When Kevin Smith made Clerks 2, somehow you knew he would end up making a third film to complete his trilogy. Maybe it shouldn’t have taken so long, but it’s nice to revisit this story 16 years later and nearly 30 years since the original film. I’m a huge fan of Kevin Smith. Not every one of his movies are great but then again, great filmmakers don’t always make a movie. They don’t stay perfect. When I look at Clerks 3, it’s like a 30-year high school reunion for everything comes full circle while reminiscing about the moments that made your life great. In a nutshell, this film is about what made the original Clerks film great and why it stands the test of time. As I watched it, I wonder if Kevin Smith just wanted to make a film that showed the behind-the-scenes of making his opus. That’s not necessarily a bad thing because making a movie about the process of making a movie can be very funny. State and Main is a great example, and a film called The Amateurs with Jeff Bridges where a group of filmmakers tries to make a porn film and it all goes to hell. Then they end up making a film about them trying to make a porn film. Clerks 3 is really just about the process he went through to make the first film but to examine all of the things that made up that story like the absurdity of humanity shown through the customers or the mundane atmosphere of working in a convenience store. None of these things are bad, but I think that you have to understand what this film really is and why it’s not on par with the original Clerks or even Clerks 2. Don’t get me wrong, I very much enjoyed it, but not through the lens of discovering an up-and-coming filmmaker who has a brilliant voice, but as a fan of a filmmaker who wants to reexamine the things he did great and therefore come full circle with his life.

The basic story of Clerks 3 is Randall Graves has a heart attack and decides that he wants to make a movie about his life working in a convenience store. Sound familiar! Yes, it’s a movie within a movie. The hilariousness of this film is seen in everything they go through to make an independent film and to put a script together of all these funny moments from their life that also include embarrassing moments of ex-girlfriends. It’s nice to have Veronica back from the original film. In fact, when you watch this movie, you’ll also see the original actors who portrayed customers come back and be in this film as well. However, as funny as clerks 3 is, there are also some very heartwarming moments where these characters have to come face to face with where their lives are now and did they move on from certain tragedies. I’ll leave it there because I don’t want to spoil anything.

I feel like in some ways these heartwarming moments kind of slow down the film and while they are necessary to make us reconnect with these characters and make them endearing, sometimes it goes on a little too long. When I watch a Kevin Smith film, I don’t want to feel sad and unfortunately, there’s too many moments where I do feel sad, but what makes it really work is Kevin Smith’s flair for comedy and his commentary on the absurdity of humanity is still within this film. Maybe it’s not as good as with the other two Clerks movies, so what, it still works. But if you’re a movie fan we all know that the third movie in a trilogy is usually the worst and that’s certainly fits for Clerks 3 compared to the other two films.

If there is a true message to Clerks 3, I think it’s for the character of Randall who learns to see the value in his life and of course he’ll put that into film that’s basically becoming the Kevin Smith of the story. But every great storyteller pick moments from their life to show to the world. It’s no secret that artists put themselves in their work. However, this film really is just about us revisiting these characters and seeing where they are 30 years later, hence the high School reunion reference. I think my biggest critique is that a lot of the comedy was sacrificed for these very emotional scenes where the characters are coming face-to-face with their own mortality and what their lives have become. It just lingers a little too long, but it’s also a necessary for this story to come full circle.

Here’s what makes this movie worth watching. Kevin Smith’s zany comedy also provides a great commentary not only on life but on movies and pop culture. He’s the ultimate geek that we all agree with. He’s like our nerd guru so some of his fantastic references for kids who obviously grew up in the ’80s are brilliant and you can’t help but laugh when Randall Graves is telling the doctor played by Amy Sedaris all about the Mandalorian series which obviously she’s in. I feel like Elias was funnier in Clerks 2, but him becoming a Satanist in this film and the changing of all his weird outfits going from cyberpunk to goth to things that I can’t even figure out we’re great. He is the comic relief that changes the mood with all his outfits because he’s finally exploring different lifestyles. There’s enough comic relief that makes this feel like a Clerk’s movie and allows us to revisit what we’ve loved about these films that makes the third one worth watching. But this is also very clearly Randall’s film. I wish there had been more done with Dante, but you also understand why it’s very much Randall’s story by the time you get to the end, and it should be. Clerks 3 is not the best film that Kevin Smith has ever made. It’s not his best-written work, but it was fun to revisit the characters that we met in 1994. It’s nice to have that reunion with them because if you grew up in the 80s and are about the same age as these characters in your late 40s approaching 5o then you’re trying to answer the same questions. Did we do enough with our life? Is our life even worth telling in a movie? Clerks 3 is a good enough film that gives a great ending to the story of Clerks, but you should also understand that the first and second acts of their story are the best parts. If this was the film where we were introduced to Kevin Smith as a filmmaker and we probably wouldn’t give him a second thought, but its commentary on his original film is brilliant and perfectly bookends the story of Clerks. Even an adequate film is still worth watching, especially when we get to revisit characters that we have grown up with and it’s still better than any high school reunion that you would ever go to. It’s a great send-off to the beloved characters of Dante Hicks and Randall Graves and their story at the Quick Stop.

Religious satire makes for great comedy! I’m a huge fan of religious satire. Any movie that makes fun of religion and shows it’s hypocrisy within humanity, I’m there! Honk for Jesus is one of those movies that after the long week, I needed a good laugh. It may not be the best when it comes to religious satire or poking fun at mega-churches, but there’s a lot to like about this movie. Sterling K. Brown and Regina Hall keep you laughing all the way to the end and even have a way of making you feel sympathetic toward the hypocritical mega-church ministers that they play in the movie. Now, while I do not have the African American experience when it comes to Baptist churches, especially mega-churches in the south, there’s a universal theme within this movie that makes it worth watching. You can literally put any mega-church pastor as a character in this film and it would work just the same. Normally, a story like this would just be sad and leave you shaking your head, but it does take two great performances to make us as an audience feel sympathy for the main characters

The story is about a mega-church pastor and his wife who are forced to close the doors after a sex scandal hits the pulpit! It’s not just any kind of sex scandal. A minister getting caught committing adultery with the church secretary would be too common, but it’s a homosexual sex scandal regarding a mega church pastor that rails against homosexuality. That’s when you have comedy gold. The movie is done in a mockumentary style as this pastor and his wife try to reopen the church on an Easter Sunday while most of their congregation have flocked to a rival Baptist Church who are opening a second location on the same Easter Sunday. That’s when the comedy of errors start to happen. The best thing about this movie is it being told in a mockumentary fashion. I don’t know if it would have worked any other way, but the dry sarcastic sense of humor brought on by the documentary style makes this movie 10 times funnier than it probably should be.

Throwing great performances by Sterling K. Brown and Regina Hall and you got a winner. Great casting can make or break a movie, and both were perfect in these roles. Don’t get me wrong, I still want to see Sterling K. Brown play a demon hunter at Supernatural, but he makes a great mega-church pastor that’s easy to ridicule. The film’s audience is probably a predominantly African American audience, but like I said before. it has a very universal theme so it’s a movie that I think everybody should see and would laugh at.

Now, it’s not a perfect movie, there are quite a few times where scenes should have been cut down. The film has its fair share of awkward moments that aren’t really funny when they should be. And it certainly has some pacing issues, but honestly, that’s probably more due to the particular style of the film. Documentaries do make you feel uncomfortable at times. They’re not meant to be a slapstick type of comedy because you’re not watching a film like The Naked Gun or Airplane, it does have some pacing issues. It’s not enough to make you not watch this movie. I’m just saying that it could have been better. Even though the film doesn’t go out of its way to say that it’s Atlanta, the city is very much an important character in the film, especially with the African American community. Probably the biggest flaws really do come down to editing. But these flaws don’t take away from the overall humor. The film starts out strong and then falters a bit in the middle but ends on a high note and finishes strong.

Overall, the film does its job of making you rethink religion and whether you should go to a mega-church or give them money. Sure, the film does have a bit a bit of political commentary when it comes to religion, but the film knows it’s audience! I enjoyed the movie because it is religious satire and although there are some issues that could be fixed if they ever came out with a director’s cut or decided to do a sequel at the end of the day it’s a hilarious film that’s worth watching. Maybe it’s not worth the price of a movie ticket, but if you have Peacock streaming then add it to your list of things to watch this weekend. With great performances and a fantastic subject that feels way too common in American society, Honk for Jesus will certainly make you laugh. And if people are offended by the film, they probably don’t have any sense of humor at all anyway. I highly recommend this movie to anybody who loves to make fun of religion or has a dark sense of humor. If you’re worried that it will only appeal to an African American audience, you’re wrong. Its universal theme makes it a film that everybody should check out. I can’t wait to watch it again on Peacock.

From Rocky to Rambo and now a superhero, I guess Sylvester Stallone has really done it all. But maybe we could have done without the last thing he’s done. Sylvester Stallone made a superhero film called Samaritan, which premieres on Amazon Prime. While he was in Guardians of the Galaxy 2, he wasn’t necessarily a superhero in the film, so this is his first foray into the superhero universe. I like the idea of Sly being a superhero, but unfortunately, it wasn’t well executed. Sure, the premise is an interesting idea about brothers who are superheroes, one evil and one good, battling it out until the last one standing goes into hiding. For 25 years the people of the city within the movie wondered if Samaritan whatever come back until a young kid being bullied thinks he’s discovered the long-lost superhero. That’s where our story takes off.

Admittedly, I was interested in Sylvester Stallone being a superhero. Why not, he’s great as Rocky, fantastic as Rambo, and the Expendable movies where he’s essentially every action star, he’s ever been wrapped up in one character are a lot of fun. So, it stands to reason that he could be a superhero. But even if you have a good story, you have to make it interesting and unfortunately for Sylvester Stallone, it feels like he just phoned it. The premise of this movie would have been better for an aging Rocky who disappeared and then discovers another young boxer. Could also probably work for a Rambo movie. Then again, that is essentially the plot of Rambo 4 where he was hiding out in Thailand until he was called upon to rescue some Americans. That was a much better story!  

We know that Sylvester Stallone is an action star so you’re not going to have a lot of witty dialogue. It’s not like he hasn’t been able to pull that off because as the straight-laced, Wall Street type Cop in Tango and Cash, he was great. But in Samaritan, he mostly pushes people around and protects a little kid with very little dialogue. As I said, it seems as if he phoned it in because he wanted to do a superhero movie. I’m not saying that the movie is a complete disaster, it’s worth watching at least once for the interesting twist at the end. But this definitely isn’t Sylvester Stallone’s best movie, and we really didn’t need him in the superhero genre.

What does make the movie worth watching is the fact that you do get a lot of good action and the fire scenes are pretty intense, very reminiscent of Backdraft. The rest of the cast is pretty good and they’re the ones that make this movie worth watching.  Javon ‘Wanna’ Walton, Dascha Polanco; Moises Arias are great.  And Pilou Asbæk is fantastic as the villain. Of course, he would be because he was great in Game of Thrones.   As I mentioned before, there is an interesting twist at the end, but the 90-minute, build-up almost isn’t worth it just to get to a few good scenes at the end.  Samaritan is a good one-timer. I definitely wouldn’t have paid money to see it in the theater, but it’s good for streaming services. You can entertain yourself for 90 minutes on a Sunday afternoon and not entirely be disappointed, but it’s not the kind of superhero movie that you will revisit.

Not every superhero movie can be great. There are plenty of Marvel movies leading up to the infinity Wars that are not that good, but they were made to tell a superhero’s origin story. If this were a trilogy of films, this would be an okay starting point because you really don’t know a whole lot about Samaritan except for the fact that two brothers fought in a great battle and one disappeared. There’s not much of a superhero origin story and you really do need that to make us connect to the character. There isn’t anything that makes us connect to Samaritan. At the end of the day, this doesn’t feel so much of a superhero movie as watching an aging Rocky or Rambo take a young kid under his wing. In fact, it would have been a much better movie if we had seen either one of those characters within the same storyline. Perhaps Sylvester Stallone just doesn’t make a good superhero and that’s okay. Sometimes you can just be a good action star and that’s all you need to be in Hollywood. 

Echoes is a new limited series on Netflix starring Michelle Monaghan. It’s the story of twin sisters who swap lives and get tangled up in all sorts of criminal activities. I have to admit, by the end of it, I still didn’t know who was who! After seven episodes, I had more questions than answers and while I do like a good mystery, all things should be answered by the end. It is an interesting story, that may be the best description I can give it, but what should have been built to a great twist, leaving you on the edge of your seat, it’s a story that fizzles out pretty quickly after two episodes and feels more like a soap opera than anything else. Honestly, I feel like I’ve seen this particular story in an episode of As the World turns when I watched it with my grandmother as a kid. Yes, that’s a whole nother story! Limited series stories should have a great starting point and have a clear ending. There’s a lot of good ones based on Harlan Coben novels. But this particular series left me more bewildered than anything else. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t check it out if you’re looking for something interesting to watch because you’ve watched everything else on Netflix, but its not as good as it should be.

The best thing about Echoes is Michelle Monaghan. Her dual performance playing both sisters is fantastic. She’s a great actress to begin with and she plays this role brilliantly. She plays the character so well that you probably are more confused by the end and that’s not necessarily a bad thing which leads to an interesting twist. But she’s really the only bright spot to this series.

While it does have a great cast with actors like Matt Bomer from White Collar and Karen Robinson from Schitt’s Creek, it’s not enough to keep you vested in the series. For me, I finished it because I wanted to get to the end, but it’s not anything I would ever go back to. However, the performances are good and Victoria Abbott, who plays the younger version of the twins does an amazing job as well. But the thing is you still need a good story to make a show like this worth watching.

Mostly what doesn’t work is the story itself. Yes, it’s interesting to have twins swap lives and give a bit of a backstory to why they started doing it, but if the main plot boils down to a soap opera-ish storyline about twin sisters basically being jealous of one another and the lives they had, that’s not really interesting. That’s boring. I’m trying to give away spoilers, but that’s essentially what the story is, jealous twin sisters. Again, I’m pretty sure I’ve seen that in an episode of As the World Turns or was it Guiding Light, who knows they all have the same stories. One thing that really did annoy me is that I literally kept getting confused about who was who between the sisters. Which one really had the breakdown, which one had it all together and fell in love with the boy from high school who was an outsider? Because the characters switch lives so often, it’s hard to keep up even until the end because you don’t really know which sister ends up back home with her therapist husband. I almost expected both sisters to show up and kill the one person who knew what they really did. Now I’m not saying that storylines with twin sisters swapping lives can’t be interesting, but the plot needs to be more believable than what you would see in a soap opera. It’s an interesting 7 episodes. I’m glad it was a limited series because trying to stretch out this storyline for multiple seasons would have been ridiculous and would have moved beyond “jumping the shark.” The story works for seven episodes and while it does keep you guessing until the end, I have to admit, once the story is over, you’ll be more glad that it’s over than feeling excitement over the twist at the end. However, the one bright spot is the brilliant performance by Michelle Monaghan, she gives an award-winning performance even if the story isn’t that good.

Vampire Slayer movies are fun! They don’t have to be great. They don’t have to be in the same realm as Citizen Kane or Schindler’s List. They’re simply fun movies and that’s the best way I can describe Day Shift with Jamie Foxx and Dave Franco. It’s just a fun vampire Slayer movie on Netflix with two great comedic actors that will entertain you right till the end. Also, the movie is made better by having Snoop Dogg in the movie as a seasoned Vampire Slayer. How would you not watch this film to see Snoop Dogg slay vampires? We always give Netflix movies a hard time for not being the greatest of movies compared to some of the movies we see in the theaters, and I think that’s okay. We mostly get fun movies that entertain us and that’s all they need to do. Every once in a while, we’ll get a movie on Netflix that will make us think or inspire us, but if there’s one thing the streaming service does really well, it gives us entertaining movies or pure escapism. That’s what I mostly liked about Day Shift.

The story is about a vampire Slayer, played by Jamie Foxx, who masquerades as a pool cleaner and has been thrown out of the Vampire Slayer Union so he’s having to fight for menial wages when it comes to hunting vampires. After he gets back in the Union on a probationary period, that’s when all hell breaks loose. His family doesn’t know he’s a vampire Slayer, but he’s trying to raise enough money to send his daughter to school and to keep his wife from moving away. And because he’s on a probationary period by the head of the Union who doesn’t like him, he gets saddled with a union rep who is logging every mistake he makes so the union can kick him out for good. On top of that, there are vampires who are wanting to take over the Valley outside of LA.  The heroes in the story will have to take them down. That’s the basis of the story and you’ve probably seen it before, but so what! What makes this movie worth watching is Jamie Foxx just being a badass and Dave Franco being comical as usual.

But put Jamie Foxx and Snoop Dogg together as Vampire Slayers, and you’re going to get a lot of entertainment. The action is good. The cast will make you laugh. And you will get all the thrills that come with vampire slaying. It’s your typical horror-action movie. Jamie Foxx and Dave Franco do not disappoint. Snoop Dogg definitely doesn’t disappoint especially with Big Bertha. Just watch the movie and you’ll find out what I’m talking about.

Day shift is not a great movie, we’ve seen this kind of movie before. There’s nothing truly original about it and that’s okay. But I think the main reason it’s on Netflix and not in theaters is that the story is not very original.  You get a great cast that gives you a lot of great action when it comes to hunting vampires and that’s essentially the movie. Well, a movie without any originality can’t really be a great movie. Films like this are largely forgettable, but the one thing it does have going for it is it is on Netflix and if you’re looking just to escape with a good movie on a weekend afternoon where you don’t have to think too hard, this one will entertain you. The pacing is fine, although it’s kind of a short movie. You get just the right amount of action to fill up 90 minutes. And unfortunately, there’s nothing special about the characters that make you connect to them. You like Jamie Foxx and Snoop Dogg because they’re awesome vampire slayers and that’s it.

Overall, it’s an okay movie and it is worth watching one afternoon even if you never watch it again. There are better vampire action movies like the Underworld series or the Blade Trilogy. There are even better horror-comedy movies, but Day Shift will entertain you just enough to make it worth having a Netflix account. It’s like one of those great B-horror movies that really isn’t great, but it’s fun and entertaining which is what they are supposed to do as films. From that standpoint, Day Shift succeeds as a movie. You even got some great buddy cop-type action like you’re watching Beverly Hills Cop but with vampire slayers. I’m not telling you not to watch it, but don’t expect much from this film. Just know that you’ll be entertained by a great cast and then you’ll probably forget you ever watched the movie. However, Netflix could do a sequel or even maybe a series, which might be a good thing to watch on Netflix. Jamie Foxx, Snoop Dogg, and Dave Franco do just enough to keep you entertained, but that’s it. And you know what, that’s good enough when it comes to entertainment. I like Day Shift for what it is and the fact that it’s not trying to be anything else than what it is as a film.  Day Shift is entertaining but forgettable!

Finally, a Predator movie worth watching since the original. This week the movie Prey premiered on Hulu. It’s an origin story of The Predator in the world the Comanche Nation 300 years before. It was before America settled the west and the only Europeans here were French fur trappers. When a young female Comanche warrior faces her right of passage to become a warrior she encounters a Predator, that’s the basis of this fantastic story. So, imagine having to kill a Predator with axes, bows and arrows, and a colonial powder pistol where you only have time to load one shot. Can the Predator actually be defeated? Let me just start off by saying that as much as I like the original Predator movie where even with machine guns, soldiers were still unequipped to kill the Predator, the odds are even worse for a young Comanche Warrior and that makes for a great film.

This movie was great. The action was phenomenal. However, this movie is really made by the performances of Amber Midthunder and Dakota Beavers who play commence brother and sister. But the stand-out performance is from Amber Midthunder who we’ve seen in shows like the Roswell, New Mexico. She is a force to be reckoned with in this movie. Her character is also the only one who understands how the Predator operates and it’s that knowledge that will help her defeat the predator. Yes, that’s a bit of a spoiler, but the Predator is always defeated in these movies so not really.  What makes the stories worth watching is how Naru, Amber Midthunder’s character,  takes down the predator. In this film, it’s her cunning and sheer will to live that makes her the ultimate warrior. No offense to Arnold Schwarzenegger in the original Predator movie, yes, he was great, but she is better in this film.

The basic story is about Comanche Indians going out on a hunt and the men not thinking she is capable enough, but she is the last survivor that not only traps the Predator but is able to kill it with its own technology. This is more than an action film. It slowly draws you into the rituals that help make lawyers in the Comanche Nation so you’re getting that mystique and mythology. You get a true hero’s journey with the character of Naru. The movie is not very long, it’s only about 90 minutes, but it doesn’t feel like a short movie at all and the action doesn’t overtake the drama among the characters, especially between the brother and sister. Absolutely loved the pacing all the way up until the end. I wasn’t bored at all.

There isn’t really anything to complain about with this movie. It works on so many levels. It’s a great action movie. You get this great mythology about the Comanche Nation. I feel like in a lot of ways they pay tribute to the nation and didn’t paint them as stereotypical native Americans as in some films. It makes you want to know more about that Nation, kind of like Dances with Wolves makes you want to know more about the Sioux Nation. If I have one minor critique, there should have been more backstory with the main characters and the tribe. We should have seen more of the everyday life of this Comanche tribe and how Naru becomes the warrior we see by the end of the movie, but at the same time, you get just enough to make you connect with them and the main characters. Overall, having Native Americans battle a Predator and hunt it down while not being it’s Prey is a brilliant idea. When it comes to an origin story, this one is perfect. It’s sad that some of the characters have to die, but that’s typical in any Predator movie. However, it doesn’t take away from the fantastic action. This is a movie that should be watched if you’re a fan of the Predator movies. But if you’re just a fan of a great action movie where a young warrior hunts the “hunter” then check it out. It’s a great movie for Hulu, but this is movie would have been a great one to see on the big screen and maybe they’ll make a sequel. Amber Midthunder gives a fantastic performance and makes you want to see her more in action movies. She was perfect casting. This is a movie worth watching, not just once, but a few times. I honestly have to say this is the best Predator movie since the original. And as a gamer, I would want to play this story in a video game.

Somehow, I think Brad Pitt gets better with age. I’ve enjoyed him more in movies over the last 20 years than I have when he first was an up-and-coming actor in the 90s. He has a plethora of serious roles where he’s been great, but he’s also a bit of a comedic genius and that is very evident in the movie Bullet Train. This is a high-octane action-comedy movie about assassins basically looking for the same thing on a Japanese Bullet Train where they will end up getting in each other’s way. Brad Pitt plays a snatch-and-grab assassin who after finding enlightenment post a bad mission, goes on what it’s supposed to be a simple job, but it doesn’t happen that way. His handler is played by the lovely Sandra Bullock. After watching The Lost City and Bullet Train, I’m convinced they need to do more movies together. Let me first say, that I very much enjoyed Bullet Train, it’s not high art and it certainly isn’t going to win an Oscar, but it’s just pure fun at the movies. A great action-comedy movie can be the perfect escape especially if you have a fantastic cast of executes the story well. Bullet Train does all of that!

What makes this movie good? First of all, it’s a great concept to have an action movie on a bullet train going over 100 mph. Not only are you in condensed spaces, which makes it harder to complete a set plan if you’re an assassin, but there’s a lot that can happen on a train. The movie isn’t all about action, yes it does have great action and fight scenes, and gives you just the right amount of gore to make it entertainment. But the comedic conversations between the characters make you root for them even though they’re bad guys. You know that they’re not as much of a villain as the overall villain in the story which is referred to as the White Wolf and Michael Shannon plays that character perfectly.

But there’s a mystery to the story of Bullet Train, a “who done it” type of aspect to the story that makes it engaging and leaves you wanting more. But honestly, the performances make this movie worth watching. Brad Pitt is great, but I loved Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Brian Tyree Henry more as the assassin’s duo called Lemon and Tangerine. They play the perfect London-type gangsters that you just can’t get enough…something out of a Guy Ritchie film. Joey King is not a kid anymore as she plays a young assassin that has a maturity about her that will make you fear any character she plays. She was great. But I also have to commend the fantastic Asian cast with Andrew Koji and Hiroyuki Sanada. You could say that this is the perfect cast.

I really don’t have many complaints about the movie because it knows what it is. It’s just a very entertaining action-comedy movie where the lives of criminals intertwined with one another as they deal with the ultimate villain on s high-speed moving train. And the Thomas the Train references are great. While the movie does give you just enough of a backstory towards the end of the movie to see how everybody’s lives connect, we could have had more backstory on all the characters. I feel like we should have known a lot more about Brad Pitt’s character, code name Ladybug, and his relationship with his handler, Maria. Also, while it’s an interesting twist to find out the true identity of Joey King’s character, we should have had a little bit more of her backstory as well…maybe some flashbacks on how she grew up.  I won’t spoil who she really is. If I had one more complaint, it’s probably more or less nitpicking, Andrew Koji’s character is not as likable compared to the actor’s skills because he’s a wonderful actor. You should check out his series on HBO max, Warrior, which is based on a story developed by Bruce Lee 50 years ago. It’s just minor nitpicking when it comes to his character because his performance is great!

Overall, this is a fun action-comedy movie that will keep you laughing until the end and won’t make you want to get up and use the restroom if you see it in the theater. Brad Pitt is at his best and as I said before he has great comedic chops, but if you’ve watched any of the Ocean 11 movies, you already know that. The premise is brilliant and the conversations with the characters are not only poignant but hilarious. You get everything you look for in a great action-comedy movie that keeps you entertained right up to the end. It very much has a Kill Bill feel to it and if you didn’t know better, you might suspect that Quentin Tarantino was directing this film. It may not win any awards, but that’s okay because it’s pure fun at the movies with a great cast that will entertain you right to the end. If you’re wondering, it’s worth the price of a movie ticket! And if they develop a sequel where all of these characters intertwine again, I’d be okay with that!

Sometimes you discover a good drama that tugs at your emotional strings. They’re more than just good dramatic films, but films that need to be seen. I always love discovering those kinds of films, especially if it’s an indie movie. I had the pleasure of watching one this week that will hit “On Demand,” on August 1st. The film is called Icon. While the central theme is about teenage pregnancy, the underlying theme is about the choices that the two involved have to make because it isn’t just one person’s choice, there’s two people involved and what this film does is center more on the man’s perspective in the situation. He’s who’s trying to do the right thing in a world where there are no perfect answers and he doesn’t exactly have great examples to learn from. Stories about teenage pregnancy look at it from the female’s perspective and that’s logical, she has the biggest burden in that situation. The movie Juno dealt with very adult situations and the hard choices that the girl would have to make. It’s a charming film, but have we ever seen a film that looks at it from the perspective of the guy? Not really and that’s what this film deals with because the male protagonist isn’t just a stupid male teenager who comes from a good family and likely doesn’t have to accept responsibility. He’s being raised by a single mother and having to deal with the ghost of his father who he barely remembers, and he doesn’t understand the truth about why his father left.  Fathers are supposed to be good examples to their sons, but it’s hard when you deal with fathers in prison who won’t accept responsibility for their actions.

The story is set in St Petersburg Florida and definitely feels like it could be a story out of the 90s or the 2000s even though it’s set in 2010, but the themes are universal because anybody who deals with teenage pregnancy still has to make difficult decisions. Do you keep the baby and try to save your future or do you create a whole other future while having the child? Do they raise the child together or do they become co-parents? If you think those questions are hard to answer when you’re in your 30s and 40s, it’s a lot harder to answer when you’re a teenager makes this film great as well as the performances. The two leads, Parker Padgett who plays Sam, and Devon Hales who plays Ana are fantastic and carry this film. They play their parts as if they are seasoned actors of 20 years or more while bringing an emotional level to their characters that will instantly make you connect with them. Julia Denton is also great as Sam’s mother. I didn’t expect this film to be so intense and it slowly draws you into the despair that both characters are going through in trying to make the smart decision, especially Sam as he’s trying to raise money for an abortion. He can’t ask his mother there aren’t many options for a teenager to raise fast cash so you can imagine where he turns to, to get lots of money. The interesting part of this film is you look at Sam as having the harder choice because he’s trying to do the right thing and he’s been told that he has to be a man… that he has to step up. Being raised by a single mother, he doesn’t have the support network that Ana does. It’s not often we talk about how hard it is on a guy who is trying to do the right thing when his girlfriend becomes pregnant, especially if he’s a teenager. But through Parker Padgett’s performance, you do feel connected to Sam and all the emotions he’s going through until he finds the right choice. That’s not only the mark of a great performance but a great story.  Devon Hale is equally as good at playing the part of not only his girlfriend but his conscience in trying to keep him honest with himself.

I honestly didn’t have any problems with this film. There are scenes that do linger longer than they should, but they’re hardly noticeable as you are enthralled with the performances of the main cast. You don’t necessarily like Julia Denton’s character right off the bat, but by the end of the film, you see what a great mother she is and how much she truly loves her son. The flashbacks work well in helping you understand Sam’s perception of his father until he learns the truth. Perhaps 10 or 15 minutes could have been cut out of the film, but it doesn’t make it any less emotional or stop you from really connecting with these characters, so my critiques are minor. I’m not saying it’s the type of movie you would rush out to go see in the theater because of the emotional weight that it carries within the story, but it’s definitely worth renting “On Demand” even if you only watch it once. Now the film doesn’t set out to make a political statement about pregnancy and abortion because it was filmed in 2019, but the political ramifications behind the story are there, and no matter your personal feelings regarding abortion, it’s easy to see that everybody has a right to make their own choice especially when it’s a hard one to make. The film doesn’t set out to make a political statement, but if there’s a statement it does make, the choices surrounding an unwanted pregnancy are emotional and perhaps there’s no ultimate right answer except for what’s be for you.  That’s the kind of great storytelling you have with this film. And that’s why everybody should see it. It’s not an easy film to watch, but it’s one that everybody should see because of the emotional connection that we can have to the story and the characters which are universal. Time will tell, but the film Icon may just end up being iconic in the long run!

Where the Crawdads Sing, based on the best-selling book, hits theaters this week. If you’re a fan of the book, then it is a must-see film and if you’re just a casual moviegoer, then it’s worth checking out. You won’t be disappointed!  It has a modern-day To Kill a Mockingbird feel to It.  The movie had a wonderful cast that leaves you with wonderment and intrigue about the “old south” without the anger that comes from the political tensions of that era. It’s a wonderful story about a girl who is forced to take care of herself and grows up in the marshlands of North Carolina. It is a tale of mystery and love to the backdrop of a court trial where the town’s “golden son” is found murdered and the girl that no one understands is accused of the crime.

Not having read the book, I enjoyed the movie very much, mostly because of the wonderful performances from the cast.  Daisy Edgar-Jones is the new “it girl.” Beautiful and talented, she was almost perfect or made to play Kya Clark, the story’s main character. While she has not done many movies compared to TV or “limited series” on streaming services, this will certainly be her breakout role and you’ll understand why once you see her performance.  In a lot of ways, she makes the movie better than it probably should be and her performance is definitely worthy of an Oscar nomination. The other great performance comes from David Strahan, who plays her lawyer and channels his best “Atticus Finch” while defending her to where it almost makes you feel like you are watching the modern-day version of To kill a Mockingbird. The story is intriguing and has many layers to it, mostly because it is set in the marshlands of North Carolina, which is its own character, especially as you’re dealing with Kya who becomes a Naturalist and understands the wildlife of that area better than most. I don’t think I would have liked the movie as much if it weren’t for the performances of the two main characters because the film does feel familiar as if Harper Lee had written it herself.

It’s not a perfect movie and my biggest complaint is that it does feel familiar, and you have seen the story before. All the tropes from the classic story, To Kill a Mockingbird, are there? A misunderstood person is accused of murder, there’s a witch hunt to put her away because she’s the obvious choice, and then a good-hearted lawyer defends her because he cares more about truth than appearances. If you’re going to copy a story about the “old south” and about standing up for what’s right, then To Kill a Mockingbird is the way to go. But it is the performances that overshadow this familiarity. The pacing is pretty good, but for me, the one downfall to it being a perfect movie is the overkill when it comes to foreshadowing. There’s no surprise to the mystery in the story. The filmmakers drop so many clues about what really happened that it doesn’t leave you that surprised at the end. While I will not spoil it, I don’t think you’ll be surprised. Foreshadowing is a useful tool, but it has to be subtle, and if you keep dropping clues even to the point where the opposing attorney explains to the audience what really happened, then you take away the mystery and intrigue of the story.  That’s never good!

It is a good film, marked by great performances. It’s probably not one you should pay a full-price movie ticket for, but it’s worth the matinee price. Even if you only watch it once, you will enjoy the good parts of the story, despite the fact you may not be surprised at the ending.  It’s also a perfect one to rent if you’re cooking dinner and staying in for the evening. The “To Kill a Mockingbird” feel to the story is a double-edged sword as it does make the movie feel way too familiar or makes you want to go back and watch the original film. However, at the same time, a story that feels like another story you could identify with, and love is not necessarily a bad thing. The marshlands provide an interesting side character and definitely adds some intrigue to the story, which a lot of movies lack these days. Where the Crawdads Sing is a beautiful movie, but you’ll be more impressed with the performances than the overall plot. However, the performances are so good that it does make this film worth watching. Daisy Edgar Jones and David Strahan give Oscar-worthy performances, which makes the film better than it really is.