Trace Sauveur

If watching Rebel Moon—Part One was over before it started, Part Two is a miserable exercise in unearned hubris.

It reaches for the heights its progenitors offer and struggles to maintain an identity of its own.

The real problem with The Last Voyage of the Demeter is just how nondescript and unmemorable it is.

With its offbeat-dramedy-meets-sci-fi concept, Jules feels pulled right out of the world of indie cinema from 10 years ago. It’s in communion with the likes of Safety Not Guaranteed or Seeking A Friend for the End of the World: movies that revel in a superficial attempt at charm that’s undermined by a shallow understanding of their own characters, instead choosing to live and die by a determined sense of quirk wrapped up within their supposedly refreshing sense of genre-bending.

An aquatic, animated, all-ages romp full of familiar lessons and a few too many peppy pop songs that plays things so down-the-middle as to become perfectly forgettable.

After the fact, The Flash feels like the ultimate case in point as to why James Gunn and Peter Safran have been brought in to course-correct the trajectory of the DC enterprise. According to them, this has been retrofitted to be the first of a few transitory films as we exit the DCEU and move into a newly established DC Universe. Here’s hoping they pull it off, because I don’t know how many more of these I can take.

This is an absurdly familiar story and there’s little it does to stand out.

This humdrum slice of forgettable studio fare about a tropical wedding hijacked by pirates has a simple pitch that could have been elevated with a clever script with a more consistent sense of humor and writing for its performers.

It’s as immersive as it is insufferable. There’s greatness packed in there, but the most lasting impression is how much time is spent trying to convince you of it.

For a film that is sold on the image and idea of a big, singing, dancing crocodile – who is otherwise mute when not belting out his tunes – there seems to be a real disinterest in any notable sight gags or physicality to Lyle as a character.

It’s all proper nonsense that in some ways lends itself to a more inspired, manic experience than the initial outing but in others is still held back by generic kids’ movie fluff.

The occasional sudden zoom or quick comedic cutaway make for brief moments of respite, and it’s hard to truly hate a film aiming for such kindly emotional resonance. But whatever slight wisdoms or truths are to be found here are squandered in a big nothing of a story trying to render them meaningful.

I’d be hard-pressed to find a filmmaker who, in a general sense, I agree with but whose movies irritate me in the way that Adam McKay’s do.

It’s not terrible as far as video game adaptations go, but as with many of them you’ll be wondering what the point is when a superior experience already exists.

Watching this vaguely preternatural, shoddily animated interpretation of a beloved character parade around really makes you feel the disconnect between page and screen.

There’s not enough here to carry the painstaking production design and costuming – a visual feast let down by shortage of meaning. This is a movie about perception, indeed: As beautiful as it is on the outside, the inside is completely superficial.

Most frustrating is that these clearly talented comedians and writers are stuck with lame gags.

As it stands, there’s a healthy amount to admire and for some it may be enough to scratch a certain itch. But much of Old Henry feels a lot like its protagonist: worn-out, weathered, and old.

Flag Day desperately wants to be an impassioned testament to the lives of both Jennifer and Dylan, but is hardly ever able to escape the myopic lens of its craftsman.

Over the course of its bloated run time, this strange hodgepodge of a film clumsily shifts gears between a family/legal drama, a fish-out-of-water tale, a midlife romantic escapade, and something of a subdued vigilante thriller.

Though good-natured, by the end it feels indistinguishable from an extended after-school special.