Disappointing movies

 Looking back through older posts I find that I use to review quite a few movies, mostly those that turned up on TV. Occasionally something I saw at the movies. 

I don't go to the movies that much anymore, especially since streaming arrived in full force. I don't feel quite so bad about watching a movie that turns out to be a bit of stinker if I haven't paid for it up front - and spent almost as much on getting an icecream. 

We have a small cinema here in Oamaru. It was recently sold and is now called The Riviera. Its seats are large, as though everyone was outsized, and it's advisable to take a cushion, since the seats' designers also assumed everyone had long upper legs. Apart from that it's comfortable enough. I think the only film I've enjoyed at this cinema was Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning. Three hours of solid entertainment: suspenseful, funny, clever, full of wonderful stunts and with a great cast. 

On the other hand, we saw a film in which Michael Caine was the only saving grace: The Great Escaper. Based on real life story that was only eventful in the mildest way, and though the film tried to inject some additional interest in it, it had the feeling of everyone trying to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Sadly it was Glenda Jackson's last movie; she has hardly any scenes with Caine, and has to carry chunks of the movie by herself when Caine's abroad. 

We saw Thor: Love and Thunder which in spite of director Taika Waititi once again at the helm was another noisy, cluttered piece full of CGI and a number of nonsensical scenes. Disappointing after the sheer enjoyment of Ragnarok.

Most recently we went to see Wicked, partly against my better judgement, hoping that when my daughter said she nearly fell asleep during it she meant that it was because she was tired rather than because it was boring. Unfortunately it was the latter. With the first act of the original stage show extended to something like three hours, it was stretched out beyond belief, and only served to show up the fragility of the musical's original book, which presumably worked well because it was shorter. 

The two stars were certainly excellent, but everything else was so overdone, and so geared towards DEI that after a while you began to count the white faces in the cast. Weirdly the Munchkins were pretty much full-sized adults, the talking animals seemed to make no sense except to introduce some political point and every dance sequence was full on and superb and EXCELLENT!!! But left you feeling disconnected. 

Elphaba's journey from unwilling witch to wicked witch seemed to be missing a gear or two. From the beginning she was drawn as a sympathetic character; by the end you wondered quite what had happened to her. 

Except that it wasn't the end. The second act is presumably in the pipeline somewhere, but I don't think this moviegoer will be drawn back the theatre for it. 

So much money spent on so much clutter.