Movie review of Tetris

 Tetris - 7/10

Directed by John S. Baird

Tetris has always been a fun game. It has been for quite some time now. I didn't really know the story behind it and this movie despite some exaggerated scenes was a big help to finding out the story of Tetris.

Taron Edgerton as Henk Rogers was a real good casting choice. As a matter of fact, the casting for Tetris is really good. The story pacing was good. I could have done without the car chase and all. It was pretty obvious that they had to make some scenes exaggerated. 

My fav thing about Tetris was the animations and transitions. It really gave a nostalgic retro feel to the movie. Even the soundtrack reminded me of the classic game, with a modern twist of course.

The scene that got me all nostalgic about my childhood was the game boy scene. I was smiling throughout the whole scene. 

All in all, Tetris is a good and heartwarming story and gives you an insight on how the game was created and got where it is now. Worth the watch.

Movie review of Evil Dead Rise

 Evil Dead Rise - 7.5/10

Directed by Lee Cronin

I've always felt that the remake of Evil Dead in 2013 was a fantastic film. It was scary, gory and some really good shots in it. Fast forward to 2023, I was skeptical about Evil Dead Rise cos usually horror sequels sucks and worse, sequels of horror remakes will suck ass. After watching Evil Dead Rise premier last night. I was wrong. Dead fucking wrong. This is definitely one of the best horror gore movies for this year at least.

It has been a while since I saw a really good intro to a movie. EDR just starts from the get go. After a scene, when you see the title, you will know you are in for one helluva ride.

Modern horror movies are always over reliant on CGI to have that scare effect. You can tell EDR doesn't have that much CGI and they were banking on cool camera shots, the actors appearances, acting and a shit load of fake blood. 6500 liters to be exact was used. The gore scenes are top notch and will make you go queasy. There also some very creative kill scenes as well. If the penknife scene in Evil Dead was memorable, Evil Dead Rise has more memorable gruesome ones.

Alyssa Sutherland as Ellie the mother definitely stole the movie for me. She already looks scary at the start and gets scarier in every scene she is in. If you can remember, Alyssa was the queen and second wife of Ragnar, in the tv series, Vikings. 

The rest of the cast are unknown to me and they were pretty decent. Their horrified looks were good enough and Nell Fisher as Kassie was cute. She has a pretty cool scene as well.

I loved the camera work for EDR. There were many easter eggs in tribute to some classic horror movies. There is a scene where the camera is shooting from below to show the actor holding the door, that was a brilliant tribute to The Shining. Subtle nods to John Carpenter's The Thing as well. And of course tribute to the original Evil Dead as well. Chainsaw, shotgun and some classic lines. The director, Lee Cronin, definitely has done his homework with producers Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell probably watching over.

My only gripe with this movie is there is no English subs. There are some scenes, I couldn't really hear what the dialogues were. I really hope cinemas would have English subs to movies instead of Chinese.

That being said, I will definitely watch this again with subs of course.

All in all, Evil Dead Rise is really good and if you are fan of the original or remake, you should definitely catch it even on a weekend!

DEAD BY DAWN!

Special thanks to Geek Culture and Warner Bros sg for the tickets!

Movie review of Avatar: The Way of Water.

 Avatar: The Way of Water - 6/10

Directed by James Cameron

If you are going to watch Avatar: The Way of Water in the cinemas, make sure you pee at least twice before you go in and get snacks. The movie is 3 hours 12 mins long. Tamil movies also lose lah. Snacks are for some parts where it gets draggy af.

I remember watching Avatar when it first came out in 2009 and I watched in 3D and that was a cinematic experience. If the sequel was released earlier, I would probably enjoy it as well. Sadly, Avatar 2 is released 13 years later. 

Visually, it's beautiful. Pandora looks amazing. There is also some cutting edge technology used to film. I was watching the behind the scenes and I have to say, they really levelled up for this.

But besides that, frankly I wasn't really impressed with the acting nor the story. The casting wasn't all that great either. One of my gripes of Avatar 2 was this. Do I really need to see the same villain again? I mean Stephen Lang was awesome in the first movie. He died at the end. Do we really need to see him again in Avatar 2? For what? No other actors to be villain ah? Same goes to Sigourney Weaver. She was good in the first one. Why is she in this as a 14 year old kid? For what? It's not just weird for a grown ass woman to play a 14 year old kid, I didn't really get the reason why either. Some shit about memory storage which was quickly explained. Zoe Saldana half the fuck time she is growling like a cat or shouting incoherent shit. Sam Worthington narrating is about as exciting as watching grass grow. 

There were some new actors joining in the cast as well. Kate Winslet is one of them. She didn't really have much scenes. I was hoping for her to go against Zoe Saldana's character but they only pretty much growled at each other for a bit. Eddie Falco would have been a good new villain for this but her scenes were limited as well. The kids in Avatar 2 are quite annoying. There's one fucker, the human kid. He goes around jumping like Mowgli from Jungle Book but with dreadlocks. I was hoping he would die. Fuck him.

The script is also pretty bad. Why are all the Navi kids talking like surfer dudes? bruh this bruh that. Just because they are sea people now ah? And why the Navi adults all talk like they are fengshui masters. It's damn annoying.

The story sadly is tame. There wasn't really a big climatic scene like the first Avatar. Somewhere around the 2 hour mark, it gets really boring and draggy. The whole teaching the Sully family to be sea people. If you need to pee, that's a good time to do so cos you are not missing much. 

All in all, Avatar: The way of water is quite mediocre. If you really want to watch it in the cinema, watch it on a Monday, cos spending $16 bucks on this is not worth it. Just wait for the stream. 

Luckily James Cameron filmed part 3 and 4 of Avatar concurrently so we probably will get to see them in the next few years. If the Avatar series doesn't do well, he might end it as a trilogy. He was also quoted saying How many people gives a shit about Avatar now?

I for one, do not but I will watch the 3rd fucking one or anything James Cameron comes out. Cos its James fucking Cameron.

Movie review of Blonde

 Blonde - 2/10

Directed by Andrew Dominik.

What a terribly boring movie. Watching grass grow is far more exciting than watching this 3 hour crap. Watching Blonde is like watching a pirated version of a Terrence Malick movie and fuck Terrence Malick.

Why would you wanna make a movie of Marilyn Monroe but use a fictionalized book? The way the movie was made was terrible. Granted there are a few very nice shots. But its like for every 1 good shot, there will be 5 shit shots. Terrible close ups and some really shit transitions. And what's with the fucking colour? some scenes are colour and some are black and white. Why? If the whole movie is black and white, it would be good.

According to Andrew Dominik, the script contains little dialogue and he has described the film as being an "avalanche of images and events." It's not an avalanche of images and events, its more like a fucking video montage edited by kids. And yes, whatever little script there was, it was fucking terrible. So many cringe worthy lines. Knn, all her husbands, MM calls them, Daddy. It's like porn script lah.

Andrew Dominik had perhaps 2 good movies. Chopper and Killing them softly. This is definitely his worst. I don't think I'm going to follow any of his future movies.

The acting in Blonde is so inconsistent. There are some well known casts in this but all of them were hits and misses. Quite a number of reviews, says Ana De Armas was really good in this. Nope. She was shit as well. She tries very hard to get the Monroe accent but its inconsistent. Every now and then, you get the latino accent. Her make up was terrible as well.

Marilyn Monroe, no matter how troubled she was, she was a decent actress and was an icon. Blonde is just basically exploiting her one more time even though she is dead. I would love to watch a proper biography of her though.

All in all, even if you have 3 hours of your life to spare, don't bother watching Blonde. Watch grass grow instead.

Movie review of Prey

Prey - 8/10

Finally lah! A fucking Predator movie that did not suck ass. Prey is directed by Dan Trachtenberg and written by Patrick Aison. I thoroughly enjoyed and loved all the Predator 1 and 2 subtle references. Prey does have a few flaws but still it is really good and Predator fans will be happy, this didn't turn to shit.

When I first found out there will be another Predator movie coming out and it was titled Prey. I didn't give it much hope. Cos all the Predator movies after Predator 2 were terrible. Yes, there were really good designs of the Predators but still the stories were all shit. Especially the last one which was directed by Shane Black. That was absolutely the worst. Super Predator??? your mother cheebye lah, Shane. Fuck you. I had zero confidence before watching Prey even though there were early reviews saying it was good. I have to say after watching Prey, its definitely up there and I loved it alot. Definitely watching this a few times for sure.

Before I go on about Prey, here is what I didn't quite like about it. The language. The cast are from the Commanche Tribe, Native Indians. I wished the Indians spoke in their native tongue instead of English and have English subs instead, to make it more authentic. Like the Mel Gibson directed movie, Apocalypto. The filmakers wanted it that way but unfortunately the studios wanted it in English. I can't blame them, cos Americans are generally stupid and they can't read and watch so everything must be handed out to them on a fucking plate. There is a native tongue version but its dubbed so fuck that.

The other thing I didn't really like is the Predator's mask/helmet. Yes I understand, it's a different type of Predator, and it's called a Feral Predator and it is set 300 years ago so the Predators are not that advanced themselves. Maybe... if I watch a few times more, I will grow to like it. Also the Predator is a little bit skinny lah and the hair kenna rebonded that looks like a Malaysian Indian girl instead of the dreadlocks. Again, I will watch it a few times more, then I will grow to like it.

The new weapons are a bit of a hit and miss for me. I loved the spear/dual sword weapon. That was fucking cool. The grenade thing that launches 3 spinning things? Meh. The millipede curling knife thing was abit meh for me as well. Maybe I watch again and see how I feel about it lah.

I love the cast of Prey. Amber Midhunter as Naru and Dakota Beavers as Taabe were brilliant. Amber as the lead actress is just fantastic. I hope to see more of her and hopefully in a sequel. The cast were mostly Native Indians and none of them looked like beefcakes. Just ordinary looking Indians against the Feral Predator. The whole vibe of the movie reminded me of the First Predator movie and Apocalypto because of the chase between the hunter and hunted. 

It took them about 4 years to get Prey written and done and it is worth the wait. Another good thing is that it is not PG13 shit so do expect some really awesome kill scenes.

I really enjoyed the pace of the movie. It starts a little slow with very lush and beautiful scenic shots but midway through the movie it gets intense and towards the end, it is really edge of your seat action. CGI was decent. The fight scenes are brilliantly choreographed and fucking epic. Especially the one between the siblings and the Predator and the final climatic fight scene between Naru and the feral Predator.

I also liked how the feral Predator starts his killings from small to big and he keeps going at it. The most stand out reference is of course the pistol which was from Predator 2. I was really happy about that cos finally there is a nod to Predator 2 which is often left out. The other references were of course about the original which everyone loves. Good thing there is no fucking choppa!

All in all, Prey is a fucking brilliant movie and all Predator fans should watch this at least twice. Do watch the animation credits till the end cos it does reveal something.

Prey is available on Hulu now. If it bleeds, we can kill it.