3 Stars

Journey to the Center of the Earth and Journey 2: The Mysterious Island – JenEric Movie Review

October 3, 2020 by Éric Desmarais

Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 2008 movie Journey to the Center of the Earth and the 2012 movie Journey 2: The Mysterious Island.

Story

Journey 1

The movie adheres really closely to the original novel. I’m impressed that they were able to create a world where the book exists and then manage to follow almost exactly the same plot.

I’m impressed at the funeral scene where they spent the time to let the two male characters grieve and cry on camera. It’s not often you see men show emotions.

I like that they made the guide a woman and made her hyper competent, but I could have done without the awkward love story.

Score: 0.5

Journey 2

The movie doesn’t follow the story line of the book but that’s probably a good thing. The code breaking at the beginning and the diverse cast is awesome. I found the movie lagged a little as they traipsed around the island from one set piece to another.

The emotion in this one felt a little stilted compared to the first. The “pecs” talk was awkward until the berry part.

It’s a very linear movie without much surprise.

Score: 0.5

Characters

Journey 1

There are three characters in the movie. The dorky scientist that morphs into an action hero, the scared kid who goes on an adventure, and the beautiful and competent mountain guide with daddy issues. The movie spends very little time on any development for the characters, even forgetting the scientists awkwardness mid-movie in order to have him punching things and ripping off his sleeves. They are static but not offensive or flat.

Score: 0.5

Journey 2

The sullen kid became a sullen teen. The rest of the cast is entertaining if borderline annoying. The Rock infuses his character with enough charisma to make him likeable as does Michael Caine.

Vanessa Hudgens is great but has no real reason to fall for the charmless main hero. Luis Guzmán’s character is absolutely fantastic, funny and relatable.

Score: 0.5

Dialogue

Journey 1

The banter between the three characters ranges from dumb to entertaining. Thankfully there’s a lot more quips than awkward flirting.

Score: 0.5

Journey 2

The dialogue between the love interests is stilted and awkward, hopefully on purpose, same with the dialogue overall. Other than a few good lines it was pretty bad.

Score: 0

Visuals and Music

Journey 1

This movie was designed to be shown in 3D in the height of 3D stupidity. To the point where they added extra gags just for the effect. I hate that. The technology and special effects should always work for the story not the other way around. Despite that, the special effects were passable and the scenery was cool.

The music was utterly forgettable but not bad.

Score: 0.5

Journey 2

The special effects are enhanced and take much too much time from the meagre story. (I sound like a grumpy critic.) It’s pretty, but not great. Again, the 3D for 3D’s sake is tiresome.

The soundtrack is meh, nothing exciting. I enjoyed the songs.

Score: 0.5

Fun

Journey 1

I like the book, I liked the old movie from the 50’s, and I had fun with this one. There’s thrills and adventure throughout along with two very pretty leads. I also enjoyed how much my daughter got into the film and reacted to the young boy’s perils.

Score: 1

Journey 2

I’m not as big a fan of the books this was based on. I liked Treasure Island, hated Gulliver’s Travels, and was indifferent towards Mysterious Island. There were a lot of exciting moments but the fun was in the, rarer, character interactions.

Score: 0.5

Overall

Journey 1

This is a fun, easy, and exciting movie. Not the greatest and maybe a little forgettable but fun to watch.

Final Score: 3 Stars out of 5

Journey 2

There was too much time spent of visual gags and action set pieces when this sort of story is supposed to showcase the characters in between. The action often replaces character development instead of accelerating it.

Overall it was fun, but lacked substance.

Final Score: 2 Stars out of 5

S.M. Carrière and I discussed and reviewed Journey to the Center of the Earth from 1958 on the Night at the Round Table. Have a look here:

Bill & Ted Series – JenEric Movie Review

September 19, 2020 by Éric Desmarais

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Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 1989 movie Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, the 1991 movie Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey, and the 2020 movie Bill & Ted Face the Music.

Story

Excellent Adventure

This story is dated in so many ways but still manages to be fantastic at the end. I’m torn between the poor pacing, homophobia, and sexism; and the fantastic message of love and peace.

Score: 0.5

Bogus Journey

The same message resounds through the second movie as in the first, but again there’s more sexism, homophobia, and transphobia to make things awkward. Again the ending is fantastic.

Score: 0.5

Face the Music

The same message of unity and love are sown throughout this movie like the others but with a little more maturity. The twist is predictable but getting there wasn’t. There was none of the previous movies’ sexism, homophobia, or transphobia, but there was a little bit of an awkward fat joke. (nothing compared to Avengers Endgame)

Score: 0.5

Characters

Excellent Adventure

Bill and Ted are well meaning, mostly kind, but so foolish. They have fantastic vocabularies but they really don’t seem to follow everything going on. They are the personification of the slacker. There was an extremely homophobic joke that was out of character and pretty jarring.

The rest of the characters are a wonderful mix of what-if historical characters showed up in 1988.

Unfortunately the women are all pretty useless.

Score: 0.5

Bogus Journey

Once again we get Bill and Ted as sweet, mostly, caring, and pretty fools. They graduated high school and got jobs at the mall.

The evil people are all very much evil and totalitarian. It’s an interesting switch to see the rebels be the ones who want to be controlled.

Score: 0.5

Face the Music

This is the saddest and the most relatable version of Bill and Ted. They are broken by the weight of their own destiny but still trying anyway.

The introduction of the daughters was great. They are the generation that grew up with music-obsessed slackers. They were both believable and perfect. Both actors managed to mimic the original Bill and Ted’s movements and mannerisms better than the original actors did.

I’m happy they gave the princesses both more story and more screen time.

Score: 1

Dialogue

Excellent Adventure

The dialogue is actually impressively clever. They bypass time travel confusion really well and do really well with making their characters sound unique. It’s endlessly quotable in the way only 80’s movies can be.

Score: 0.5

Bogus Journey

Station! The dialogue doesn’t seem quite as special the second time, but there are some fantastic lines. The time travel battle at the end and speech is fantastic.

Score: 0.5

Face the Music

It’s hard to judge the dialogue of this one compared to the others. It’s a lot of self-referential jokes and quips but there’s some interesting bit in there too. I like the consistency in speech patterns and then impressive impersonations of famous musicians.

Score: 0.5

Visuals and Music

Excellent Adventure

The production value on this was fantastic, making each time period look authentic (in an 80’s high school curriculum sort of way).

The music was perfect for the movie and really enjoyable.

Score: 1

Bogus Journey

The nature of them going to hell and heaven make so that everything in this movie is more stylized and a little darker.

The music was okay but not excellent.

Score: 0.5

Face the Music

The special effects were updated and beautiful, the makeup work was fantastic, and everything worked towards the story. The locations were authentic and the shots were well thought out.

The nature of the final twist means that the music is less important than the message, but despite that there’s some fantastic pieces. Especially between the historical figures.

Score: 1

Fun

Excellent Adventure

Despite a little cringe and a few really awkward moments the movie is pure fun.

Score: 1

Bogus Journey

There’s some cringe and a few parts that I think drag but overall the movie is a lot of fun.

Score: 1

Face the Music

For both nostalgic reasons and because it was well written with little to no cringe, this was a lot of fun. It kept the entire family entertained and watching.

Score: 1

Overall

Excellent Adventure

The movie is dated but still really heartwarming. They really want to push the love and peace message and like Bill and Ted themselves they stumble a few times along the way.

Final Score: 3.5 Stars out of 5

Bogus Journey

Like the first movie, it is dated but overall positive. It manages to capture the optimism of the first despite the darker tone.

Final Score: 3 Stars out of 5

Face the Music

The movie manages to pay homage to the first two while surpassing them in fun and quality. Definitely my favourite of the series.

Final Score: 4 Stars out of 5

Feel the Beat – JenEric Movie Review

August 12, 2020 by Éric Desmarais

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Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 2020 film Feel the Beat.

Story

Other than a few little surprises this movie is a sports comeback by the numbers. If you know the type of movie, you’ll know what happens. There’s some fun dances along the way and a few good cheese jokes.

The script could have been tighter. There was a character arc that seemed to be completely forgotten after set-up and a few missed opportunities for inspiring the main character to have fun with dance. Both of which could have been fixed with short scenes.

There was one scene that was completely unnecessary and felt forced where the dads get into a fight with the rivals dads. It felt like the film equivalent of saying the toxic, “Yes, they like dance and are supportive, but they’re not gay.”

Watching this with a family that has danced informed me that the fact that the characters came up with new dances for each stage of the competition is unrealistic. I understand why they did it but it’s a little grating to have it treated like a series of concerts instead of dance.

Score: 0

Characters

The main character is utterly despicable to start and slowly gets better. The kids are pathetic and useless but slowly get better. The dad does the dad thing really well. And the gay best friend is fabulous. Oh and the love interest is pretty and pining.

All these characters we’ve seen before. They’re comfortable to the point of being boring. Thankfully the attention they missed in tightening the story was spent in making the characters feel like they had their own lives, motivations, and interests. No one was a cardboard cut-out and the actors brought a warmth to even the blandest character.

I was impressed that even though the main character was a jerk, she never mocked anyone’s appearance, disability, or ethnicity. The diversity in the dancers was great and motivated the characters. It was nice to see a dancer who was deaf and treated the same as the others.

The dance dads in the movie were extra awesome and other than the dumb fight, I like how accepting and supportive they were. Same with the town.

Score: 1

Dialogue

Ranging from cringe-y cheesy to sweet and funny. The movie dialogue was best when it wasn’t trying to be sappy or important.

Score: 0.5

Visuals and Music

There were some fantastic scenes outdoors and the dances were shot really well. It’s always impressive to me how Toronto can look like Wisconsin and New York at the same time.

The music was ok. The pieces chosen for the dances were fun and not overdone.

Score: 0.5

Fun

Once we were over the part where the main character is a total dick, I started to enjoy myself. I had told my family they could stop it if they were bored or annoyed but I think I would have had a mini riot if I had stopped it.

Watching it with dancers and a 3 year old was a good choice. They enjoyed it and there was an impromptu ballet class after.

Score: 1

Overall

The story isn’t anything new, the characters are fun, and the rest was enjoyable. If you like sports movies or love dance you’ll enjoy this one.

Final Score: 3 Stars out of 5

It Came from Outer Space – JenEric Movie Review

July 20, 2020June 10, 2020 by Éric Desmarais

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Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 1953 movie It Came from Outer Space.

Story

The story was interesting and delivered in a pretty good combination of dialogue and action. It was ridiculously dated, but I liked that it basically came down to the aliens crash landing in a bad neighbourhood and trying to GTFO as soon as possible.

I like the underlying narrative that we as a species are not ready to accept what we can’t understand and that what looks strange isn’t always evil.

Score: 1

Characters

Angry sheriff, writer with an open mind, scream queen, and various others. This was a standard cast for a sci-fi story from the 1940’s and 50’s.

Score: 0

Dialogue

This felt written by two people. The dialogue between the sheriff and the writer was pure Universal horror movie. The dialogue between the writer and the girl was pure Bradbury.

Half of it felt philosophical and high minded and the other half standard horror movie.

Score: 0.5

Visuals and Music

This was a very well shot film. Other than a few odd angles it really did a great job building atmosphere and being pretty.

The music was pretty much a re-hash of other Universal monster movies at the time. I wouldn’t be surprised if everything was from something else.

Score: 0.5

Fun

This was a cerebral science fiction concept that the filmmakers desperately wanted to turn into a creature feature. That being said, I really enjoyed it.

Score: 1

Overall

At 70 years old, it’s a quaint film from a simpler time exploring ideas of what the cosmos might have in store. I love the narration at the beginning.

If this were made today it would either be an indie film or some weird action horror and frankly neither would do it justice.

Final Score: 3 Stars

Spy Kids 3 and Spy Kids 4 – JenEric Movie Review

July 20, 2020May 20, 2020 by Éric Desmarais

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Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 2004 and 2011 movies Spy Kids 3: Game Over and Spy Kids 4-D: All the Time in the World.

I reviewed Spy Kids 1 and 2 in a previous post

Story

Spy Kids 3

Villain captured in a cyber prison turns that prison into a game in order to enslave kids minds and …? Spy organization sends kid spy into game to find his sister and shut the game down.

It has serious potential but there was so little story and what there was, was confusing, ableist, or just boring. I spent most of the movie shaking my head or yelling at the main character. The first two were all about family but this one barely makes a cameo out of everything.

Score: 0

Spy Kids 4

It took seven years for people to forget about the last one. This one brings in new kids, new parents, and a very updated OSS. The time manipulation was utterly unbelievable and made my head hurt.

The story did go back to it’s roots and become all about family. The cameos by the original kids was great.

Score: 0.5

Characters

Spy Kids 3

They really tried to make Juni the sensitive outsider here and it failed completely. He’s basically a bumbling idiot. While in the others he and his sister bumble together and solve the problem, in this one the villain is helping him win and his sister is only in a tiny part of the movie.

Stalone is fantastic at chewing the scenery but his character is confused, confusing, and barely above useful. And don’t get me started on the one girl character.

Score: 0

Spy Kids 4

The characters in this were much better and less insulting stereotypes. I like that the boy being hearing impaired doesn’t make him weak, I like that the mom kicks ass while pregnant, I like that the kids are smart again. That being said, they were all a little bland as characters.

Score: 0.5

Dialogue

Spy Kids 3

There’s a scene near the beginning where the main character is talking about family and another character says, “Everyone is family Juni.”

His reply is, “That doesn’t any sense.”

That’s the best description of this movie. Nonsensical drivel followed by insipid dialogue.

Score: 0

Spy Kids 4

It wasn’t great but it wasn’t terrible. There are a few good puns and a lot of clock or time jokes. It’s ok.

Score: 0.5

Visuals and Music

Spy Kids 3

I thought 2 had a lot of 3D gimmicks and stupidity. This one practically based the entire movie on it. It’s cheesy pseudo computer game graphics for the entire movie. It looked bad sixteen years ago and looks worse now. The music was better.

Score: 0.5

Spy Kids 4

It took a few movies but they finally moved back to the hyper-saturated cartoon look of the first one. The action well done and the scenery is great. The music wasn’t fantastic but it was pretty good.

Score: 0.5

Fun

Spy Kids 3

The beginning and the end are a lot of fun and the middle parts are interesting if non-nonsensical and dumb.

Score: 0.5

Spy Kids 4

This was my daughters favourite of the four. She said it’s cause there was a dog and a baby. I liked it because it was a fun kids action movie. It doesn’t hold up to the original, but it was ok.

Score: 1

Overall

Spy Kids 3

Taking out the sibling dynamic from this series was a mistake. This movie doesn’t live up to the first and frankly is one of the worst movies I’ve seeen. It’s not offensive (Except the honeypot, nerd bashing, and ableism) just boring.

Final Score: 1 Star

Spy Kids 4

This movie tried to recreate the whimsy and awesomeness of the first but doesn’t quite get there. It’s bogged down by fart jokes and 3D gags along with a premise that makes my head hurt if I think about it too hard.

Final Score: 3 Stars

Legally Blonde – JenEric Movie Review

April 29, 2020 by Éric Desmarais

How This Works – Read Other Reviews

Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 2001 movie Legally Blonde.

Story

This movie takes the usual narrative of the blonde rich girl being a bitch and turns it on its head. Elle is a genuinely sweet person. It has an interesting mix of awkward college movie and legal drama.

The story is great if a little simplistic. It gets its messages across and aged relatively well.

One of the main messages is that you need to love yourself and be with someone who loves the real you. But there’s one scene where Elle pretends to have had a one night stand to make her friend look like he’s good in bed and didn’t call her after. It makes the mean girl the guy was talking to give him a second chance, but feels contrary to everything else in the movie. If she wouldn’t date him and even went as far as insulting him in public, maybe she’s not worth it.

The legal plot was laughably simple with nice coincidences.

Score: 0.5

Characters

Elle, her sorority friends, and most of the characters are really sweet. The “mean” girl and professor guy are the only ones to do much evolution other than Elle.

The characters are mostly good people and that’s great. However that movie is overwhelmingly white and straight. The few LGBTQI+ or POC characters are dated and disturbingly tone death stereotypes, even for 2001.

Score: 0.5

Dialogue

The dialogue is very exaggerated for each of the stereotypes and other than a few adorable valley-girl sayings from Elle, it’s all pretty meh. However the body language, especially the amused bemusement of Luke Wilson, is pure awesome.

Score: 0.5

Visuals and Music

I really liked the contrast between the gaudy LA style versus the stuffy Boston law school style. It really made the fish out of water story believable. I also love the evolution of Elle’s wardrobe and how it matches her own character development.

I honestly can’t remember the music at all. I know it was there but I can’t remember it. That means it did it’s job.

Score: 0.5

Fun

This movie rolls together mystery, college, romance, humour, and characters that want to genuinely do good in the world. It’s fun to watch.

Score: 1

Overall

This movie is about empowerment and being yourself, even if it doesn’t fit into the stereotype everyone has for you. It’s about doing something you love for yourself.

It’s got a few cringy scenes (Bend and Snap?) but overall it’s a feel good movie that made me feel better about my current stresses and worries.

Final Score: 3 Stars

A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood – JenEric Movie Review

March 25, 2020 by Éric Desmarais

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Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 2019 movie A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood.

Story

This isn’t the story of Mister Rogers. It’s a story where he’s a force of nature and personality, making him feel surreal and almost prophet-like.

The actual story is a basic workaholic writer with daddy issues. It’s the kind of thing that makes English majors roll their eyes and critics salivate.

That being said, the parts with Mister Rogers were expertly done. He’s part guru, part prophet, and part therapist.

Score: 0.5

Characters

The characters aren’t boring, but they are overall cliché. The story was paced to keep me watching but I couldn’t care less about the characters.

However again Mister Rogers and his wife were fantastic.

Score: 0.5

Dialogue

This movie was way quippier than you’d expect or than it had any right to be. From jokes about the sister’s third wedding, to quotes from Mister Rogers, to dialogue between the characters.

While the characters were pretty boring, the dialogue was authentic and interesting.

Score: 1

Visuals and Music

The visuals were interesting. I liked that the cuts were versions of models like in the Mister Rogers show. I liked that they switched to full screen for the fake clips of the show. I even enjoyed the fever dreams of the main character. But at some point the movie crossed into the WTF just happened and then stopped doing anything. The last 15-20 minutes the cuts become real etc. It’s jarring and ignoring some trite, “it represented the character becoming more intune with his real life once he accepted his father and emotions”, it wasn’t well done.

The music was mostly forgetful or taken directly from the Mister Rogers show. There was a great piano duel between Mister and Mrs. Rogers.

Score: 0.5

Fun

I didn’t like it. But I did like parts of it. The surreal aspects and quippy dialogue. The saintly Mister Rogers reminded me of a great Doctor Who quote: “Good men don’t need rules. Today is not the day to find out why I have so many.”

Score: 0.5

Overall

Tom Hanks is spectacular, the dialogue is great, and the nostalgia is fun but beyond that it’s a typical white male 30 something writer’s story.

If you replaced Mister Rogers with Jesus or some other saint like figure you’d get the same story but with less people caring.

Final Score: 3.0

Sleeping Beauty – JenEric Movie Review

March 8, 2020February 5, 2020 by Éric Desmarais

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Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 1959 film Sleeping Beauty.

Story

This is a classic. It’s now 61 years old and the 16th animated feature by Disney.

The story is pretty standard fairy tale with a little less death, rape, and horror in it than Grimm liked. A lot of the hour and seventeen minutes is spent of the set up to the big song number in the woods.

Other than some cringe-inducing grabbyness on Phillip’s side and some alcohol jokes that haven’t aged well, it held up pretty well.

The major difference with it and the more modern films is how simple the story is. Something that can be said about a lot of 1950 movies, not just the animated ones.

Score: 0.5

Characters

Poor Aurora had little to no choices in the movie. She was literally tossed around by the forces of fate and faerie.

Phillip was a nice strong hero but also felt young and less 1400 more 1950’s, which I suppose was the point.

The fathers, as is usual, were useless; and Aurora’s mother had almost no part.

Maleficent was a lonely, angry witch who could have used more motivation.

Score: 0.5

Dialogue

On average, the dialogue was simple, easy to understand and very forgettable. Maleficent didn’t need to call herself the Mistress of Evil for us to know she was the baddie, but she did.

The narration at the beginning felt over exposition-y and could have been done in dialogue or visually instead.

Score: 0

Visuals and Music

This was an absolutely gorgeous movie. Colourful, clean lines, no choppiness in animation. There are plenty of movies that don’t look half as good that came out in the past 10 years. The change in colour with the change in light source was beautiful, if a little over done.

The music was fantastic and catchy. If you don’t get Once Upon a Dream stuck in your head I’ll be surprised… and a little jealous.

Score: 1

Fun

This movie didn’t drag and if I found myself annoyed at the characters, there was always something visually stunning to look at. I had fun the entire time and wasn’t even tempted to look at my phone.

Score: 1

Conclusion

Overall, the movie was fun and beautiful. Some of the jokes fall flat after 60+ years but I didn’t need to pause and talk to my kids about what terrible thing was going on.

Final Score: 3 Stars

2019 Book Rankings

January 24, 2020 by Éric Desmarais

Hello My Imaginary Friends,

This year I read 21 books, one of which was mine.

If you like Fantasy and Adventure, try Everdome By Éric Desmarais

5 Stars

4 Stars

2 Stars

What was your favourite book?

Éric

2018 Book Ranking

January 8, 2019 by Éric Desmarais

Hello My Imaginary Friends,

This year I read 28 books, one of which was mine.

I challenged myself this year to only read books from people I’d met or interacted with. It was a great experiment, but I look forward to reading anything I feel like in 2019.

If you enjoy wish fulfillment, mystery, or urban fantasy, check out The Sign of Faust by Éric Desmarais