Category: April 2024

Abigail “Review” “Rant”

Release date: April 19, 2024 (USA)

Director: Matt Bettinelli-Olpin

Distributed by: Universal Pictures

Box office: $34.7 million

Cinematography: Aaron Morton

Edited by: Michael P. Shawver

Let’s begin shall we because I’m going to cook and I’ll let you know when to get off before the main course is in the oven.

Abigail is a perfect example of why I’ve had such contrasted reviews to others recently. Trailers are a great marketing tool. Get the message out and gather interest buzz for an upcoming title. However, to much material is being shown and it’s impacting the movie experience.

The first hour of this movie is a lengthy version of the trailer. – If you didn’t see the trailer then excellent enjoy that first hour because it’s a pretty cool mystery and exploration of the movie before the reveal which so far I’m being totally spoiler free unlike the trailer.

A universe of sorts is created and draws the viewer in for those that have and haven’t seen the trailer. – This is your starters. I hope you enjoyed because from here some enjoy steak medium rare, others rare, medium, burnt, well done ext.

I put up with the meal thus far at around a 6/10 balancing having saw the trailers and being recommended this title by a friend….. sadly I ended up coming out with a 4/10 hoping to have watched Madame Web again.

Okay, let’s start the oven if you want to jump off here to not ruin your dinner.

Note to studios. Please make a teaser trailer and MAYBE 1 trailer before the movies release. Especially for movies like this where you spend so much time keeping the reveal (THAT’S IN THE TRAILER) away from the audience that already knows what’s to come. Be smart with the trailer and be deceptive and add mystery within to avoid this. To many trailers and way to many reveals are being shown. Challengers was another great example.

People informed me based on the trailer they expected more of what was being shown. Along with thought the plot took to long to get to where they wanted it to get to based on already knowing the characters from the trailer. I got to enjoy the ride of each character and the plot reveal due to not watching the trailers.

Okay steaks going into the oven now. Let’s get to what brought my 6 down to a 4. The meat and potatoes of my “Rant”.

When so many vampire movies exist and so much lore and tropes have been used. There’s a common and never touched established use of vampires. When you first become a vampire (By the way they literally mention this at the end of the movie which dumb founds me how this occurred) you’re a weak ass vampire. You’re stronger, you’re better than your human self. But never has a new vampire been stronger, even when that vampire is a kid been stronger than an older pre existing vampire which we know from the movie has been AT LEAST 2 years based on another vampire telling us that. Mind you a 2 year old vampire that needs help to kill the child vampire. O.O WTF! Who f$%ked that one up?

Abigail even mentions it takes a long time to learn all the cool shit…. so why didn’t she use any of that when the quirk of her character was that she was a ballerina? Utilize that rather than pushing down on a steak with a human O.O. Whoever wrote the ending of this movie needs to watch some good examples of vampire movies. BLADE the original Blade series. Along with True Blood tv show.

Another reason I bring up this rant and Blade is due to Blade being rebooted by Disney. PLEASE DONT FUCK IT UP!

Lastly for the 4/10 is the movie didn’t even follow its own established lore and plot. When one character is bitten and controlled. (Which took awhile to occur mind you) Why does the other human for 1 instantly get turned and 2 is able to control the master O.o.

If it wasn’t for writing this review / rant I’d of walked out during the 5 different endings this movie could of had. Every time throwing up an over used trope or gimmick horror scene done to death.

If you haven’t watched the trailer then check this out on streaming. If you’re still interested after reading all this then good luck and love to hear your thoughts over this overly cooked meal I’ve prepared.

Thanks for coming to Popped for this burnt batch but look forward to what’s to come with Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes later this week.

Check out better Vampire movies/shows mentioned before or if this is 2020’s version of a Vampire going forth I’m out for this section of the monster verse.

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Boy Kills World “Review”

Release date: April 26, 2024 (USA)

Director: Moritz Mohr

Story by: Arend Remmers; Moritz Mohr

Distributed by: Roadside Attractions, Lionsgate Films

Box office: $1.7 million

Music by: Ludvig Forssell

For a movie not even on my radar a couple weeks back, the word of mouth and late feedback this week drew me in to watching this movie yesterday. I watched the trailer afterwards and wow that’s a fun entertaining trailer.

The movie opens up with a narrative voice over almost to that of Sin City meets Dead Pool humor. Throughout the movie this voice sat with me and then it hit! This is Bob from Bob’s Burgers. This honestly may have been what stole the entire film for me as I loved! Watching this movie with his commentary over the top.

Back to the opening however the story was to that of a Hunger Games meets Squid Games. Within this world is a yearly event called “The Culling” when people are rounded up based upon a list and killed. The villains in control of this entire thing is a family called Van Der Koy which have some interesting personalities. Sadly not enough to have kept me entertained when the fantastic H. Jon Benjamin isn’t voicing over the scenes occurring.

Without Boys voice over the later half of the movie does get a little boring and I waited for the next scene we get to have him back.

The reason why the voice over is so important and crucial to this movie is due to “Boy” played by Bill Skarsgård who’s also staring in the upcoming Crow movie. Is deaf and mute only able to read lips, which is rather funnily implemented and used during this feature. Boy is raised by a shaman due to loosing his entire family in The Culling and has one mission and purpose in life. To Kill Hilda Van Der Koy!

With his voice over inspired by a video game voice over from Boy’s childhood I love his interactions with other individuals throughout the movie. The fight choreography and cinematography used in this film is excellent and worth checking out as you go along this revenge plot with some intriguing tid bits that I’ll leave out for your discovery as you watch Boy Kills World.

Again word of movie drew in me into watch this title so I had a score in mind I wanted it to be at. In addition to having the bar set high with Challengers the previous day I was thinking of this title around an 8. Until sadly the lack of Boy’s voice over was truly felt and sadly the Van Der Koy family not being engaging enough for me personally when Boy isn’t interacting with them.

I couldn’t get to an 8 personally so felt 7.5 for Boy Kills World felt right sitting along side Monkey Man for 2024. Now if you’re not into the voice over for some reason this maybe a harder watch but maybe the action and other aspects of the film will be enjoyable enough viewing experience for you.

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Challengers “Review”

Release date: April 26, 2024 (USA)

Director: Luca Guadagnino

Distributed by: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Warner Bros. Pictures, Amazon MGM Studios

Box office: $7 million

Cinematography: Sayombhu Mukdeeprom

Music by: Trent Reznor; Atticus Ross

Honestly I didn’t really pay attention to the trailers. Thought this was a tennis movie until I was informed there’s lots of drama with Zendaya character dating 2 guys. I went in to see what Zendaya is up to outside of Spiderman and freaking loved the entire ride.

Challengers stars Zendaya as Tennis player turned coach – Tashi Duncan. Mike Faist as Art Donaldson & Josh O’Connor as Patrick Zweig. I thought when people mentioned Zendaya being the main character that there wouldn’t be other main characters but I felt as these 3 equally shared the spot light with one another.

Each of them had fantastic performances which captivated me along the entire story unfolding. This movie has one of my favorite story telling methods where it starts with the ending or a moment in time where the film takes you back to piece together the details required for that moment later on in the film.

Bravo to the director for this movie as I felt like the movie flowed like a tennis match going back and forth introducing characters and information about our 3 leads opening up and unveiling more and more. You may pick your sides and maybe even switch as the scenes revealed more but the entire way your captivated with what’s being displayed on screen.

I don’t want to entire spoiler territory so I’ll go up to a point without crossing. Art & Zweig are the best of friends and Zweig has a infatuation with Tashi. Art was smitten upon first sight of Tashi and from there the competition was on to win her affections over. I use competition as Tashi only speaks of Tennis and refers to all situations around Tennis. Not as she’s a prize to fight over despite that’s kind of what’s going on. She wants the best and that’s the better player the one whom wins at Tennis.

I’ll stop there and wait for your thoughts on this back and forth for after you’ve watched the movie. Now for another component of this movie, the sound track! The sound track was so insanely good! Loved it loved it loved it!

Pacing, story telling and the sound track were my top highlights of this feature. I honestly felt this was a perfect movie. That being said I’m giving it a 9/10 for I have an idea between 9 and 10 to come as a showdown toward the end of the year. That’s when my top 10 list will battle it out with 2 lists. An initial impressions and a rewatched and refined list. I’ll only be giving 9’s until November ish time when the showdown for 2024 top 10 truly begins.

This movie read the assignment and understood it. The bow tie was there and I recommend this title to all looking for a solid flick. Popped to the freshest caliber.

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Spy x Family Code: White “Review”

Release date: April 19, 2024 (USA)

Director: Takashi Katagiri

Distributed by: Toho Co., Ltd.

Adapted from: Spy × Family

Animation by: Kyoji Asano

Box office: US$45.9 million

If you enjoy the Spy Family Anime you’re going to enjoy this movie. Spy Family is a Solid A show with episodes of S tier. This movie would be inline with it’s A tier content rather than an S.

Who’d have thought a treasure disguised in chocolate could go so wrong but thus this wacky movie used that as it’s fuel for the steam to power ahead. Anya is one of my favorites along with Bond the families pet dog however the storyline written for her goes completely insane and focuses VERY much on the youth audience rather than her more detailed calculated adventures from the anime series.

I did appreciate no homework being required as new comers of the series can easily jump in here. Do minimal research on the side characters but can easily jump in and know about this family and begin connecting with their favorite characters.

Maybe an 8 is to high maybe a 7.5 is to low but considering I love this show and the movie was more of the continued awesome show in a longer format I’d have to personally go with an 8/10. Had a blast and don’t over think the decisions along the way. It looked cool, the characters are cool. Nothing needs to make sense or be grounded to being real after the crazy stuff I saw.

Code: White….more like Code: Brown…. yea I’ll let you digest that for a bit and come to your own conclusions. See you after my surgery with either Challengers or The Fall Guy in the next popped “review”.

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Civil War “Review”

Release date: April 12, 2024 (UK)

Director: Alex Garland

Distributed by: A24, Entertainment Film Distributors

Budget: $50 million

Cinematography: Rob Hardy

Produced by: Andrew Macdonald; Allon Reich; Gregory Goodman

When Grace from beyond the trailer dropped an early review stating how bad this film was. I knew something controversial was upon us leading up to release. Once others started to review this film and praising it the other way I had tampered my expectations but never actually looked at the reviews other than their scores.

Apparently the add campaign was an issue giving misleading message on this film? I understood going in that we were following these journalist within a Civil War setting as they complete their objective story.

Apparently others thought we were going to see a War Film filmed around the Civil War. Not sure how the Press part was missed from that but anyway that’s the story being told.

I’ve absolutely loved Kirsten Dunst since Spiderman days and even further back to the days of Jumanji in 1995. I haven’t seen her since Melancholia unless I just forgot movies since 2011? Which is interesting as 2012 was when I moved to America from England. Looking up her Bio I see 2016 Hidden Figures however totally don’t remember her in that movie sadly.

This movie had very impactful moments which will grasp you in intense ways of fear and awe. From the chilling sounds of gun fire or the breath taking silence as you’re left waiting in knowingly what’s to come fear of an uncontrollable action.

All the actors played their roles well most of the movie. For two thirds of this movie I was with our characters on their journey from NYC to DC in attempts to interview the president on answers for how he’s dealing with this Civil War. A War mind you that has California & Texas on the same side :O what happened! I have no idea as this movie placed the viewer within the midst of the battle without any lead up or information outside what we’re seeing with our Press characters.

Maybe that’s where the dip in ratings for this movie comes from. The lack of context for the war or information on everything surrounding it. It was a great ride worth watching at least once. Sadly that final act went from a 7 to an 8 and back down to a 7 real quick as those epic action moments and final revelations of the strings being pulled quickly snapped and all came loose with odd direction and sadly unbelievable character decisions which came out of no where. Maybe another scene for them to develop those decisions but sadly wasn’t it for me.

I had a great time though and believe Civil War was a solid movie being scored personally as a 7/10. It offered something different of a War film but left me wanting a stronger conclusion on what was an intense enticing journey.

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Monkey Man “Review”

Release date: April 5, 2024 (USA)

Director: Dev Patel

Budget: 10 million USD

Producers: Dev Patel, Jordan Peele, Samarth Sahni, Erica Lee, MORE

Distributed by: Universal Pictures

Music by: Jed Kurzel

Monkey Man was a rollercoaster on where to rate this feature. I had a personal journey ranging between a 7 and an 8 /10.

Monkey Man is an intriguing entry into the revenge-thriller genre that manages to differentiate itself enough to stand on its own. Many individuals prior to my performance compared this to the John Wick series. This film, while steeped in the same visceral action and relentless pursuit of justice, deviates by weaving a more spiritual tapestry around its narrative core.

I found Monkey Man had strength in it’s ability to oscillate between its action packed sequences and the more serene moments of philosophical contemplation.

Unlike John Wick’s more personal vendetta, the protagonist is driven by a broader mission to avenge not just his own losses but the sufferings of others who have been wronged by the same villains.

Hearing after my viewing that no one wanted to pick this title up I was rather happy and thankful that Jordan Peele came to Dev Patel’s aid in producing this feature.

It may bounce between a 7 and an 8 in various aspects. I felt a 7.5 feels right for a movie that offers a satisfying blend of action and a deeper spiritual quest. A journey well worth taking those seeking more than just bullets and bloodshed.

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Sting (2024) “Review”

I was rather lucky to have seen this movie ahead of it’s release. My local theatre started to run mystery movies and this was the first in their mystery horror line up.

Going in I thought the movie was The Last Omen until I saw the trailer play prior. Once this title begun I was rather excited to finally see a new movie that I had not seen a single trailer for prior. In fact I’ve seen very little being mentioned of this title leading up to it’s release on April 12th.

I absolutely loved the setup of this feature introducing us to the situation and then going back 4 days prior to how these events unfold.

Now I’d like to keep this spoiler free but there’s a giant spider in front of our faces so let’s address that first. Despite Charlotte’s grand mother calling the exterminator to deal with noises going on within her walls. Charlotte is introduced as a meteor crashes though the attic window and reveals to her in a form of a spider (Alien Spider? o.O) lets name it “Sting”.

Charlotte is a rebellious 12 year old girl who takes quite a liking and fascination of this spider and uses the pipes to descend down from this apartment building of flats to her living quarters with her mother, brother and mothers boyfriend. The cinematography was remarkable and I can see this movie either being a niche film with strong followers or a solid good film for the masses.

As the poster suggests, this fear just gets bigger and I’ll allow you to dive into this 1 Hour 30 Minute feature to see just how deep this tale goes and if you’re strong enough to prevail against the webbing and do battle with moth balls.

On the descent down to Charlotte’s room I loved the use to get glimpses into all our supporting characters and taking perfect snap shots of their daily lives to grow and connect with throughout. I was pleasantly surprised by this feature and happily give it 7.5. Let’s not bash Imaginary once more but considering this was an R rating film you can see what having that safety net what can be done with your big bad.

Look forward to this title coming April 12th hopefully to a theatre near you. This was a first getting to review a title early and hope I intrigued and left mystery for you to enjoy what horror’s to come.

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