"

Starting the month off is yet another comic book movie, that of Sony’s Morbius. While the Marvel Brand, and superhero movies as a whole, are bigger in today’s era of movies than they ever have been, “Morbius” isn’t one that has received a whole lot of positive fanfare. Dr. Michael Morbius is a comic book character dating back to 1971 and is typically used as a villain to Spider-Man, although he has wandered into anti-hero realms at times. His character biography includes him having a rare blood condition that evolves into him becoming a full-out superhuman vampire upon them attempting to cure said blood condition. Thus he’s another “science experiment gone wrong” style of Spider-Man villain. This adaptation of the character is played by Jared Leto and follows the trend of Sony making movies of Spider-Man villains or anti-heroes without the inclusion of Spider-Man. What Sony’s end game with all of this is anybody’s guess, but the massive success of “Venom” and its sequel has given them confidence in going forward with this route. Although Venom is a much more popular character than Morbius, so this is a potential oversight in reading what audiences want.

The initial trailer for “Morbius” was released in January 2020 as it was scheduled for a July 2020 release date. It thus became one of the many movies that became victim of COVID and has thus bounced around the release schedule until Sony finally settled on this date, over two years after that initial trailer was released. And while such ping-ponging is understandable, “Morbius” is not one that has been well-served by such delays as reactions to any trailer have been mixed to negative. The negative stench has seemingly gotten worse the more the movie has been pushed back. And Jared Leto’s reputation has only worsened after his Razzie-winning performance in “House of Gucci” added to an already controversial resume of recent performances following his widely mocked turn as Joker in 2016’s “Suicide Sqaud.” Fair or not, the man has become a bit of a punchline, which doesn’t help this movie’s prospects. No surprise the reviews have come in at an abysmal 20 percent on Rotten Tomatoes. Yet despite that, Sony is still expecting a $40 million debut, which is half as much as “Venom” and not anywhere close to the MCU Marvel films, but for its respectable $75 million budget is not bad at all. A potential minor win for a movie that’s had a lot of toxic buzz for two years.

April 8 – 10

Paramount's "Sonic the Hedgehog 2"

Perhaps the most highly anticipated movie of the month hits theaters in this second weekend of April. And in an odd turn of events over the last three years, that movie is Sonic the Hedgehog 2. Because, yeah, it was around three years ago this time when that initial trailer got released and widely mocked. You know the story. The movie was postponed for them to redesign Sonic and that redesign shocked people in a good way. The movie went on to be a pretty solid hit, opening with $58 million over the 3-day and $70 million over the 4-day Presidents Day weekend in February 2020, a month before the pandemic hit. And yes, it has been two years since COVID initially hit, which through all the craziness and blurred timelines for all of us, Paramount managed to make a sequel to “Sonic,” with the return of Jim Carrey as the villain and the addition of Tails and Knuckles to the adventures. Anticipation and excitement are pretty high and initially reviews are fairly promising. $40-60 million is the expected range for its opening. I personally wouldn’t be surprised to see it hit the top end of that range, matching or coming close to its predecessor. And it should have a fairly long runway with its release with not a whole ton of family competition in April and May.

The other release of this weekend is the new Michael Bay action/thriller Ambulance. This is Michael Bay’s first movie he’s directed since “6 Underground” in 2019 and first theatrical release since “Transformers: The Last Night” in 2017, as “6 Underground” was a Netflix release. It stars Jake Gyllenhaal and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as two adoptive siblings who attempt a bank robbery. Said bank robbery goes wrong and leads the brothers to hijacking an ambulance and leading the police on a high speed chase. This was actually released a few weeks ago in a handful of international markets and has performed decently, earning $13 million so far from about 30 markets. Reaction has been decently positive. Nothing through the roof, but it appears to be a fairly entertaining action film from people wanting a simple escape. In terms of its opening weekend, the last two theatrically released non-Transformers movies that Michael Bay directed were “13 Hours” in 2016 and “Pain & Gain” in 2013. Those two movies opened to $16 million and $20 million, respectively. That’s about the range that’s expected here, if not a tad bit lower. $12-18 million is the range that Box Office Pro has projected.

April 15 – 17

Warner Bros.' "Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore"

The third weekend of April sees the return of the Wizarding World, with the third movie in the “Fantastic Beasts” spin-off franchise, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore. Normally one would think that there would be massive buzz and excitement from Potterheads that would lead this to be one of the most anticipated movies of the year. However, it’s worth noting that excitement levels seem to be an all-time low for any “Harry Potter” or “Fantastic Beasts” related property. The first “Fantastic Beasts” was generally well received, albeit with a tad bit of mixed feelings. However, “The Crimes of Grindelwald” was pretty universally rejected among Potter fans, casual fans, and critics alike. On top of that, there has been plenty of controversy surrounding the franchise outside the realm of the films themselves, with J.K. Rowling herself making many enemies with her online comments as well as Warner Bros. making the decision to fire Johnny Depp as Grindelwald, replacing him with Mads Mikkelsen. While Mikkelsen is a well-liked actor, many may choose to skip the movie due to a bad taste in their mouth after the firing of Depp. And that decision has been perhaps made easier by the fact that many have lost interest in the series, anyways.

Fair or not, “The Secrets of Dumbledore” has a bit of an uphill battle to climb to win fans back. But all that considered, this is still a movie in the “Harry Potter” universe and that alone will lead this to at least not be a complete disaster. Every movie in the main saga opened with at least $75 million, regardless of response. The two “Fantastic Beasts” movies opened to $74 million and $64 million, respectively. “The Crimes of Grindelwald” became the first movie in the universe to not hit $200 million domestically, but its $159.6 million isn’t terrible, especially for spin-off movie standards. Box Office Pro is expecting around $50 million for its opening and $100-125 million total domestically. I’m sure Warner Bros. would like a whole lot more out of one of their main franchises, but things could be worse. If they end up making a quality film that people enjoy, that will go a long way in winning audiences back.

Tagging along with “The Secrets of Dumbledore” this weekend is a little film called Father Stu. This is a Mel Gibson and Mark Wahlberg led drama from Sony about a boxer turned priest, based on the true life story of Stuart Long, with Wahlberg being the one playing the lead role here. I’m not 100 percent sure how much of a religious angle this has as compared to simply an inspirational story, but in theory it is positioned well as a movie about a man changing his life to become a priest being released on Easter weekend. Although the movie has an R-rating tagged to it, suggesting the target audience isn’t necessarily the grassroots Christian audience, but rather simply to adults in general who want to watch an inspiring drama. The Easter release of it all might be more of a coincidence. This will look to find a place somewhere in the top 10, with a projected $4-8 million for its opening.

April 22 – 24

Universal’s "The Bad Guys"

Not the final weekend of the month, but it is the final weekend of the month with wide releases coming out. Leading the way will be DreamWorks with their latest animated film The Bad Guys. This will be leading the way out of the new films, anyways as it’s more of a low key release for DreamWorks. They have been pushing it, but awareness doesn’t seem to be incredibly high at the moment. This stars a team of bad guys, or bad animals, rather – a wolf, a snake, a tarantula, a shark, and a piranha – who are trying to change their imagine and become good guys, cleverly using Billie Eilish’s song “Bad Guy” in their advertising. DreamWorks is still one of the major animation studios around, but it has been a while since they’ve had a broadly appealing franchise hit like a “Shrek,” a “Kung Fu Panda” or a “How to Train Your Dragon” to attract audiences with. Comparing their last two “normal” releases (ignoring the pandemic releases), “The Boss Baby: Family Business” opened to $16 million last year and “Abominable” opened to $20 million in 2019. That’s a far cry from when they consistently opened movies to $30-50 million, but it seems like a fair range for this one. Like with “Sonic,” though, there’s really no other major family release until “Lightyear” in June, so the potential runway here could be long if this gets good reviews and word of mouth spreads.

The second movie of this weekend might be more of a niche thing and said target is already loving it and that’s The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent. I say “already” because this premiered at the South by Southwest Film Festival a few weeks back in March and is currently standing at 100 percent on Rotten Tomatoes through its first 24 reviews and has an IMDb score of 8.8. Whether or not those numbers stand when it hits a wide audience is to be determined, but this movie is a Nicolas Cage meta action/comedy. Love Nicolas Cage movies? Love how he’s crazy, goofy, and unrestrained in a very self-aware sort of way? Well, “Massive Talent” is a movie where Nicolas Cage stars as Nicolas Cage and leans into every Nicolas Cage trope or meme in what seems to be one of the most self-aware movies as of late. Those who don’t get the joke have the potential to be lost, hence this being more of a niche movie. But I could see a world wherein this either tops “The Bad Guys” as the highest grossing new release this weekend or holds well throughout the weeks and months ahead as word gets out to Nicolas Cage fans, assuming word of mouth as high as it has been from South by Southwest.

The final movie of the weekend and the month sees director Robert Eggers returning with The Northman. Eggers is the director of “The Witch” and “The Lighthouse,” both of which he took the audience directly into the time periods of the subject matter in attempted super realistic portrayals, including actual dialogue styles from the time taken from journals and whatnot. “The Witch” portrayed the time of the Salem Witch Trials while “The Lighthouse” involved late 1800s sailors at a lighthouse. And now Eggers is taking his audience into the time of the Vikings with an action/adventure epic about a young Viking prince on a quest to avenge his father’s murder. It’s an Eggers reunion of sorts as he brings in Anya Taylor-Joy from “The Witch” and “Willem Dafoe” from “The Lighthouse,” while adding the likes of Alexander Skarsgard, Nicole Kidman, and Ethan Hawke to the mix. Now there is a chance that Focus Features decides to play the long game with this in terms of theater counts and the box office plan. It’s scheduled for a wide release, but said wide release could be a smaller one focused on building buzz and establishing long legs rather than going for the big opening weekend. “The Lighthouse,” Egger’s most recent film, maxed out at 978 theaters after a smaller rollout. This could be bigger than that, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Focus is not too terribly concerned about having a large opening weekend as their marketing hasn’t been too aggressive yet.

April 29 – May 1 

Currently as I’m typing this, there’s no new wide releases scheduled for this final weekend of April. And that would kinda make sense as “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” is set to kick off the summer movie season in the first weekend of May, in true Marvel tradition. So studios tend to mostly avoid the final weekend of April before that happens. And that’s a smart move. You only have a week before you’re completely swallowed up.

That said, the sites I look at give me conflicting results on what’s going on with the latest Liam Neeson action movie “Memory,” as directed by Martin Campbell. So that may or may not be coming out. If it does, “Blacklight” in February opened to $3.5 million, while “The Marksman” opened to $3.1 in January 2021. So that’s the easy comparison for “Memory” if it does come out.

It’s also worth noting that A24 will be expanding the release “Everything Everywhere All At Once” throughout the month. It had a fantastic limited release opening on the final weekend of March, making $501,305 from just 10 theaters and so far has had phenomenal reviews. It’s set for a wide expansion on April 8, but also might be continually expanding as the month moves on and word of mouth continues to build.

Finally, we could always be in for some potential surprises. When I wrote my March preview, the calendar was mostly empty and I suggested some potential titles that could take advantage and have a surprise wide release. And that happened with “Jujutsu Kaisen 0: The Movie” on March 18 and “RRR: Rise, Roar, Revolt” on March 25, both of which had solid debuts ($18 million and $9 million respectively) and they weren’t even on my radar. “X” and “The Outfit” also wound up with semi-wide releases and did decently well and those were among the movies I did suggest could go wide. So just a reminder that this is not necessarily an all-encompassing post. I do my best to hit all of the major wide releases, but surprises sometimes happen, especially on weekends like this where nothing is scheduled.