IT CHAPTER TWO Review

IT Chapter Two is a film with great vision, while also being one that lacks focus. This lack of an anchor, or heart-if you will-is the source of much frustration as it's clear director Andy Muschietti has great ambition for what he not only wants his adaptation to be, but represent; this is to be the modern day equivalent of The Shining, a Marvel-esque sized accomplishment in the horror genre, but while the mission is clear and the intent appreciated it seems Muschietti's bloated sequel to his 2017 introduction to the Losers Club bit off more than it could chew. Rather than purely being the twenty-seven year-later sequel it was assumed to be, IT Chapter Two largely operates in a fashion where the first, more endearing chapter, didn't have to exist. It's nice that it does and of the two is the better film, but this is because that movie-while still sprawling in its scope-didn't have to deal in two separate timelines, didn't have to fully dissect the characters, but more just plant the seeds for them and it didn't have to somehow shoehorn in a story about an ancient ritual that would defeat this cosmic entity that we come to know is Pennywise the dancing clown. In other words, Muschietti's predecessor had the ability to focus on its characters in both its heroes and its antagonist while developing the undesirable, but sometimes symbiotic relationship between the two. In Chapter Two, Muschietti and his editor, Jason Ballantine, never find the necessary groove to make everything the film is trying to accomplish flow with the comprehension necessary to lend the film that needed focus, that necessary anchor that gives the viewer something specific to latch onto so that it connects to-if not everything the film is trying to do-at least one thing that will make it feel more personal and therefore more haunting. IT Chapter Two is such a film of fits and starts that it's almost impossible to find any one thing to latch onto at all, but lucky for us Chapter Two does in fact boast a game cast of adult Losers that make the jumbled narrative bearable while Muschietti's visual prowess remains on impressive display throughout. Furthermore, Bill Skarsgård's performance as Pennywise is still gold, but even in this regard the filmmakers don't take as much advantage of the performance as they should-layering in CGI and not allowing Skarsgård's disturbing portrayal to truly breathe. Like a buffet plate that's loaded with everything that looked good, IT Chapter Two ends up a pile of parts with a single bite out of each-nothing fully digested leaving the consumer full, but not satisfied.

Official Trailer for IT: CHAPTER TWO

Scoring the largest opening weekend for an R-rated movie ever, then continuing to perform week after week ultimately taking in over $700 million worldwide, the runaway success of 2017's IT gave director Andy Muschietti’s sequel the luxury of an A-list ensemble and plenty of time to develop and shoot it.  Jessica Chastain, James McAvoy, and Bill Hader lead the cast of IT: Chapter Two as the sequel picks up with the characters from the first film as adults twenty-seven years later. While not too much is known about the follow-up, we obviously know from the book and previous mini-series that a devastating phone call brings "The Losers Club" back together and back to Derry, Maine. In speaking with Entertainment Weekly Pennywise himself, Bill Skarsgård, stated that, "The arc of the first movie is that he, for the first time, experiences fear himself,” which could certainly mean the character might go in one of two drastically different directions, but it seems rather than sulk back into the darkness from which he came Pennywise will be seeking revenge as Skarsgård reiterated that this encounter with fear, "fuels hatred and anger towards the kids, who are now adults, so I think there might be an even more vicious Pennywise.” And given some of the voiceover in this new, final trailer for the epic horror film it seems this is nothing short of accurate. While I've never read Stephen King's novel and only saw the 1990 miniseries in the lead-up to the release of the 2017 film, these two films seemingly set themselves apart from your typical trash horror flicks from the get-go as Muschietti’s objective is aimed at being more illustrious than is typically seen in the horror genre and in pulling off this level of grandeur really well in that first film it only creates more reason to be excited for what this final product might deliver thematically. Along with Skarsgård, McAvoy, Chastain and Hader IT: Chapter Two will also star Javier Botet, Xavier Dolan, James Ransone, Andy Bean, Troy James, Jay Ryan, Jake Weary, Jess Weixler as well as seeing the return of Jaeden Lieberher, Finn Wolfhard, Jack Dylan Grazer, Sophia Lillis, Chosen Jacobs, and Jeremy Ray Taylor. The film is scheduled to open September 6th, 2019.

Teaser Trailer for IT: CHAPTER TWO

The success of the first half of director Andy Muschietti’s adaptation of Stephen King's IT afforded him the luxury of an A-list ensemble and plenty of time to develop and shoot this sequel we kind of already knew was happening even before that first film blew all expectations out of the water; going on to score the largest opening weekend for an R-rated movie ever, then continuing to perform week after week ultimately taking in over $700 million worldwide. Jessica Chastain, James McAvoy, and Bill Hader lead the cast of IT: Chapter Two as the sequel picks up with the characters from the first film as adults twenty-seven years later. While not too much is known about the follow-up just yet, we obviously know from the book and previous mini-series that a devastating phone call brings "The Losers Club" back together and back to Derry, Maine. In speaking with Entertainment Weekly Pennywise himself, Bill Skarsgård, stated that, "The arc of the first movie is that he, for the first time, experiences fear himself,” which could certainly mean the character might go in one of two drastically different directions, but it seems rather than sulk back into the darkness from which he came Pennywise will be seeking revenge as Skarsgård reiterated that this encounter with fear, "fuels hatred and anger towards the kids, who will be adults in this one, so I think there might be an even more vicious Pennywise. He’s really going after it.” While I've never read Stephen King's novel and  only saw the 1990 miniseries in the lead-up to the release of the 2017 film, this set of films (and maybe this simply comes from the precedent the sheer size of the book sets) quickly established themselves as separate from the pack of your typical trash horror flicks. Muschietti’s approach seemed to carry the objective of being more illustrious than usual and in pulling off this level of grandeur in that first film there is only more reason to be excited for what this final product might deliver thematically. Along with Skarsgård McAvoy, Chastain, and Hader IT: Chapter Two will also star Javier Botet, Xavier Dolan, James Ransone, Andy Bean, Troy James, Jay Ryan, Jake Weary, Jess Weixler as well as seeing the return of Jaeden Lieberher, Finn Wolfhard, Jack Dylan Grazer, Sophia Lillis, Chosen Jacobs, and Jeremy Ray Taylor. The film is scheduled to open September 6th, 2019.

SHAZAM! Review

Shazam! immediately sets itself apart from its comic book brethren by opening the film not with a flashback to that of the titular heroes origin, but to that of the origin of its main villain; an antagonist that very easily could have been the protagonist and caused this story to be quite different had one slight outcome been different. Maybe slight is the wrong word as Mark Strong's Dr. Sivana takes a certain defeat to heart and dedicates his life from this point on to figuring out why he wasn't worthy of dawning the Shazam suit. The point being, director David F. Sandberg (Lights Out, Annabelle Creation) and screenwriter Henry Gayden (Earth to Echo) begin their movie by filling in the blanks of the bad guy and immediately set-up the audience with an understanding and empathy as to how the rest of the events we see unfold do in fact unfold in the manner they do. This is a key ingredient in a recipe that is repeated so often these days with so many super hero and comic book films saturating the market. Such is the case that filmmakers, studio heads, and whole creative teams alike have essentially been forced to find ways to differentiate their hero from the next studio's hero. While personally, I'm as sincere a fan of both sides of the studio rivals as I could imagine to be Shazam! does a pretty damn good job of making a full-length, fun feature out of what could arguably be one of the corniest super heroes ever put to panel. Shazam is a super hero that is actually a kid and is costumed like a hero out of a 1940's serial series wearing his cape with pride and his spandex with dignity as the large, luminescent lightning bolt that is the symbol of his heroism shines brightly at the costume's core. While most modern super hero films will tend to dial back the costumes that graced the pages of the source material so as to ground the film and the character in more of a familiar reality, Shazam! embraces the corniness whole-heartily and then balances it with a true threat in the aforementioned villain, true tension in that villain's master plan, and real stakes that aren't cataclysmic in nature, but more personal both in relation to the characters we come to know and invest in as well as in making the film feel more like a small movie made for a specific group of people rather than the big movie that appeals to everyone it so very clearly is.

SDCC: First Trailer for SHAZAM! Starring Zachary Levi

First trailer for Shazam!, the DC comics adaptation from director David F. Sandberg (Annabelle: Creation), starring Zachary Levi, Jack Dylan Grazer, Djimon Hounsou, Mark Strong, Asher Angel, Grace Fulton, Faithe Herman, Ian Chen, Jovan Armand, Cooper Andrews, and Marta Milans from screenwriters Henry Gayden (Earth to Echo) and Darren Lemke (Goosebumps) has been released via Warner Bros. The movie hits theaters April 5, 2019.

IT Review

There is something inherently kind of trashy about horror films. If Oscar bait movies are mansions then horror flicks typically reside in the trailer parks. There is a class system to movies that is even less subjective than the constructs applied to actual society and there is almost no arguing that horror movies are always the ones that get relegated to the, "fun, but not actually good or worthwhile" category while time and time again movies with more grounded subject matter are allowed to be labeled as good without necessarily being exceptional. One could argue that horror would have to duke it out with comedy as to which genre gets the least amount of respect, but to that point one could argue that at least major studios still take more chances on broad comedies than they do mid-budget horror flicks and not to mention that, despite comedy stars largely being reduced to dancing clowns, there is genuine admiration for those who are able to pull off successful comedy as it has been admittedly more difficult to pull off than reliable drama. It's appreciated when horror is approached with clear skill, just look at what James Wan has done for the genre, but no matter how skillfully the job is done there is hardly ever any real merit awarded to what we might call a "scary movie." And so, when a studio or director decide to approach the horror genre with the objective of being more illustrious than usual there is reason to be excited for what the final product might deliver. Add to this the fact the movie this studio and director are setting out to make is a new adaptation of one of the horror maestro himself, Stephen King's, most talked about works and it is almost unavoidable: the anticipation and thus the expectations. This is where it seems society has landed on director Andy Muschietti's (Mama) new take on King's magnum opus of a novel that is IT; there is a want for this kind of horrific escapism. This is not because there isn't enough horror in the real world (no, there's plenty of that these days), but because audiences seek a genuine escape back to a time when things seemed simpler while adding a dose of thrills to that nostalgia kick. This new version of IT has come at an opportune time with the implied legacy being that it will take on the mantle of being one of the most disturbing films in recent memory, finally doing justice to the source material, while hopefully living on as such for years to come. So, how does the actual film line up with everything that has come to be expected of it? Fairly well, considering. By no means is IT a transcendent work of horror fiction, but it provides an ample amount of legitimate scares while at the same time capturing this touching tale of friendship and unbreakable bonds that is so endearing it can't help but to make everything else about the movie that much more unnerving. As with all things, IT will inevitably be grouped into that aforementioned set of hierarchical cinema categories, but I have to imagine Muschietti's film, while not achieving that upper class status it so ambitiously seemed to be chasing, works hard and well enough to escape the lows of thoughtless dismissal earning enough admiration without a solid balance of respect to settle into the most comfortable of middle classes.

First Trailer for IT Re-Make

Confession time: I've never read nor have I seen the 1990 miniseries that was based on the acclaimed Stephen King novel. That King novel, which was originally published in September of 1986 spawned a two-part television event that has always felt well-renowned, but that I always felt would be too terrifying to entertain me. As I got older and became a more eclectic movie-watcher this was one that simply fell by the wayside. The novel is told through narratives alternating between two time periods, one following a group of seven misfit eleven year old children in 1958 and the other following these children as grown-ups who come back to their hometown of Derry, Maine in the mid-eighties to face the ominous Pennywise, a being who exploits the fears of its victims thus the reason "it" primarily appears in the form of a clown. The 1990 adaptation split the two time periods into two distinct parts, or so I'm told, and there are apparently plans already in the works for a sequel to this latest iteration of the source material that would continue the original story of "The Losers' Club," as the kids call themselves, into their adult years. As for how this first outing might fare-so far it certainly has my attention. Despite some solid horror efforts over the past few years I can't help but feel we've had a drought on what are truly genre-defining horror films and though It will largely capitalize on its known brand and iconic elements I'm sure there are plenty of people such as myself who've only heard tell of the dread that Pennywise has brought to his victims that will flock to this re-imagining in droves. Coming from the director of Mama, Andrés Muschietti, this certainly has the look and eerie feel of a classic horror flick and to that effect, it's been a while since we've had a solid Stephen King adaptation as well so if nothing else here's to hoping Muschietti's film might reverse that fortune. This first, teaser trailer certainly bodes well for what we might be getting this fall as the trailer sets the tone for something truly menacing. It stars Jackson Robert Scott, Bill Skarsgaard, Jaeden Lieberher, Finn Wolfhard, Jack Dylan Grazer, Wyatt Oleff, Chosen Jacobs, Jeremy Ray Taylor, and opens on September 8th, 2017.