Tag: Noah Segan

Cinema Dispatch: Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery and all the images you see in this review are owned by Netflix

Directed by Rian Johnson

The thing about the Knives Out series is that you never seem to get what you wanted going into it, and yet it still manages to come around to being a great movie. The first one revealed its mystery fairly early on but managed to have enough twists and turns to keep you guessing until the end, and while its sequel was a bit messier with an oddly underwhelming denouement for its own mystery, it’s a well-made Whodunit that worked even better for me on a second viewing. Rian Johnson is definitely doing something interesting with these Benoit Blanc mysteries, but can this latest entry in the series be yet another masterful take on the classic genre, or have the gimmicks gotten staler than the corpses Blanc is sent to investigate? Let’s find out!!

In a sleepy rural town somewhere in upstate New York, a young priest has been transferred in after an altercation with a deacon and is now under the watchful eye of Monsignor Wicks (Josh Brolin); an ornery man with a childish sense of humor and a teenage view on the world. His fire and brimstone sermons are a hit with his core fan base which includes the local church lady Martha (Glenn Close), the town doctor (Jeremy Renner), a conspiracy writer (Andrew Scott), a disabled violinist looking for a cure (Cailee Spaeny), and a mother and son who don’t get along (Kerry Washington and Daryl McCormack), but to the newly arrived Father Jed (Josh O’Connor), they seem to be alienating these people rather than helping the community. Still, at least it leaves the suspect count low when the Monsignor dies during the Good Friday service and Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) is called in to investigate. All suspicions seem to land on poor Father Jed as he’s the only one who was not a fan of the Monsignor, and as evidence mounts against him, it’s up to Blanc to cut through the hysteria and histrionics to find the truth. Who is truly responsible for the death of Monsignor Wicks, and will the investigation uncover unsavory truths about him and this community? Can Blanc and Jed get along despite coming from such vastly different worlds, and what will this case reveal within both of them that neither wishes to face head on? Maybe the secret Jed wishes to hide is that he’s really good at playing Bad Cop when they start interviewing suspects.

“This here is Blanc. He’s your friend. I’m not, and if you don’t tell him who did it, I’ll make you recite SO many Hail Marys it will make your head spin! ARE WE CLEAR!?”
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Cinema Dispatch: Knives Out

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

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Knives Out and all the images you see in this review are owned by Lionsgate

Directed by Rian Johnson

I gotta tell you, I was in LOVE with this movie from the very first trailer!  Seeing great actors like Michale Shannon, Toni Collette, and Daniel Craig, on screen with Captain America in a movie from the Last Jedi guy, AND it’s a juicy as heck murder mystery?  What more could one person ask for!?  Even with the best of trailers however, there’s always a possibility that what we saw was a cleaned up version of the best bits while the finished product is a compromised and messy waste of time; the Suicide Squad approach if you will.  Can Rian Johnson prove once again how great of a filmmaker he is despite how… “controversial” his last film was, or is this just more fuel to the fire for the more obnoxious anti-fans of The Last Jedi?  Let’s find out!!

The morning after the eighty-fifth birthday of famed mystery novelist Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer), he is found dead by his nurse Marta Cabrera (Ana De Anmas) with this throat slashed open by a knife, and because of his massive wealth and greedy family members it only makes sense to investigate things a bit further despite it looking like a suicide.  Not only that, famed detective Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) with his rich southern accent was brought in to investigate by a mysterious correspondent who sent him no identifying information but a wad of cash to find out if there was foul play or not.  His entire family was in attendance the night before and most of them stayed the night in the giant and ridiculously furnished mansion complete with a giant display of knives that looks like a rejected Game of Thrones prop, so there was plenty of opportunity for someone to get the drop on him and possibly make it look like a suicide.  The suspects include his children Linda and Walt (Jamie Lee Curtis and Michael Shannon), his children in-law Richard and Joni (Don Johnson and Toni Collette), and his grandchildren Hugh, Meg, and Jacob (Chirs Evans, Katherine Langford, and Jaeden Martell); all of whom are bizarre in their own way, but hardly seem to be the types to kill unless VERY highly motivated.  The key here is not finding the right method or the most capable suspect, but who had the most REASON to kill, and chance are it has to do with money as Harlan seems to have upset quite a few people at the party last night, though everyone is staying rather tight lipped about it.  Can Detective Blanc find the truth among all the lies, misdirection, and self-serving half-truths?  Which member of this eclectic family has the most to gain now that Harlan is gone, and who has the most to hide?  Is the big twist at the end that Detective Blanc was ACTUALLY Joe Bang in disguise this entire time!?

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“There was a time where I thought cracking bank vaults would solve all my problems.  Then I realized that my true passion was in cracking cases.  And also cracking bank vaults.  That’s just fun!”

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Cinema Dispatch: Star Wars: The Last Jedi

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

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Star Wars: The Last Jedi and all the images you see in this review are owned by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

Directed by Rian Johnson

And we’re back for our yearly song and dance to the empire George Lucas created and Disney is rebuilding!  Not that Star Wars ever really went away (nor did its fans who were perfectly willing to still spend money on it), but the last few years have been just the shot in the arm the franchise needed in order to make it more than a nostalgia artifact that won’t go away into something that will resonate with audiences today and maintain its throne as KING OF THE BLOCKBUSTERS.  Now that we’re at the second installment of the new trilogy, will it be yet another example of Disney getting this formula right, or have we already started hurtling head long into the dark side… by which I mean the movie is not very good?  Let’s find out!!

The movie picks up not long after the events of the first film where The First Order is understandably peeved over the destruction of the Star Killer Base and are on a warpath to hunt down the remnants of The Rebellion; more or less whittling them down to a single flagship desperately trying to find a place to hole up until the heat dies down.  Unfortunately for them, Supreme Leader Snoke (Andy Serkis) along with his own flagship are right on their tails and are blasting away at the Rebel ship’s shields until they can get a shot in and blow the whole thing up; effectively killing the resistance and all the loveable characters onboard.  Said characters include Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) who’s having trouble ceding to the Rebel Leadership which is primarily General Leia and Admiral Holdo (Carrie Fisher and Laura Dern), Finn (John Boyega) who’s all fixed up after the fight against Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) and the engineer Rose Tico (Kelly Marie Tran) who’s sister recently died in an attack and wants to help Finn in saving everyone who’s left on the flagship.  While Finn, Pie, and Rose are working out a way to save the ship while subverting the Rebel Leadership, Rey (Daisy Ridley) is off on Planet Nowhere with Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) trying to coax the latter into going back to The Rebels and giving her Jedi lessons, while Chewbacca (Joonas Suotamo)… well he’s keeping the Millennium Falcon warm in case either of them needs it.  Need it they might though considering how dire the situation is with The Rebels and Rey can’t exactly wait around for Luke to stop being a grumpy pants; especially with Kylo Ren growing more and more desperate to prove himself which only makes him that much more dangerous of a blunt tool for Snoke’s greater ambitions.  Will The Rebels find a way to survive this unceasing onslaught by The First Order?  Will Rey find her place in this conflict and become the Jedi Master that everyone can look up to in these trying times?  Will Luke teach her all those lessons he kinda sorta learned from Yoda and Obi-Wan!?

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“Do, or do not.  There is no try.”     “What do you mean there’s no try!?”     “Huh. You know, I never really understood that part either.”

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