A New Day: The First Review

 

First blog post!

So I decided to make a blog thing and review stuff like movies or food or whatnot with the caveat of only reviewing things that I haven't already seen or tried.  That way it'll be fresh and I won't be drawing on past experiences.

The first movie to review is the new Ghostbusters movie, which I got up early to watch before work today.  I didn't know what to expect, what with the buzz being either overwhelmingly positive, or extremely negative, but I tried to go in with a clean slate and an open mind.  I'll try to break down pros and cons without spoiling anything major.

  

Firstly, shout out to the  Aksarben Cinema for the six and change ticket for the early morning show. The theater was mildly crowded and we watched it in ACX, which is sort of like the Aksarben version of IMAX.  Bigger screen and higher quality audio.  The presentation was top notch as always. Skipped the popcorn and soda since it was just before 10:00 AM and I was still, by law, asleep.

Jumping into the things I did like: I'll start this with the best part about the movie.  Chris Hemsworth stole the whole movie in his ~10 minutes of screen time. Think of him as Lloyd from Dumb and Dumber, but he looks like Chris Hemsworth.  His comedic timing was spot on.  He should really jump on the comedy train and do a few titles in between those comic book movies.

The dynamic between the four leads was also good.  This is just me personally, but a lot of the jokes didn't hit me as laugh out loud funny, but there were times when the theater was filled with laughter from the other patrons, so someone thought it was funny. That point in itself is sort of a grey area of a good thing and a bad thing.  It's good because when some jokes fell flat and didn't work, which was the case, 2 or 3 minutes down the road, something else did work and a majority of the people there were right back into it.

Some of the things that I really didn't like include the villain, cameos, and how some actors were used.  Let's take the villain for example.  At no point in the movie, do we ever get a clear idea why he is doing the bad things he is doing.  Not even a little 2 minute flashback to justify his upcoming planned apocalypse.  It is shrugged off as 'People were mean to him, and now he is mad", which isn't even acceptable in a small budget, independent movie, much less something with the scale and scope of this.

We all like a cameo or two, here and there.  It gives us that 'gotcha' moment of Hey I get that! Done right, cameos can really add to fan service and the overall experience you have, especially with something as well received as the original Ghostbusters. The overall pacing of the movie was good.  It reels you in and keeps you right where you need to be throughout, but every 8-15 minutes, you get a new cameo, which basically says 'Wait just a minute. I know we're in the middle of this movie, but let's get off track for just one second because HEY LOOK BILL MURRAY,' and that really doesn't do justice to the movie they are trying to present.

I like Leslie Jones on SNL, but in my opinion, she was playing one large stereotype, and that did her a disservice as a performer. She has a lot more to offer than the cookie cutter boisterous, loud, over the top black lady that spews one-liners that is seen in a lot of movies. If they do make a sequel to this, expanding her character with more depth and range would be a great way to improve on where they are now.

In the end, I am sort of meh on Ghostbusters.  I didn't have much of a pre-opinion going in and it didn't wow me, but it didn't make me openly weep into my hands either.  I got about what I expected: A watchable and overall fairly entertaining popcorn flick that had some good points and some definite areas of improvement. I'll give it 2.5 out of 5 shoe boxes. Enjoyed, but not immensely.  Probably wouldn't sit down and watch it again.