THE CREATOR Review

Visually absorbing if not thematically so. Though the ideas it's playing with and tropes it's utilizing may not be as shallow as they initially appear they tend to feel cursory due to the fact writer/director Gareth Edwards (Monsters, Rogue One) never finds the right groove for his film to slide into. The Creator is ultimately a movie of fits and starts in which each new promise of something exciting and/or interesting never fully delivers on as much.

It's an odd feeling, really, given mere minutes into the film I was bowled over by the authenticity imbued on an image of a massive spacecraft hovering over a more natural (and clearly real) location. I'm a sucker for when films can integrate futuristic or not yet realized elements into a more common and recognizable environment and Edwards has a great eye for such combinations that really allow both components to pop, but while I was immediately in on the aesthetic I kept wondering when I was going to be made to care or even be wowed by anything other than the framing.

Aside from a few in-world inventions, performance moments (largely from Madeleine Yuna Voyles in a really wonderful and really complicated role for a child to play), along with some questionable story turns there wasn't anything that made me sit up in a way that I was inclined to lean forward. Rather, I kind of shifted my weight to the other armrest to consider why the film didn't seem interested in leaning into its ideas either. The mission is fairly straightforward, but the intentions are not...always. Weirdly, and despite admitting it was beings operating on artificial intelligence who nuked Los Angeles, The Creator is determined to convince us the only thing left of our souls are the fingerprints we left on the programming within the robots we're now at war with.

GODZILLA: KING OF THE MONSTERS Review

The “pictures” have always been about spectacle and spectacle, especially in this day and age, is what we have come to expect from our picture shows. Spectacle isn’t a dirty word and is often the reason to pay more to be immersed in the movies, but spectacle is best served with a meaningful narrative. There are and can be a lot of variations on the word "meaningful" mind you, but when it comes to movies about giant monsters it doesn't seem to be asking for much for said narrative to at least try and find meaning in the smallest of details, character moments, or even just in the knowing indications of the filmmaking that own up to the fact that the movie itself knows what the audience is really in attendance for; if the focus is going to be the titans at least have a little frivolous fun with the extraneous elements. What is maybe most disappointing about Godzilla: King of the Monsters though, is the fact director Michael Dougherty (Trick 'r Treat, Krampus) touches on the potential meaning through each of those aforementioned examples in his screenplay yet never takes them far enough to where any of them connect. Instead, Dougherty’s sequel to Gareth Edwards' 2014 Godzilla doubles down on the spectacle so as to please the masses who are coming to this movie looking for more of what they didn't get in that previous film. Again, there’s nothing wrong with spectacle and if that's all you’re hoping this new Godzilla flick delivers then you’re in luck, but if you need the human element to help enhance your investment in the monsters then you'll likely be somewhat disappointed-especially considering the grade-A cast in place here. It’s not even that the characters aren’t likable or endearing, but rather that they don’t tend to be consistent in their intentions and/or as intelligent as they’re obviously supposed to be. Dougherty is a guy who knows how to deliver extravagance with a sly side of brazen as has been exemplified in his past works and while there was hope that this unique flavor might be able to transcend the big studio blockbuster system it seems Dougherty's special brand of schlock has been watered down to fit this pre-ordained plan of plain characters doing plot-convenient actions so as to bring these monsters together for a smackdown rather than being allowed the space and freedom to find meaning in any of these elements surrounding Godzilla that might have assisted in his presence feeling both more natural and impactful. That "spectacle" is admittedly grand in moments, but it can't help but feel empty; devoid of any real feeling and therefore not eliciting much of one either.

POKÉMON DETECTIVE PIKACHU Review

It's still difficult for me to wrap my brain around the fact that despite countless video games and other IP adaptations over the years that Pokémon has somehow eluded becoming a big screen, live-action event film until this weekend. I can remember Christmas of '99 and getting a Game Boy Color that had to be shared between myself and my siblings with each of us wanting to play our respective Pokémon games at the same time whether that was the red version I received or the blue version my brother did. This was my first real encounter with the world of Pokémon after which I enjoyed collecting the cards more so than I did necessarily playing the actual game. And then there was of course the animated series which led to a couple of animated feature-length films and some Nintendo 64 games (Pokémon Stadium was legit!), but in retrospect it all felt more like a fad that came and went rather quickly in the scheme of things. After the Pokémon roster started expanding past that original one hundred and fifty characters and through to a few years back when the brand re-claimed its dominance over the market with Pokémon GO-the interactive mobile game that had you feeling like you were actually catching Pokémon in the wild-I'd been more or less out of the loop. Moreover, despite how far-reaching Pokémon continued to be, I simply couldn't muster any interest in the multi-format craze; the individual facets of it seeming as widespread as the next and each with as dedicated a fan base as the next. What was I missing? With this in mind, one can imagine my initial response to the news Warner Bros. was hiring Ryan Reynolds to voice Pikachu in a live-action adaptation of one of the newer video games that dealt with this fan-favorite Poké-creature becoming a detective. In short, it sounded like a really dumb idea that could in no way translate to the big screen in any type of credible manner that might pull in an audience beyond the already initiated and the Deadpool 3 screenwriters. Rather, it felt as if it would probably end up going the route of those Alvin and the Chipmunk or Smurf movies where no one actually cared about them and the only people who saw them were children whose parents needed eighty-eight minutes of repose over the weekend. This was, of course, until the first trailer arrived lending the feature the favor of clearly being a more creative endeavor than those aforementioned cash before quality adaptations. This is to say there was evidence of a certain level of care given in the creation of Pokémon Detective Pikachu as the trailer and subsequent execution of the film illustrates both a style and ambition in developing this world that means to both fulfill the fan base as well as weave this strange attraction from the uninitiated by being just weird enough to be engaging; by being unabashedly unusual, but undeniably interesting.

Official Trailer for GODZILLA: KING OF THE MONSTERS

While the distance between myself and 2014's Godzilla has not exactly made the heart grow fonder, last year's Kong: Skull Island at least did more with the titular monster character and his friends to be entertaining if not necessarily excellent. Skull Island completely knew what it was and embraced that whole-heartily and it seems Trick ‘r Treat and Krampus filmmaker Michael Dougherty has very much done the same with his follow-up to Gareth Edwards' film. In Godzilla: King of the Monsters, the crypto-zoological agency Monarch-which has been the connective tissue through both of those two, aforementioned Warner Bros. monster movies-faces off against an arsenal of god-sized monsters, including the mighty Godzilla, who collides with Mothra, Rodan, and his ultimate nemesis, the three-headed King Ghidorah. Having no sense of the history of this franchise or real sense of significance with these monsters outside of that one time when a younger cousin got really into the old Toho Godzilla films, there was never any real connection I held with the material. I remember the names Mothra, Rodan, and King Ghidorah, but not much else as I was never drawn to the appeal of the movies; I could see why people were drawn to them, but they never felt as if they were for me. This is all to say that while this latest Hollywood version of Godzilla's greatest hits will probably be a lot of fun and looks as if it knows how to be exactly what it wants to be there is a certain sense of coldness between myself and everything I've seen around the film that doesn't necessarily have me excited for what the narrative or even the action might have in store. It is worth noting that the human cast in this thing is pretty incredible as it not only includes the likes of Stranger Things breakout Millie Bobby Brown (I still can't believe that's her full name-it's so great) at the forefront, but also has newcomers Vera Farmiga and Kyle Chandler joining in on the action as what I can only surmise are Brown's character's guardians in some capacity though what connection her character makes with the title character remains to be seen. Godzilla: King of the Monsters also stars Bradley Whitford, Ken Watanabe, O’Shea Jackson Jr., Thomas Middleditch, and Sally Hawkins, but c'mon...we all know who the real stars are here. Additionally, the film opens on May 31st, 2019.

First Trailer for POKÉMON DETECTIVE PIKACHU

This is just...too weird. Warner Bros. has apparently figured out how to, after nearly two decades of prominence in the States, concoct a live-action Pokémon movie that actually looks nothing like I would have imagined the first live-action Pokémon movie would look. That said, I don't remember much about the whole Pokémon boom of the late nineties other than the fact that the show was mildly entertaining as were the Game Boy games and I never got that damn holographic Charizard card. I'm not necessarily a big fan of the brand, but I was able to get into it for a little bit when everyone else was given I was in junior high at the time and all anyone was doing was playing the new N64 games Nintendo and The Pokémon Company were pumping out. How the brand is still viable so long after it catapulted into the zeitgeist twenty years ago is beyond me (and no, I didn't play Pokémon Go a couple of years ago), but as these things go it's clear as to why WB and Legendary would partner with The Pokémon Company to bring these monsters to life for the first time: global appeal, global dollars. Still, POKÉMON Detective Pikachu doesn't exactly seem the obvious route to go. The film is apparently based on a spin-off game that came out a few years ago in Japan. The Japanese version had an older, deeper voice actor performing the role of Pikachu, but for this Americanized version we have Deadpool himself, Ryan Reynolds. To hear this very distinctive voice coming out of this well-known character is a bit disorienting to be sure, but it will be interesting to see if Reynolds can condition audiences to look past his voice and believe it really is the character of Pikachu rather than Reynolds in a booth somewhere. The film concerns itself with an ace detective, Harry Goodman, who goes missing thus prompting his son, Tim (Justice Smith), to find out what happened to his father. The trailer tells us Tim is the only one who is able to actually understand Pikachu and thus the two of them partner up as Pikachu assists in Tim's investigation; the two of them piecing together clues through the streets of Ryme City. POKÉMON Detective Pikachu also stars Kathryn Newton, Ken Watanabe, is directed by Rob Letterman (Goosebumps), and opens on May 10th, 2019.

SDCC: Official Trailer for GODZILLA: KING OF THE MONSTERS

First trailer for Godzilla: King of the Monsters, the sequel from director Michael Dougherty (Krampus), starring Millie Bobby Brown, Max Borenstein, Vera Farmiga, Ken Watanabe, O’Shea Jackson Jr., and Sally Hawkins has arrived via Warner Bros. The movie hits theaters May 31, 2019.

TRANSFOMERS: AGE OF EXTINCTION Review

Is escapism really that if the relief we seek turns out to be just as unpleasant as the reality? It is questions such as this that begin to seep into your mind during the exhausting, nearly three-hour experience that is Transformers: Age of Extinction. Director Michael Bay has no intentions of creating anything other than grand escapism here in that this is not a film intended for a specific audience or niche, but is mass appeal in the largest sense possible. The thing about Bay that most people hate is that he has the mentality of a 12 year-old boy and composes his films from that perspective while being technically proficient. While there will be those who ask what might be wrong with the imagination of a pre-teen boy splattered across an IMAX screen the answer is technically, nothing, but might result in some incohesive story elements and slight exploitation of the young female body. There are stereotypes thrown around here from time to time, but the racism has been dialed back considerably from the truly messy second installment, Revenge of the Fallen. There is no mention of Sam Witwicky anywhere and thus there is no forced feeling of having to evolve that character from where we saw him last allowing for the new humans to simply exist in order to aid the giant robots in whatever quest they are out to achieve this time. The film is unnecessarily, even punishingly long in that you'll be sitting in the theater for over three hours if you arrive early and catch the previews. Bay could have easily kept this at a strict two hours while providing some solid entertainment, some stunning visuals and a story the majority of us could follow with ease, but he doesn't. Bay is not one to avoid indulgence and so what we have actually been given is an over-complicated version of a rather simple story that in being so big forgets the little things such as a reason for shoe-horning in robot dinosaurs. To be fair, Age of Extinction is in some ways an improvement over the last two films in that Bay seems to try and take the criticisms he's given and apply them to improving his work (the streamlined story, the less distracting human characters) yet in the end it more or less feels like we're watching the same things we've already seen before.

GODZILLA Review

Admittedly, I have never been a fan or seen much of the supposed entertainment value in what a giant lizard fighting other monsters brings to the table other than spectacle, but for some reason Hollywood feels a need to keep going back to this well to the point it seems they have something they really want to unearth, but can't put their finger on. I was only eleven years old when Roland Emmerich's version of the King of the Monsters hit the screen and for the most part I enjoyed that one with my easy to mesmerize mentality. It has been a long while since I've re-visited that take and was never able to get into the string of films featuring the creature produced by the Toho Co. What has always evaded me is where audiences find substance in this idea that watching a mythological monster, sometimes played up as the lesser of two threats, has anything more to say other than it looks pretty awesome when he fights these creatures, but only if we know the city's they are destroying in the wake of their battles to determine who resides at the top of the food chain are completely abandoned. Otherwise, we just feel bad for the countless lives being lost in one seemingly small motion of this monster rather than being able to enjoy the majesty of what is taking place before us. Coming around to director Gareth Edwards take on the monster though, Godzilla, the marketing did something unexpected and actually had me fairly excited to see what this new film might bring to the table and if the studios may finally have been able to press that button or unearth that value they so desperately are searching for with this property. I guess, if I were to say anything in this introduction without giving specifics away it would be that Edwards has given over to the more serious undertones that were the point of origin for the character in the first place and with that he has crafted a film as much about the story and the impact of the fact Godzilla exists rather than simply producing a film that goes exactly where your instincts want to take you. That the film subverts the obvious ideas and goes in a completely different direction assured me that audiences don't really know what they want when it comes to a Godzilla movie, but would no doubt be satisfied with monster-fighting on an epic scale and while Edwards Godzilla is not the exceptional piece of popcorn entertainment I was hoping for, he still delivers on many levels.

First Trailer for GODZILLA

I've never been a big fan of the monster movies or the character that was spawned in the 1954 original Japanese-language film, but that doesn't mean Hollywood will stop trying to convince me and everyone else who was introduced to Godzilla through the 1998 Roland Emmerich disaster that there really is something awesome to see here. That's really an exaggeration as at 11 years-old I was fine with the monster movie starring Matthew Broderick just as I accepted Batman & Robin without any real qualms, but now that we are in a phase of remakes and reboots with grittier, more reality-based substance it is no surprise that the time has finally come for Godzilla to receive the same treatment. It isn't as much a surprise as much as it is refreshing to see that the trailer looks interesting and that director Gareth Edwards (Monsters) has acquired a certain style with which he wants to tell this familiar story. The opening sequence looks like it could be potentially breathtaking while setting up a creative way of revealing our titular monster. If this type of energy and creativity spans the entire length of the feature there is no doubt it could turn out to be a rather invigorating re-imagining. I wasn't the biggest fan of Edwards previous, small budget film that was more a character study under extreme circumstances than the loud action flick the title might imply, but he clearly has a budget behind him here and will have been able to play out his directorial ambition on a much larger scale. Here's hoping he is able to even it out rather than over-indulging in either one as he has a pretty great human cast in at work here as well. Godzilla stars Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Elizabeth Olsen, Bryan Cranston, Juliette Binoche, David Strathairn, Ken Watanabe, Sally Hawkins and opens in 3D on May 16, 2014.