Movie Review: Godzilla Minus Zero

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Counting the new movie “Godzilla Minus Zero”, 39 Godzilla movies have been produced, 34 of them from Japan. Why the entire country of Japan has had a fascination with this giant lizard creature since 1954 would just be speculation. Perhaps because the Japanese are generally shorter and this creature is so huge?

Anyone can easily estimate the special effects budget for any Godzilla movie, based on the total time with setup and build-up to the fighting and action scenes. For this movie, which runs for 2 hours and 15 minutes (too long), the build-up scenes are far too long and boring before the final payoff.

For this movie, there is a one-headed giant flying dragon who originally had one head, then, due to radiation and a series of electrical shocks, grows two more heads. This fire-breathing dragon is Godzilla’s antagonist with the big fight/payoff at the end of the movie. The problem with this screenplay is that there is not near enough explanation as to what is really going on (especially given the subtitles).

The main characters include a young married couple and their five-year-old daughter, who they have to leave on several occasions to keep her safe from the ongoing danger and explosions.

Movie Review: Wild Horse Nine

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In the new movie “Wild Horse Nine,” two CIA operatives, Chris (John Malkovich) and Lee (Sam Rockwell), travel in 1973 to vacation on Easter Island, an Island about 2200 miles west of Chile’s coast. One of the reasons why Chris and Lee go to Easter Island is to see the “big heads.”, which are a series of about 900 giant heads carved from volcanic rock, constructed between 1250 and 1300 AD by the Rapa Nui people, the Polynesian inhabitants of Easter Island. The statues honored ancestors and protected their communities. The Rapa Nui believed their ancestors could provide spiritual protection and power, called mana.

While this big head story is the backdrop of this film, the real reason Chris and Lee are on Easter Island is that Chris is dying of what is probably lung cancer, and the CIA was involved in trying to undermine Chile’s democratically elected socialist president, Salvador Allende, and the military coup that brought General Augusto Pinochet to power on September 11, 1973. Surprisingly, with all of this going on, this movie was too slow and too boring for a large percentage of its runtime. There is witty and sometimes funny dialogue between Chris and Lee but not enough to try and figure out what was the point of these two hours?

Chris and Lee run into two young women from Chile who were unaware of the huge events that would be unfolding in Chile in the next few days. Steve Buscemi, plays MJ, the CIA bureau chief in Santiago, Chile, who is also a Heroin addict. Buscemi is very good and funny in his role, with some of the best scenes in this movie.

Wild Horse Nine is another one of these “let’s be different at all costs” movies that was too strange and unfortunately too boring for me to recommend. The Rotten Tomatoes rating is a way too high 94%, with my rating at 75% and a recommendation only for the biggest fans of Steve Buscemi, John Malkovich, and Sam Rockwell.

Movie Review: Jimmy

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In the history of the movie industry, Jimmy Stewart (1908-1997) is arguably the most beloved and respected lead actor of all time. From his 80 films to his popular appearances on The Johnny Carson Show and his poetry readings, there is no doubt of Jimmy Stewart’s popularity as an actor. At the peak of Stewart’s fame, after winning an Academy Award, Stewart insisted on serving his country, facing the high probability of death and leaving behind a very lucrative movie career that, when he returned from the war, had no guarantee of continuing.

Jimmy Stewart flew twenty highly dangerous bombing missions over Germany during World War II and one more over Vietnam in 1966. Stewart retired from the Air Force in 1968 with the rank of Brigadier General.

The new movie “Jimmy” is mostly about Jimmy Stewart’s career in the Air Force during World War II, with additional stories about his love life and his return to Hollywood after the war, when he no longer had an acting career. What saved Jimmy Stewart’s career in Hollywood was his personal favorite movie, “It’s a Wonderful Life”, which was released in 1946, written and directed by Frank Capra.

The actor who played Jimmy Stewart is KJ Apa, with actor Max Casella as Frank Capra. Both were very good in their roles, with Apa closely mastering Stewart’s well-known and very often humorous way of talking. The best parts of this film were the many scenes of Stewart as the leader of his crew and how close the world was to losing Stewart during so many close calls during World War II. Imagine movies without Jimmy Stewart and “It’s a Wonderful Life” without Jimmy Stewart as the star. The flaws in this movie are that there are too many moments where the story moves too slowly, with too many scenes that seem more like filler than necessary.

Probably due to the slow-moving parts of this film, the Rotten Tomatoes rating for this movie is a too-low 64%, with my rating a solid 75% and a recommendation to see this well-done biography of Jimmy Stewart.