Pacific Rim Uprising is more of the same for fans of the franchise

Movie Title:    
  Pacific Rim Uprising

Grade:   C+

Rating: PG-13, 111 minutes

In a Nutshell:  If you liked the first Pacific Rim movie, this is more of the same, but even bigger, louder, and chaotic.

Tips for parents: 

• Some subtitles when people speak Mandarin.  By the way, have you noticed that more and more movies have Chinese characters in them?  That's because American movie studios are trying to get more of their movies into the extremely lucrative Chinese market.  In fact, this movie exists mainly because the first one in the franchise did so well in China.
• Some Russian profanity with subtitles.
• One of the Jaeger robots flips the bird.
• If your kids love the Transformers or even the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie movies, they’ll like the fighting robot action of this franchise too.
• Some profanity.
• Tons of destruction and fighting.

Uplifting theme: 

• “We make our own luck.” – Hologram
• Never give up.
• Family and friendships

                                    

Things I liked:

• Good special effects for the most part.
• I loved the respectful nod to Idris Alba’s character from the first Pacific Rim movie, as well as the funny line when Dr. Newton Gottlieb says, “Your father was a great speech writer.  Did you hear the one where he canceled the apocalypse?”   ha ha 
• I always appreciate some humor.
• The sound effects are really good.  You can hear the weight of the heavy footsteps of the various machines and monsters.
• I loved Tian Jing’s outfits, especially her long, white coat towards the beginning of the movie.
• I thought John Boyega did a great job and I loved his hair cut. 
• If you can, see it in 3D, but sit farther back in the theater.

Things I didn’t like:

• Some people may actually want to wear ear plugs while they watch this because it’s so loud.
• Super clichéd beginning where a teenage genius builds something incredible and races off with a covered face for the big reveal later.  In fact, the whole movie was super predictable.
• Jake Pentecost’s rotten attitude was annoying and tiring.
• Jake Pentecost and Amara Namani constantly bicker.  It’s supposed to be endearing, but it was just annoying.  Several times he yells, “Shut up!” which is a phrase I really dislike.
• If you haven’t seen the first movie, you might be a little bit lost in the story; however, there is a quick recap to bring you up to speed at the very beginning of the movie.
• The character development seems super contrived and cliche.
• It actually becomes boring watching robots fight each other and smash everything around them over and over and over.
• Yep, this movie leads into another sequel.  (sigh)
• I heard another movie critic explain that this movie felt way too corporate for his taste.  It's true.  Everything seems very calculated and researched to profit the most from cultural tastes.  For example, the two main pilots are Jake and Nate.  Those are the top two baby boy names in America.
• Robots often fight monsters, but when the rogue Jaegers fight the good Yaegers, it looks like just another Transformers movie.
• Guillermo del Toro was going to direct this movie, but he stepped away from it in order to direct The Shape of Water, which he ended up winning an Academy Award for as Best Picture in 2017.

Funny lines:

• “Stay focused and try not to fall over.” – Chinese guy
• “Speak in English.  Your Mandarin makes you sound like an idiot.” – Liwen Shao (Tian Jing)
• “In theory, what does that mean?” – Jake (John Boyega)

“Today, it means YES!” – Dr. Hermann Gottlieb (Burn Gorman)

• “Well, THAT’S confusing.” – Jake after Cadet Jinhai kisses him and Nate Lambert
• “I can’t believe she just hologrammed me.” - Jake

  

                                            @trinaboice

Transformers 5 chooses special effects over substance

Movie Title:   Transformers: The Last Knight

Grade:  C

Rating:  PG-13

In a Nutshell:  Michael Bay says this is his last Transformers movie.  Even fans hope that's true. This Transformers blockbuster franchise seems to have fizzled, disappointing movie-goers with a weak story and paper-thin characters.  

Having spent 260 million dollars on the film, Director Michael Bay seems to have chosen special effects over substance. If you have kids who love the auto-bot franchise, they'll still be entertained.

Uplifting theme: 

• “Without sacrifice, there can be no victory.” –  – Sir Edmund Burton (Anthony Hopkins)
• “Funny what you can do when what depends on you is all you have.” – Izabella (Isabela Moner)
• “We all want to believe we can be heroes in our own lives.” – Vivian Wembley (Laura Haddock)
• “Magic does exist.” – Sir Edmund Burton

Things I liked:

• Anthony Hopkins is always great.  I loved his beautiful British home in the film. There's also a lovely British cathedral that gets painfully destroyed by Transformers destruction.
• You get to visit Stonehenge...sort of. He wanted to set off an explosion at the real site, but was denied, so he had to create a set that looks like the real thing. Seeing it was on my Bucket List and I finally visited the site a couple of years ago. Very cool!

• I appreciated some of the slow-motion scenes.  One of my complaints from the previous films in the Transformers franchise was that the action sequences were so fast and jumbled that it was difficult to actually see what was happening.
• I thought “Canopy” was a cool Transformers that I would liked to have seen longer.
• I love Stanley Tucci in anything. I almost didn't recognize him as Merlin.
• TONS of action sequences and you get to see a lot of your past favorite transformers, as well as some interesting new ones.
• Mark Wahlberg works pretty doggone hard in this flick.
• Laura Haddock is the newest beauty to save the world, but with a higher IQ than her gorgeous predecessors.

Things I didn’t like:

• The very first scene features England in the Dark Ages when some knights were fighting.  The CGI fire looks totally fake and so I worried that the whole film would have terrible special effects.  It definitely got better.  By the way, King Arthur (Liam Garrigan) looks like Josh Groban.
• The legendary Merlin the Magician is a drunkard, intended for comic relief, but the jokes fall flat. 
• I definitely appreciate humor in movies, but most of it doesn’t land in this one.  The jokes fly pretty fast, but land with a thud.
• If you’re hoping to see Optimist Prime, you’ll be disappointed with his little screen time.
• I’m sure Michael Bay thought that a new twist to spruce up this installment of the franchise would be to throw a bunch of foul-mouthed kids in it.  Nope. They were all super annoying.
• Like the other Transformers movies, it’s often difficult to understand what everyone says because of their garbled voices or due to all of the background noise.
• It drove me nuts that Izabella had carefully placed strands of hair down her face in every scene. I just wanted to comb it back sometimes. It seemed super manipulative.
• Girl power!  Um...like every other movie lately.
• The aspect ratios kept switching around, which was super distracting.
• The movie contradicts itself constantly.  For example, we're supposed to believe the world is in chaos, yet Vivian has time to play polo in an idyllic British field before teaching children in a museum.
• Product placement that features Mark Walhberg drinking a Bud Light, just like in the last Transformers' installment.
• Some of the edits are too fast and choppy.
• The little leprechaun robot is a C3PO rip-off.  Even one of the transformers points it out.

Funny lines:

• “You get back in your hole and think about what you did.” – Cade Yeager
• “Love that guy.  Goosebumps every time.” – Transformer with a Cockney accent  (What's his name?)
• “So, is this a kidnapping situation or her first transformer experience?” – Cade
• “A mojito needs ice.  Ice!  We are not animals!” – Agent Simmons (John Turturro) 

Tips for parents: 

• Lots and LOTS of destruction and fighting.
• There is a lot of profanity…in fact, a surprising amount of it.  What makes it even worse is that it comes out of the mouths of children and even Sir Anthony Hopkins, both equally disappointing.

@trinaboice 

Do we really need another Terminator movie?

Movie:    Terminator Genisys

PG-13, 1 hour 59 minutes

Grade:    B-

In a Nutshell:   Fun for The Terminator fans, but not necessary for others.   I mean, do we really need a reboot of this James Cameron franchise?  This is supposedly the first of a new trilogy.  Yikes.   Don’t get me wrong…I really like The Terminator movies.

My biggest gripe about this film is that I just don’t care anymore.  It’s hard to feel invested in a story that will probably be redone AGAIN in another sequel or prequel.  I just didn’t care if any of the characters lived or died, because I knew that a future movie might completely reverse what happened in this film anyway. 

There is a lot of time traveling that will make your brain begin to hurt if you try to figure it all out.   It’s not exactly logical, but it’s sure going to make the studio a lot of money….because, as Arnold says…”I’ll be back”.

Good for Arnold Schwarzenegger for keeping his acting career going.   We all love to watch him kick bady-guy butt.   (Forget he told us he was going to retire.)  As his character, Terminator/”Pops” says in the movie, “I’m old, not obsolete.”

Uplifting Theme:

·         “There is no fate, but that which we make for ourselves.” – John Connor (Jason Clarke)

·         “Straight line.  You just go and you don’t look back.” – Kyle Reese (Jai Courtney) , Sarah Connor (Emilia Clarke)

·         “One thing we know for sure…the future is not set.” - Kyle

Things I liked:

·         The best moment in the movie for me was watching the young Arnold Schwarzenegger fight the old one.   Epic.

·         I loved traveling back to 1984 with punk rock hair do’s and Velcro-strapped shoes.

·         They poke fun at 2017 Americans who can’t live without their cell phones.  True.

·         The script explains away Arnold Schwarzenegger’s older look by saying that the machine has human skin over it, which ages.  Oh, ok.  That works for me.  It’s a good thing Arnold doesn’t have to do much running; The Terminator always walks slow and determined.

·         The jail scene is hilarious.  Bad boys, bad boys!

·         J.K. Simmons (Detective O’Brien) is such a likeable guy. 

·         Lots of action scenes.  Lots.

Things I didn’t like:

·         This Sarah Connor (played by Emilia Clarke) is cranky and barks at everyone during the entire movie, allowing very little time for us to like her.  She’s not vulnerable and endearing like Linda Hamilton in the original The Terminator

·         The T-1000 liquid metal, shape-shifting terminators are extremely cool, but it’s not anything we haven’t seen already before.

·         If you haven’t seen the original, you won’t appreciate the nuances of how the story has veered off in different directions.

      It's so hokey when they change the spelling of a word to make it seem cooler.  (Genesis)

Funny lines:

·         “Bite me!” – Sarah

“That is a very immature response.”  - Terminator/”Pops”

·         “We have approximately 35 seconds.” – Terminator/”Pops”

A bad guy crashes through a window and the Terminator says “One less.”

·         “Can you stop him talking like that?  Is there a switch or something?” –  Kyle  (referring not only to the Terminator’s content, but Austrian accent)  ha ha

·         “We’re not even sure he speaks English.” – random cop in the jail scene   (another funny poke at Arnold’s Austrian accent)

·         “We’re here to stop the end of the world!” – Sarah Connor

“I can work with that.” –  Detective O’Brien

·         “I read about this on GunsandAmmo.com” – The Terminator/”Pops”.   Hilarious.  It’s a real web site.

·         “I thought you were dead.” – Sarah

“No, just upgraded.” – The Terminator/”Pops”

Overly dramatic lines:

·         “We take it tonight or there is no tomorrow.” – John Connor

·         “Come with me if you want to live!  Now, soldier!” – Sarah Connor

·         “We’re exiles in time.” – Reese

·         “You are nothing but a relic from a deleted time line.” – John Connor

Tips for Parents:

·         Like in the other The Terminator movies, you see Arnold Schwarzenegger naked (from the rear) as he transports through the time traveling machine.  A few other people travel through it naked as well, but you don’t see too much.

·         1 F-bomb

·         “Mild” profanity, intense fighting.

       Some of the terminator skeleton robots may be too scary for young children.

Need to catch up on the films in this futuristic franchise?