Movie Review: The Tragedy Of Macbeth

Posted on January 10, 2022 by jjcwn • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged Denzel Washington, Francis Mcdormand, Joel Cohen, Macbeth • Leave a comment

There is an old saying about, “You are not really an actor until you make it to Broadway, you are not really a great actor until you can act in a Shakespeare play”. For those of us who think that acting is easy, or if you think you can act, try and memorize or even understand any Shakespeare play. The new movie “The Tragedy of Macbeth” is all about admiring the acting skill of Denzel Washington and Francis McDormand, who are two multiple Academy Award winning actors. This film is not about enjoying the actual story, or understanding the scenes, or most of what the actors or saying and is in fact rather agonizing to sit through, because I for one had to leave before the end. This is a film that should be shown at an acting school within an Ivy League college, and not shown in theaters.

One has to admire Joel Cohen for adapting a very challenging Shakespeare play into a screenplay and shortening the story to try and fit it into almost 2 hours, but for me this is not enough to recommend as I would any normal movie.

The Rotten Tomatoes for this movie are a very high 93%, a rating I would agree with if it were an education class on acting, not a movie that is supposed to entertain an audience. This movie should be seen by big fans of Shakespeare, Denzel Washington or Francis McDormand – not for anyone who is looking for 2 hours of escape. Therefore I cannot recommend this movie, despite the fact that some Academy Award nominations might come from this film.

Movie Review: The 355

Posted on January 8, 2022 by jjcwn • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged Jessica Chastain, Penelope Cruz, The 355 • Leave a comment

The reason why the ratings are so horribly low for “The 355” despite the fact that
Diane Kruger, Penelope Cruz, Jessica Chastain and Lupita Nyong’o are in this – is that the there is no logic, no continuity, no real story – just a series of excuses for Karate, gunfire and explosions. This is why screenwriting is so hard, because a huge part of the process is to not only write something interesting, but also make it understandable and actually hold water. Logic Please.

This movie is another one of those examples where some kind of deal making was going on, because how did they convince 4 bankable well known female actors to make this mess where both the worst part about it is the ending, which is also the best part, because its finally over.

We have all seen the spy-like-trickery movies in the past and there is nothing new here. There is another computer device that everybody is after in this story, that seems to have the ability to easily hack anything – including Jet Airlines. How many times have we seen something like this? Too many.

It was hard to understand why this movie was made and with critical reviews as extremely low as 26% on Rotten Tomatoes and only 4.6 on IMDB, this film will be out of movie theaters probably by next week. Considering the salaries of the 4 stars they hired, this will most likely be a big time money loser.

Do yourself a favor and miss this bad movie that should have gone right to DVD.

Netflix Movie Review: The Lost Daughter

Posted on January 2, 2022 by jjcwn • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged Dakota Johnson, Olivia Coleman, The Lost Daughter • Leave a comment

The new Netflix movie “The Lost Daughter” is highly unusual on a number of levels. A woman, Leda, played by Olivia Coleman, is along on a beach, obviously depressed about something. She is riveted on The new Netflix movie “The Lost Daughter” is highly unusual on a number of levels. A woman, Leda, played by Olivia Coleman, is along on a beach, obviously depressed about something. She is riveted on another woman Nina, played by Dakota Johnson, who has a 6 year old daughter and she is having problems with this child. At one point the child is lost on the beach and Leda finds her. The rest of this film is a series of flashbacks that slowly tells a story that I did not expect about Leda’s own daughters, her life as a professor and her marriage. The acting is very good in this film, but the overall story and payoff I did not think was strong enough for a recommendation.

The Lost Daughter is another one of this art-type-too-unusual-movies where the critics give it high marks, in this case 96% on Rotten Tomatoes – and the audience gives it low ratings, only 45%. My rating is around 60% because of the strange series of events and the way the depressing story was told. Despite the good acting, I cannot recommend this movie.