“Deadwood: The Movie” Movie Review

    Before “Game of Thrones” became a cultural phenomenon and the biggest hit HBO ever produced, the cable channel had several critical hits under it’s belt including one of my favorite shows, “Deadwood”.  The show was gritty and unusual with a huge talented ensemble cast.  The dialogue was interesting because while characters cursed like sailors, they would do so with a poetic flair that made every line of dialogue feel both dirty and beautiful at the same time.  Sadly, “Deadwood” was cancelled after it’s third season with no resolution to some of it’s key storylines.

    The film takes place ten years after the finale of “Deadwood” and we most of the characters have remained in the town of Deadwood, chiefly U.S. Marshal Seth Bullock and Al Swearengen.  The town has settled down for the most part since we last left it and South Dakota is in the process of entering statehood.  The town’s peaceful existence is put at risk when George Hearst, now a United States Senator, returns to Deadwood and seeks to purchase Charlie Utter’s land (and get payback on Trixie for shooting him a decade ago).

    I had long given up hope for a film follow up to the series years ago.  There were talks of a film concluding the series for years now but after a few years, talks of a movie died down (along with talks of a movie following the events of “Rome”).  The show ended more than a decade ago and most of the cast went on to other successful shows and films.

    The movie was a worthy successor to the show and it was nice revisiting the characters.  The only problem I had with the film was that the end felt a bit rushed in my opinion.  Maybe I just wish their was more “Deadwood” on the horizon.  I feel like they left the ending a bit open ended deliberately in case David Milch ever decided to revisit the series again at some point (which I would be down for).  At the end, it supplied a more satisfying ending than the series did and it was nice to get a sense of closure.

    It is a bit refreshing to see a western these days, especially one so well written and performed.  The thing I love about David Milch is that his scripts are almost Shakespearean.  The characters are far more articulate than characters in other shows.  I enjoyed having some of the events from the series briefly shown via flashback because I hadn’t had a chance to revisit the series before I watched this (plus I wanted to test the movie and see how accessible it would be to first time viewers).

    I adored seeing Timothy Olyphant and Ian McShane return as Seth Bullock and Al Swearengen and the pair were amazing.  Gearld McRaney also proved to be the perfect antagonist as George Hearst.  McRaney is a very underrated performer.  It was also amazing seeing Paula Malcomson, John Hawkes, Molly Parker, Kim Dickens, Brad Dourif, and Anna Gunn all reprising their roles.

    Director Daniel Minahan managed to capture the tone and spirit of the series in a way I didn’t think possible.  He also managed to get some of the best performances I have seen from actors I have seen this year.

    “Deadwood: The Movie” is a satisfying finale to the epic HBO series.  New viewers may feel a little lost but should enjoy the film for it’s overall quality.  As a fan of the series, I was happy to see this.

Grade: B+

“Dark Phoenix” Movie Review

    The final Twentieth Century Fox owned and controlled “X-Men” movie was released a few weeks ago to little fanfare and a terrible marketing campaign.  “Dark Phoenix” unwisely dropped X-Men from the title which I am sure led to some audience members being unaware that this was meant to be a continuous of the X-Men saga.  As many of you know, Disney bought Twentieth Century Fox and has gained the rights to the X-Men and the Fantastic Four.  The next X-Men movie besides from the already filmed “New Mutants” will likely be a complete reboot set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

    The film starts out showing how Professor X and Jean Grey met.  The film then jumps to show the X-Men on a rescue mission to save the astronauts of a destroyed space shuttle.  While on the mission, Jean Grey absorbs what turns out to be the Phoenix force.  As Jean Grey starts to lose control, the mental barriers Charles Xavier put in her head start collapsing and Jean realizes her father is still alive so she takes off to find him.  Professor Xavier and the rest of the X-Men try to bring her back to the school but they end up fighting and Mystique is killed in the battle.  Seeking sanctuary, Jean Grey seeks out Magneto Buy is turned away by him before he found out what she had done.  Hank McCoy/Beast decides to leave the X-Men over the grief of losing Mystique and ends up seeking out Magneto as well.  Beast informs Magneto that Jean had killed Mystique, the woman both men had loved, and the two decide to set off to kill Jean Grey as a result.  The X-Men are forced to square off with them before an alien threat forces all parties to work together for the sake of the entire planet.

    So, there is a lot of story going on with this film, both in front of and behind the cameras.  Currently “Dark Phoenix” is the worst reviewed X-Men film to date and probably will remain so for a long while (unless “New Mutants” ends up taking that honor).  The critical bashing the film took certainly didn’t help the film at the box office, as the film opened to disappointing financial results.  I had to check out the movie for myself however, not only as a film reviewer, but as someone who has seen every other film X-Men related (including the made for TV movie “Generation X”).  Without further suspense, I will say I found the film to be okay.  It wasn’t a masterpiece nor as bad as some of the reviews made it out to be either.  The worst thing I could say about the movie is that I expected a little more from it.

    The film focuses on the popular Phoenix saga from the X-Men comics.  This story arc was already used in the clustered “X-Men: The Last Stand” so this was essentially a reboot of that sequel.  Unfortunately, this film proved to be just as clustered but instead of focusing on action, this film was clustered with melodrama.  Personally, I prefer a messy action film over a messy melodrama.  I won’t say “X-Men: The Last Stand” was a better film, but it was no worse either, and to spend time rehashing this particular storyline, you want the film to top the film it’s rebooting.

    One very distracting aspect of all the X-Men films is their lack of solid continuity throughout the franchise.  These films span decades but the filmmakers use the same actors without any age prosthetics.  You would think I multimillion dollar film could invest a little money into age makeup or cgi touchups on the actors.  Another solution might have been to set all the films in the 60s-70s but that didn’t seem like a sensible solution to the studio.

    The film primarily starred “Game of Thrones” breakout Sophie Turner as Jean Grey/Phoenix.  Turner does a fine job as Grey but can only do so much with the material she was given.  Jennifer Lawrence was quickly killed off on the film and sort of phones in her performance.  You could tell she was done with the franchise and just wanted out.  James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender continue to prove to be the backbone of the films and deliver stellar performances as the head figures of two drastically different ideologies.

    Say what you want about filmmaker Bryan Singer (and he may very well deserve it) but the X-Men movies have always been their best with his direction.  His ability to relate to the source material and use his struggles with his homosexuality as an allegory for the mutant struggles.  Singer has also proven to be the only filmmaker to successfully showcase the character of Quicksilver (Joss Whedon included).

    It should be noted that the ending had to be changed due to it’s similarity to the ending of “Captain Marvel” which was released a few months before “Dark Phoenix”.  It is believed the original ending featured the Skrulls (which makes sense since the aliens depicted in the film were shapeshifters) and a battle fought in space.  It’s ironic that the filmmakers changed the ending for it’s similarity to the ending of “Captain Marvel” yet decided to leave the opening of the film untouched considering it was almost identical to the opening sequence of “Shazam!” (which is based on a different Captain Marvel ironically).

    While we talk about the film’s final act, why on Earth did someone think turning the final battle into a literal train wreck was a good idea?  I can just imagine the meeting to change the ending going like this...

Fox Executive:

I can’t believe this!  Disney is making a Marvel movie with almost the same ending that is hitting theaters before us!  This is a nightmare!

Script Writer:

This is terrible!  What are we supposed to do?

Fox Executive:

I was hoping you might have some ideas.  The last thing we want is for this to turn into another train wreck like “X-Men: The Last Stand”.

Script Writer:

Did you say something about a train wreck?

Fox Executive:

F*** yeah I did!

Script Writer:

Interesting...  Also, I like that you threw in a random F bomb.  Being a PG-13 movie, I feel it is my moral obligation to throw in one random F bomb (randomly turns to a page and places his finger somewhere) HERE!

Fox Executive:

Are you drunk?

Script Writer:

Nooooo....now hold my beer!

    So in a nutshell, I found the movie to be okay with some enjoyable action set pieces but nothing about the movie will wow you either.  Still, there are far worse movies that have hit theaters this year alone.

Grade: B-

“Rocketman” Movie Review

    Another week, another trip to the cinema!  With so many good looking films out now, it’s been hard to decide what to see these past few weeks.  One movie my girlfriend and I really wanted to see was the Elton John biopic “Rocketman” so when our friends Elva and Roy wanted to see that movie as well, it was settled.

    The movie tells the story of Sir Elton John from his childhood to his rise to living legend status.  Born Reginald Dwight, the movie shows his upbringing in a broken home and how he felt responsible for his home life.  Reginald was born a musical prodigy and turned to music in his troubled times.  The film then swifts focus to Reginald as a young man struggling to make it as musician.  This all changes with his musical partnership with Bernie Taupin.  Their collaborations together helped create some of the most iconic music in the modern era as the movie goes on to depict.  There are plenty of dark times for Reginald, now known as Elton John, ahead however.  As his fame rises, Elton John is forced to hide the fact that he is homosexual from the press for fear of the damage it would do to his career and he also grows increasingly addicted to alcohol and drugs.

    I really enjoyed this movie overall.  One thing that caught me a little off guard at first and took a little getting used to was the fact that the movie was both a biopic and musical.  I was expecting a more straight forward biopic in the vain of “Bohemian Rhapsody” but this film managed to set itself apart from that film by telling it’s story in a different way.

    I am a big Elton John fan so I wanted to see this movie a little more than my girlfriend (although she enjoys some of his music as well).  I grew up listening to oldies as a kid and performers like The Beatles, Elton John, The Monkees, Queen, The Doors, The Rolling Stones and so on have a special place in my heart.  Naturally, the music that featured in this film was a highlight for me.

    One thing that worried me a bit going into the movie was the fact that Elton John himself was listed as an executive producer, which typically means, Elton John himself has to approve of how he is depicted in the movie.  People have a tendency to only want to highlight the best parts of their lives and omit aspects which may make them appear in a negative light.  After all, we are the heroes in our own stories.  Somewhat surprisingly, the film does a pretty admirable job painting a complete picture of Elton John.  There are times in the film in which Elton John comes off as a very sympathetic character and times in which he is depicted as sort of a jerk.  The thing is, it makes him feel like a real person because even the nicest person can be seen as rude or nasty to someone else and perhaps they have good reason to be.

    The film also doesn’t shy away from Sir Elton John’s personal struggles.  The film depicts Elton John as a man who turns to alcohol and drugs to cope with his depression.  His depression, at least as depicted in the film, is caused from his home life and having to live his life in the closet.  It wasn’t until he could accept his homosexuality and learn to love himself that he was able to free himself from addiction.  With June being LGBT pride month, this movie couldn’t have picked a better time to come out.  One struggle I thought Elton John might want downplayed in the film was his struggle writing lyrics.  Instead, much of the focus of the film was about his struggle admitting that he loved and needed Bernie Taupin in his professional and personal life.  The two are still good friends after all these years.

    What makes this film extra special is the cast.  Taron Egerton does a stellar job embodying Sir Elton John.  Egerton seems almost destined to play the role after singing one of Elton John’s songs in the movie “Sing” and co-starring with the icon himself in “Kingsman: The Golden Circle”.  Jamie Bell does a good job as Bernie Taupin (thankfully Bell is a better actor than he is a singer however).  “Game of Thrones” alumni Richard Madden plays against type as John Reid, the antagonistic manager of Elton John.  Fun little trivia for “Game of Thrones” fans, Aiden Gillen played John Reid in the film “Bohemian Rhapsody”.  Lastly worth a mention, Bryce Dallas Howard appears and does an incredible job as Elton John’s mother.

    It should be noted that Dexter Fletcher directed this film and a good chunk of “Bohemian Rhapsody” after Bryan Singer was fired from the project.  To some degree, the two movies feel a bit like they share the same universe (being biopics, I guess they do to some degree).  While some aspects feel very different than “Bohemian Rhapsody”, other visual styles feel very similar.

    In the end, “Rocketman” proved to be an interesting look inside the early life of Elton John.  Regardless if you enjoy his music or not, it makes for an interesting movie. “Rocketman” shows how a star is truly born and will keep your toes tapping.

Grade: A-