Movie Review: Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour

Posted on October 14, 2023 by jjcwn • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged Eras Tour, Taylor Swift • Leave a comment

Anyone could easily argue that right now in the entire history of concerts, fame, money, and success in the entertainment industry Taylor Swift is the most successful of all time. At only age 33, she has surpassed all the most famous performers at the top of their careers, including Micheal Jackson in 1984, Whitney Houston in 1992, after the release of “The Bodyguard”, and even Elvis at his career peak. Swift most likely has one additional ability that the other 3 major superstars did not have – a level head and the ability to not let all of the white-hot fame go to her head.

Taylor Swift is now so popular that when she shows up to watch an NFL football game to see her boyfriend Travis Kelsie, the ratings skyrocket. Travis Kelsie’s NFL shirt sales have gone up 400%. The upside of this level of fame means more money for Swift’s record sales and more ticket sales for her concert tour. The downside, as the world has been seen too many times, is that when anyone is too famous and too hot, things tend to reverse at some point. The audience is always fickle. When the Eras tour is finished next year, Swift should take some time off to reduce the risk of overexposure. Too much white hot fame for too long is never a good idea as history has tragically proven too many times.

Her current Eras tour, still about halfway completed, has easily surpassed the ticket sales of any single performer or group in entertainment history. Due to unprecidented supply and demand for any concert venue, ticket sales have crashed the ticketmaster web site and the prices are the highest ever. This tour is scheduled for 146 dates in five continents, has 2.2 billion in sales just in North America, with each night generating 13 million in sales and an average ticket price of $1,425.

As far as “the movie “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour”, there is little doubt that this will be known as the best concert movie ever produced. Most performers, no matter how experienced, would probably show some level of stage fright while surrounded in front of 80-100 thousand fans – but not Taylor Swift. She is as natural and unaffected by her unique place in this world, as any peformer I have ever seen. One can only imagine what it must feel like to be in the center of so many thousands of fans, remembering and performing 44 songs over 3 hours. This has to be a high that is beyond all imagination. Her fans all seem to remember all the words of every song, and many others are crying during her entire performance. This production, included a continuously moving stage and 3D halogram effects, lighting and even a log cabin that pops up on stage are amazing to see, along with the appreciating some of Taylor’s greatest hits and the fact she writes all of her own songs.

The logistics of putting on a show as state of the art and huge as the Eras tour requires 90 trucks to transport all of the equipment to and from each venue. There are freight management issues, rerouting, redundancies, and administration work. The freight forwarders need 3-6 months to plan every aspect of transportation for a concert tour. Labeling technology is used to mark every item moved to each venue. Management companies must plan each route for Taylors concerts, accounting for every possible risk, that include a truck breaking down on a highway. Air freight companies will now have to transport the equipment in 90 trucks from the US to Europe for the next leg of the Eras tour. Then there are storage costs for warehouses that will store the equipment in between each show. The assembling of the huge mechanical stage and high technology lighting takes close to 2 full days, and then every aspect has to be tested thoroughly before the concert begins. The Eras tour has buffer stock, of all the equipment in case anything breaks during the transportation and assembling of the stage and lighting. The entire staff, both on and off stage, technical support, truck drivers and other people managing this concert, makes Eras tour likely the largest and most costly in music history.

The only problem with a phenomenon like the Eras Tour, is how can you top yourself? What can Taylor Swift do after this tour? How many years before the next one? The singer Bionce also has a concert tour and will also have a concert movie coming out December 1, 2023. This might start a new trend in the movie industry with movies following a major tour.

The movie tickets for this Eras film are more expensive than a normal movie, this time around Taylor Swift bypassed the middle man with movie distribution.

The Rotten Tomatoes ratings for this concert film is a perfect 100% and I agree with this rating. Whether or not you are a Taylor Swift fan, this movie is a must see.

Movie Review: She Came to Me

Posted on October 8, 2023 by jjcwn • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged Anne Hathaway, Marissa Tomei, Peter Dinklage, She Came to Me, Tug Boat Captain • Leave a comment

Somewhere in New York City, probably over a year ago, there was a dinner party with actor Daniel Day-Lewis, his wife, writer director Rebecca Miller and several other actors including Anne Hathaway, Marisa Tomei and Peter Dinklage. During this dinner, a favor-bank was created that included possible movie deals and future collaboration. Unfortunately, one of the deals was an agreement to make the new movie “She Came to Me”, where even the title of this strange production makes little or no sense.

This entire story seems to be entirely about being as extremely different as possible, never interesting or good. This all starts with the two main characters Steven Lauddem, played by Peter Dinklage who is a writer of Opera and Patricia Jessup-Lauddem, played by Anne Hathaway who is a therapist. From the start of this movie, we are expected to believe that Anne Hathaway is married to Peter Dinklage, which in the real world is highly unlikely. It turns out that Steven has been creatively blocked for 5 years, unable to turn out another Opera and his frustrations are having a negative effect on the marriage. This leads to a meeting between a drunk Steven and Katrina Trento, played by Marisa Tomei at a bar, who is of all things a tug boat captain. Within 30 minutes we realize the problem with this film, trying so hard to be different, weird and strange, forgetting any attempt just to be good. A tug boat captain? Really?

Then Katrina and Steven have a one-night stand, later finding out that Katrina is a love and sex addict. A sex-addicted tub boat captain – easily a character we have never seen in any movie before. Who is now obsessed with Peter Dinklage? Soon after Steven breaks free of his creative block by falling by falling off of a pier and while under water is suddenly struck with a new idea for an Opera. Another implausible scene.

There is a subplot with Steven and Patricia’s son Julian and the daughter of their maid that later becomes the main plot with a final series of scenes that are an attempt for them to get married for Julian to avoid a possible statutory rape charge. It turns out that the husband of the maid is a court stenographer and also a Civil War reenactor – covering all the bases as far as professions within this story. Convoluted and insane, as the characters and plot are all over the place forcing different ideas and nonsensical situations, forgetting about quality or respecting the audience.

There is a scene with Patricia going crazy during a session with one of her patients and starts taking off all her clothes while screaming – that is one of the most insane out-of-place crazy scenes I have seen in any movie, much less one that is supposed to be a thrown-together romantic comedy. It was hard to believe that Anne Hathaway agreed to shoot this scene, considering it was bad enough she was in this film in the first place.

It makes no sense that any screenplay in this stage of a creative writing process was greenlighted before about 5 more re-writes, much less 3 named actors agreeing to make this movie, that was nowhere near ready to start shooting. This film reminded me in some ways of the movie “Maybe I Do” that was released in February of this year and included several well known actors who once again agreed to make a movie before reading the script first.

The Rotten Tomatoes ratings for this film are a correct and very low 46% that could be even lower at 25%. This movie is a very surprising big miss, especially considering the named actors involved.

Movie Review: The Exorcist: Believer

Posted on October 6, 2023 by jjcwn • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged Ellen Burstyn, Exorcist: Believer, Leslie Odom, LInda Blair, The Excorcist • Leave a comment

The way things are going, with so many Exorcist movies in the last 50 years, the decisions makers in Hollywood will probably never realize that equaling the horror and quality of the original “The Exorcist” released in 1973 will ever be achieved.

The stories of the audience’s reaction to the original film were unprecedented in movie history. This included: Many moviegoers vomiting at the horrific graphic images on screen. Others fainted or just left the theater, nauseous and trembling before the film was even half over. People were telling their friends and family members to “not go” to see this movie. This level of red-hot interest in a horror movie has never happened since The Exorcist was released, 50 long years ago. Since 1973 there have been 7 Exorcist movies, and several other movies with the word Exorcist in the title, including the recent and very bad “The Pope’s Exorcist”, reviewed in this blog, starring Russel Crowe.

The reason why the original Exorcist will always be more horrifying, is a documentary itself, to analyze why this movie is always at the top of all lists of the scariest and most unsettling movies ever made. No horror director has ever gotten close to matching the original, including the latest installment, “The Exorcists: Believer”. With this new film, there is a good attempt at the beginning to at least be different, with two young girls walking in the woods, and then walking into what looked like a man-made ditch (something that two young girls would never do), and then becoming lost for 3 days. Then somehow transported to a farm, some 30 miles away, thinking they were only lost for a few hours. Soon after they are found, they slowly become possessed and the rest of this story is the obvious exorcism climax scene for both girls, which I thought was poorly done with not enough buildup before the final climax scenes.

This film has three well-known actors, Leslie Odom Jr., who plays the father of one of the girls, and Ellen Burstyn who plays Chris MacNeil, the mother of Regan, the girl who was possessed in the original movie. I was rather surprised to see Linda Blair at the end of this movie, considering that her part in the original film at age 14 has caused her more downside than upside in her acting career. After starring in a movie like the Exorcist that was so horrifying, it would be impossible to play any other part because the audience will always think of you as that possessed young child. Becomming type-cast in any role has been the curse of far too many television and movie actors.

The ultimate problem with this Exorcist sequel, with another one following in 2025 “Exorcist: Deceiver” is that there was not enough originality, and an ending that was dissapointing, rather than new and ground breaking. The Rotten Tomatoes ratings for this film are a very low 20%, with my rating 30 and a solid miss for this one.