Tag: Florian Munteanu

Cinema Dispatch: Borderlands

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

Borderlands and all the images you see in this review are owned by Lionsgate Films

Directed by Eli Roth

Video game adaptations have certainly gotten better in the last few years, but there’s still a wide gulf between genuinely good movies and good-for-a-video-game-adaptation. I had mixed feelings about this when the trailer dropped as it looked like a Guardians of the Galaxy knock-off which worked out well for Dungeons & Dragons, but it’s also directed by the guy whose made some of my least favorite movies of all time. Does Eli Roth finally prove himself to be a competent mainstream director with a fun adaptation of a beloved game franchise, or will he be just another director who couldn’t crack the code on turning games into movies? Let’s find out!!

Welcome to Pandora! The planet that is to late-stage Capitalism what Rapture was to Objectivism! Corporations have stripped the planet bare, everyone is a jerk only out for themselves, and the masses are placated with a false promise of ascending up the social ladder by achieving the Pandorian Dream; in this case, finding a secret vault full of ancient alien treasure. Bounty hunter Lilith (Cate Blanchet) is far too savvy to buy into that nonsense, but she makes her way to the planet anyway in order to rescue Tina (Ariana Greenblatt), the daughter of an industrialist (Edgar Ramirez) who was taken to Pandora by Roland (Kevin Hart). When she arrives, she finds the foul-mouthed teen bumming around with Roland and Krieg; the latter being a jacked dude with a mask (Florian Munteanu) who’s surprisingly good with kids. Let’s just say that the rescue goes a bit sideways for Lilith, a situation not helped by a bunch of space cops trying to grab her bounty out from under her, and she ends up stuck with this group of misfits who are there to find the vault and prevent Tina’s dad from using it for evil! With the help of a local scientist (Jamie Lee Curtis) who knows more about the vault than anyone else on the planet as well as a robot named Claptrap (Jack Black) who follows Lilith around and seems to be programmed for maximum annoyance, will they be able to find the one thing on the planet that the wealthy can’t get their hands on and use it to make things better for the people of Pandora? Why did Roland need to take Tina in order to do this, and is does Lilith have a connection to all this that she has yet to understand? Perhaps they can also solve the mystery of how her hair is able to look like that without using super glue and spray paint.

“Seriously, do you use a diffuser when blow-drying it, or is all in the hair gel?”     “Can we talk about something else, please?”
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Cinema Dispatch: Creed III

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

Creed III and all the images you see in this review are owned by MGM Pictures

Directed by Michael B Jordan

Who would have expected that we’d get two movies back to back starring Jonathan Majors, and even more unlikely that there are a lot of similarities between the two?  Perhaps it’ll be worth probing into those odd connections later, but for now, we’re here to talk about the latest entry in the Creed franchise and the directorial debut of its star, Michael B Jordan!  He’s got some big shoes to fill; not only with this being the latest entry in the venerable Rocky series but also coming in after Ryan Coogler and Steven Caple Jr left their own marks on the franchise.  Is it a worthy successor to everything that came before it, or is the Creed franchise destined to repeat the mistakes that the Rocky movies made once they got a few sequels in?  Let’s find out!!

Adonis Creed (Michael B Jordan) is on top of the world as the boxing champ and has decided to retire while he still can, so instead of preparing for yet another fight he’s training an up-and-coming talent (José Benavidez Jr) with the help of Little Duke (Wood Harris) and the only thing that could get in their way is… I don’t know, perhaps a part of Creed’s past coming back to haunt him.  Then again, what are the chances of that, am I right?  Oh, wait, it looks like an old friend of his just got out of jail and is throwing more than a few subtle hints that he wants a shot at the title.  Yes, the blast from the past turns out to be a guy named Damien (Jonathan Majors) who seems cool at first as Creed’s longtime friend who’s ready to turn his life around, but he ultimately lives up to the name and before long he ends up on top of the boxing world under very dubious circumstances.  Creed having to confront his past brings up some very mixed feelings that start to affect his relationship with his wife and daughter (Tessa Thompson and Mila Davis-Kent) and when it comes down to it, does he have what it takes to set Damien straight and stop a monster that he has inadvertently created?  Will his family be able to follow him on his path to redemption, or are the wounds of the past too deep for them to heal?  Sure, this guy beat Drago Jr, but I don’t know; maybe Kang the Conqueror is just a hair outside of his league?

“OKAY! *COUGH* “NO MORE MR. NICE GUY!”
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Cinema Dispatch: Creed II

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

CREED2CD0

Creed II and all the images you see in this review are owned by MGM Pictures

Directed by Steven Caple Jr

Back when I reviewed the first movie, I made a note that my conception of Rocky for the longest time was just the first three films, so the whole Ivan Drago thing always felt like an afterthought despite it being so iconic for many fans of the franchise.  That said, when the first one came out and was about the son of Apollo, yeah there was NO WAY that a sequel could exist without bringing Dolph Lundgren back into the mix which thankfully they managed to do here with what is probably the last necessary sequel to Rocky we’ll ever need (unless we want to bring back Clubber Lang) and they can either continue the franchise without the baggage of the original films or let this series finally lay to rest.  Do they manage to do justice to the story of Ivan Drago and Apollo Creed in this tale about their sons settling a decade’s long rivalry, or should the franchise have stopped while it was ahead?  Admittedly if they HAD stopped while they were ahead we probably wouldn’t have gotten the first Creed, but in any case LET’S FIND OUT!!

The movie picks up a few years after the first film where Adonis Creed (Michael B Jordan) has risen in the ranks of the boxing world with the help of his wise mentor Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) and the loving support of his girlfriend Bianca (Tessa Thompson).  After winning the WBC World Heavyweight Championship, he has FINALLY reached his dream of reclaiming the belt that his father lost those many years ago!  Well that’s great!  So now what?  He decides to marry Bianca for one, but even with a loving wife and a sterling career, something feels… missing.  Despite being the best of the best, he can’t seem to find the joy in it and pretty much immediately starts looking for a new challenge.  Fortunately a very helpful fight promoter (Russell Hornsby) saw this coming a mile away and knew that once Adonis became champ that there was only one challenge left for him to face, and by challenge I mean one BIG spectacle of a fight to rake in millions of dollars!  We are of course referring to, a rematch with Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren); the man who killed his father.  Or at the very least, Ivan Drago’s SON (Florian Munteanu) who as far as I know hasn’t killed anyone, but that might change if Adonis takes the bait and faces him again in the ring.  If you’ve seen a Rocky movie, you know the basics of what happens next (i.e. Adonis loses the fight at the halfway point), but what does it mean for him to have his first taste of true defeat, and will he be able to face him once again, as well as all his fears and insecurities that have held him back from reaching his true potential?  What will the strain of this lose put on his marriage to Bianca, and will she be able to live the life of a boxer’s wife; something that she’s never had to face since Adonis has never truly lost a fight on his own terms?  Perhaps most importantly, DOES ADONIS COME OUT TO LIVING IN AMERICA!?

CREED2CD1
It’s hand to HAND across the nation; not hand to FACE!

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