Film Review - Force of Nature: The Dry 2 (2024)

Force of Nature: The Dry 2 is the follow up to 2021’s The Dry and both Writer/Director Robert Connolly and Eric Bana as Aaron Falk return in their roles, this story however takes place in Victoria’s High Country as 5 women (Deborah Lee-Furness, Anna Torv, Robin McLeavy, Sisi Stringer and Lucy Ansell) head up into the high country for a corporate retreat but only 4 return and Alice (Torv) is the one missing and Falk was using her for a high stakes AFP operation so the race is on to find her before a powerful storm system sweeps through the area.

I was very keen for this movie as I really enjoyed the Dry in early 2021 and have rewatched it a couple of times since then, it had a great mystery, a much welcome great role for Bana who had really been struggling since his break out role as Chopper Reed and great use of the drought stricken area it took place in but sadly this movie was the first to fall victim to the dual writers and actors strikes last year and its original August 23rd release date was delayed to February 8th but my main cinema was able to take part in some early screenings over the Australia Day long weekend and I pounced.

And happily most happily this movie has been well worth the wait and if you liked the Dry then you will not be disappointed and in 2 of the 3 fronts that film succeeded well in this one does too:

- The first of those is the location, whereas the first film had this dry desert frontier town feel to it where showers were a luxury and you felt the browns of the drought stricken land and the reds of the nearby fires and clear skied sunsets, this one is full of flowing waterfalls and riverbeds and dense green grassland where it can be easy to get lost and one small mistake can see you going down a mountain to almost certain death and the film makes great use of the high country landscape to full effect and it really shows on a big cinema screen.

- And the second of these is the casting, Bana is as good as ever second time around as Falk but here he has a co-detective to bounce off of in Jacqueline McKenzie and the two play off each other pretty well even though there were times I wished Bana was alone trying to solve the case, Lee-Furness (who previously made a movie set in the High Country called Cool Change with Jon Blake and Lisa Armitage in 1986) is very good here while Richard Roxburgh is good as well in a small role.

Also good are the other returning members of the corporate retreat McLeavy, Stringer and Ansell while Anna Torv who has rapidly emerged as one of my favourite actresses working today delivers her usual very good work as Alice, I can’t wait to see her again in the 3rd Season of the Newsreader later this year.

But there is one area where this movie isn’t as good as the Dry and that is in its central mystery, in the Dry it was easy to follow whereas here it’s firstly not as interesting and secondly at times it feels a little too twisty turny for its own good but that said this movie does NOT In any way fall into the same trap that both Kenneth Branagh’s Death on the Nile or Rian Johnson’s Knives Out sequel Glass Onion fell into where they were just inferior films full stop when compared to their predecessors.

And so that was Force of Nature: The Dry 2 and this is a sequel that is as good as the first film and I will be keen to see this again when it starts its national run on February 8th, 3 weeks before Dune Part 2: Long Live the Fighters Will finally come out and what a glorious day that will be, 4 out of 5.

Film Review - The Color Purple (2024)

The Color Purple is not a remake of Steven Spielberg’s 1985 film but instead based on the Broadway Musical of the same name (though Spielberg and Amblin are producers on it as is Oprah Winfrey who along with Whoopi Goldberg came to prominence with the original film) and this time Fantasia Barrio stars as Celie who is forced to marry the abusive and hard driving Mr (Colman Domingo) but one day she meets the Blues singer Shug (Taraji P Henson) and Celie starts to think of better days ahead as well as possibly seeing her Sister Nettie (Halle Bailey) again.

This new version of Color Purple is a good film but its not without problems but before I delve into those I want to talk about what I do like:

- Firstly I did like the films musical numbers, they are well shot and edited and have a real verve to them and when they came on in the cinema I was tapping my feet to them for the most part though as the film goes on they do start to get in the way of the storytelling a little bit.

- And secondly I think this is a solid cast, Barrio steps into some big shoes taking over Goldberg in this role but she does very well here (even if at times she looked a little too much like Goldberg) as does Danielle Brooks who is very good as Sophia and again taking over another icon in Oprah Winfrey who could not be easy but she does very well, Corey Hawkins and Hally Bailey are good in their roles and also the films production design especially of the swamp house is good as well.

But there are two big issues that I had with this movie:

- The first of these is the films length, it goes for 141 minutes but it felt more like 161 minutes at times especially towards the end where you just want the film to not have another song and dance ballad but instead to wrap up its story so I can exercise my bottom and stop it from going numb sitting in my seat and long musicals are hit and miss for me as well, sometimes like Spielberg’s West Side Story which had a 156 minute length worked wonderfully for me but here I was bothered by the length more.

- And secondly the films more serious storytelling moments and the films vibrant musical numbers clashed for me in terms of the overall tone and more than once I kept thinking to myself “I wish I was watching the original instead” and this feeling is heightened by Colman’s performance as Mr because at times especially in the second half I kept thinking he was doing an imitation of Danny Glover who played Mr in the original film (and was cast as Roger Murtaugh in Lethal Weapon afterwards) and Glover has a distinctive voice that it sounded like Colman was doing that instead of making the part more his own and that bothered me as well.

All that aside however the Color Purple is not a bad film at all it’s a good watch if tough at times but I would watch the Spielberg original instead if your not hugely into musicals as this is a musical through and through and it worked well enough for me that I enjoyed myself watching it, 3 out of 5.

Film Review - The Beekeeper (2024)

The Beekeeper is directed by David Ayer who you may remember from such films as Fury in 2014 and the original Suicide Squad film in 2016 and stars Jason Statham as Adam Clay a beekeeper on a nearby farm who notices the farms owner has committed suicide after falling victim to a phising scam on her computer but Andy is more than any ordinary beekeeper and is determined to find the member of the hive responsible and drain them of their honey.

The Beekeeper is terrific fun and multiple times while watching it I had a big smile on my face and at times I event went “Yaaaayyyy” as Jason does his Stath thing and kills a whole bunch of people but thankfully this time the action is fun to watch and not borderline boring which it has been in some of the Stath’s recent films like Operation Fortune and Expendables 4 though at times Ayer cuts the action scenes a little too tightly and it takes you out of the film at times.

Also the film has a fun story of tech bros as the villains which Josh Hutcherson (he of Peeta Mallark from the Hunger Games) does pretty well and I enjoyed seeing Jeremy Irons and Minnie Driver in small roles and the film clips along at a nice brisk pace and even has some story turns I didn’t expect and were nicely surprising.

And so that was the Beekeeper and its fun to watch and definitely a welcome step up in quality for the Stath who I often found myself wishing was making better films and now he has hopefully this continues, 3 and a half out of 5.

Film Review - Ferrari (2024)

Ferrari is the new film by Michael Mann and stars Adam Driver as Enzo Ferrari who in 1957 is facing a crisis within his company Ferrari and in his personal life as his now ex-wife Laura (Penelope Cruz) still maintains an interest in the company while his mistress Lina (Shailene Woodley) looks after their young son Piero (Giuseppe Festinese) but when a dangerous 1,000 mile race comes on the horizon Enzo decides to bet it all on winning that race.

Ferrari is very much a middle of the road Michael Mann film for me, it is not a dumpster fire like 2009’s Public Enemies or 2015’s Blackhat were for me but nor is it up there with his best films like 1986’s Manhunter or 1993’s The Last of the Mohicans.

For starters both Driver and Cruz are good in this movie both in their individual scenes and especially in their scenes together and it was those scenes that I felt the film really come alive as it felt like Mann had 2 great actors ready to go at each other and he was waiting to press record and get it on film and their chemistry works really well, Cruz in particular was my favourite part of this film from her sadness to anger and ultimately heartbreak at what has happened to Enzo and her life with him now that they are no longer together and sometimes Cruz says this with her eyes and its great to see.

Plus the films racing scenes are pretty good even if at times its all too obvious that CGI has been used in some of the films car crash scenes as it looked a bit janky in spots.

But this movie has 2 big problems:

- The first of those is that this movie lacks a good race car driver character like we got with Christian Bale’s Ken Miles in Ford V Ferrari which James Mangold directed and Mann executive produced and not only was Bale great in that film with his accent and yelling at everyone and swearing his head off but he also served as a pivotal anchor point to that films car racing scenes in terms of giving you a character to really get behind and hope that they win.

Here that is absent and although Patrick Dempsey and his silver hair try their best he’s in too little of the film to really make that key difference that Bale did in FvF.

- And second Shailene Woodley is really bad in this film and her casting is almost as misplaced as Chris Hemsworth’s was in Blackhat where that film has the government people going “we need a great computer person” and then it cuts to Chris in prison doing what looks like his workout for Thor: Ragnarok and that film was fatally undermined by his casting and Woodley’s casting almost does similar damage as she just comes across as dull, lifeless, flat and boring in her scenes and she has not only no real chemistry with Driver but I just do not believe Driver’s character would leave someone as beautiful as Cruz’s Laura for someone like her and also at times she just looks bored to be there and that also bothered me.

All that said however Ferrari is a good enough film that’s worth a watch down the line mainly for Driver and Cruz, 3 out of 5.

Film Review - Next Goal Wins (2024)

Next Goal Wins is the new film by Taika Waititi and is based off of the American Samoa Soccer Team who in 2001 suffered a humiliating 31-0 defeat at the hands of the Socceroos, now 10 years later Thomas Rongen (Michael Fassbender) is sent there after losing his job to help whip this team into shape before the World Cup Qualifiers but it will not be easy.

Next Goal Wins is not a bad movie from Waititi (those would be Thor: Love and Thunder which got far too silly and Jojo Rabbit which made me so disgusted with its frivolousness in the beginning of that film I nearly walked out of the cinema) but it is not one of his better films either (those would be Hunt for the Wilderpeople and Thor: Ragnarok.)

The main reason it didn’t really do it for me is that I’m starting to get a little bit over Waititi’s style of comedy, it was a lot of fun in Wilderpeople and even in Ragnarok at times but here I didn’t really find myself laughing all that much (though I did chuckle a few times) and I also felt that its attempts at comedy felt like everyone involved was trying too hard to generate those big cinema crowd laughs and when that doesn’t happen I feel a little embarrassed for all involved.

But that said there is some good to be had here, Fassbender is good as Rongen even though I liked him more in David Fincher’s The Killer last year and a lot of the pacific island actors are good as well, I particularly liked Oscar Kightley the head of the American Samoa Football Club and Kaimana as Jaiyah a trans soccer player plus Rachel House fresh from Foundation Season 2, Will Arnett, Angus Sampson and Luke Hemsworth have fun small roles as well plus when the film plays itself as more sincere it did make me smile.

But alas Waititi is starting to become one of those filmmakers like George Lucas or M Night Shyamalan where they can become their own worst enemy and they have to play things a certain way when they sometimes need to just let a good story play out on its own and not feel the need to inject themselves so much into it and that happens here sadly, I hope Waititi changes course soon as I do feel he is a talented guy who is letting his ego run rampant.

And so that was Next Goal Wins and its fun for the most part but it didn’t really work all that well for me as I felt its laughs were too forced and I’m a little over Waititi and his style at the moment, 2 out of 5.