Film Review - The Witches (2020)

The Witches is based off the book by Roald Dahl and is directed by Robert Zemeckis and co-written by Guillermo Del Toro and Alfonso Cuaron is a producer on the film as well, the story concerns a young boy (Jazhir Bruno) who goes to live with his grandmother (Octavia Spencer) and she warns him about evil Witches who hate children and now the Grand High Witch (Anne Hathaway) has devised a plan to rid the world of children by turning them into mice.

 

The Witches is a fun movie, Mr Zemeckis can still deliver somewhat of a fun experience somewhat and the film has a lot of his technical trademarks on it most notably a great musical score by Mr Alan Silvestri who did the legendary score for his Back to the Future and crafted that great Avengers theme which I got a real joy out of hearing in a big cinema screen plus there are some fun sequences with the mice that definitely have that influence of Mr Cuaron as well.

 

One big negative I have to mention is Ms Anne Hathaway, someone I have been a big fan of for a long time but here she goes so far over the top it becomes groaning to listen to after a while and I got sick of hearing that voice, now to be fair Mr Zemeckis can get great comedic performances out of his actors the criminally underrated Death Becomes Her is a prime example of this but this one really didn’t work.

 

Also the more I’ve come to think on the film I have found myself wondering what a Del Toro directed and Cuaron produced version of this movie would’ve looked like as I have pondered that Del Toro’s extraordinary imagination would’ve been a great fit for Dahl’s writing as a movie perhaps it would have pushed more of the technical wizardry, more of that childlike horror feel and more of that visual wonder like in Pacific Rim where I just sat there with my mouth wide open smiling from ear to ear.

 

Or indeed the Zemeckis that made Death Becomes Her that was a dark comedy with great comedic performances that didn’t feel like a bombastic cartoon either way as fun as this movie is I can’t help but feel that either of those would have been better than the movie we got which despite Hathaway’s cartoonish voice is a fun ride that I did enjoy, 3 out of 5.

 

Film Review - Fatman (2020)

 Fatman tells the tale of Billy Wenan (Chance Hurtsfield) a young rich boy who happens to know a hitman (Walton Goggins) and after receiving a lump of coal in his Christmas stocking he then hires said hitman to kill Chris Kringle (Mel Gibson) and he has survived other attempts on his life in the past.

 

Fatman is an interesting movie in that it is not as bad as I thought it would be, its certainly a weird one but there were times where I did enjoy myself and I did laugh but there is a big big issue with this movie.

 

And that is the films tone, when the film strives for a black comedy feel it does work and that was when I did laugh at the film and have fun with it but when it tries to be serious it really doesn’t work and that was when I wasn’t really getting with the film.

 

As for the performances well, Mr Goggins is okay though he’s played this type of role before such as in the Hateful Eight but I did enjoy watching Mr Gibson again, yes he’s said some truly awful things and he’s gotten the punishment he rightfully deserves but I still had fun watching him here and like when I rewatched Lethal Weapon 1 and 2 earlier this year there is a clear reason he became a movie star and also a clear reason why he lost it all.

 

And lastly I have to talk about the young kid in this movie he is such a spoilt little brat that when I was watching the film I thought to myself “This kid is one adolescence away from turning into the Joker” and I feel like if the kid was likeable then this movie wouldn’t have these tonal problems as much as it does.

 

And so that was Fatman and look there is some fun to be had but the films tonal problems really hold it back, 2 and a half out of 5.

Film Review - Mank (2020)

 

Mank is the newest film directed by David Fincher and written by his late father Jack and concerns Herman Makiewicz (Gary Oldman) who is hired by Orson Welles (Tom Burke) to write a draft script for his newest film project but this tale has been long brewing in Mank’s mind and the road to it is a roadmap through his own history in 1930s Hollywood.

 

Mank was a movie I was very keen to see mainly due to it being the return of Mr Fincher to the directors chair on a movie since Gone Girl in 2014 and I was hopeful that he would deliver another rousing movie like he did with Gone Girl that year and 2011’s criminally underrated Girl with the Dragon Tattoo adaptation.

 

Sadly I must say with a degree of sadness that this movie left me a little flat and a fair bit disappointed but before I delve more into that I want to delve more into what did work for me.

 

And that is surely Mr Fincher’s way with a camera, his direction is fantastic and along with the costumes/production design/sound/music and editing mounts a very nice production and a lot of the time I was watching this film I found myself once more admiring Mr Fincher’s craftsmanship and the physical production traits he inspires from his collaborators.

 

But I must also say that this movie just felt flat and more like a Diet Fincher film much like his well liked 2010 film The Social Network which again was handsomely made but overall did little for me much like this film does and like that film it has a central performance this time being Mr Oldman as the title character Mank that really grated with me after a while I just got so sick of hearing that voice that sounded like some babbling drunk at a dinner party that all of the guests just want to shut the fuck up and after a while I wanted the same thing to happen.

 

And also as nice as the period is I didn’t find myself being all that invested in it emotionally which again Gone Girl and Dragon Tattoo did do for me but those felt like proper Fincher with this dark MA15+ edge where there are no rules, no limits and a willingness to probe into the darker sides of human nature in terms of how we treat those we love and they in return treat us or how society looks upon those in societies where the normal rules of right and wrong don’t always apply, that to me is the Fincher I love and respond to the most.

 

The Fincher of this movie and the Social Network not so much and I get that this movie and that one will have their fans but I am not one of them and my hope is that if he does make another film after Mank it will be another dark and nasty MA15+ film as that to me is where he works best, 2 and a half out of 5.