The Tomorrow War (movie review)

 The Tomorrow War

Cast: Chris Pratt, Yvonne Strahovski, JK Simmons, Betty Gilpin

            Taking place in the near future, this action flick stars Pratt as a former Marine who gets 

   passed over for a job he wanted. He realizes he has no purpose in life until people from the 

   future show up on TV & ask citizens to come fight with them against an army of aliens that 

   has been killing people. He willingly joins and heads to the future. He ends up meeting a

   grown up version of his daughter (Strahovski), who works as a scientist trying to figure out

   how to kill the aliens with a virus.

           I really enjoyed this movie alot that has heart. The casting is excellent and features 

  a prominent male action hero something that is lacking in today's progressively woke 

  Hollywood . The special effects are top notch considering the nearly $200 million

  price tag Amazon had to pay for the rights. The father/daughter dynamic will hit you right

  in the feels. 

       Grade B+

              

Kong: Skull Island

Kong: Skull Island 
Dir: Jordan Vogt-Roberts

Cast: John Goodman, Brie Larson, Tom Hiddleston, Samuel L Jackson,

John C. Reilly. Toby Kebbel

       The summer blockbuster season gets off to an early start in this feature from 
  WB and Legendary Pictures. It also pays homage to classic monster movies of
  the 1950's & 60's.

       It's the early 70's and during the Vietnam War, a group of scientists studying 
MUTOs  (Massively Unidentified Terrestrial Organism) send some researchers 
to a remote island hidden deep in the South Pacific. There, they come across 
a gigantic ape the size of a building that inhabits the island.

       Leading the expedition is Gov. agent Bill Randa (John Goodman).To help him 
are a Ber Grylls type adventurer James Conrad (Hiddleston), a cute photographer
girl, Mason (Larson) and strict colonel Preston Packard (L. Jackson).

      When the army begins to drop napalms, Kong is awakened and starts attacking
 the military copter. Col Packard makes it his personal mission to hunt down and 
 kill Kong after witnessing this. The survivors band together and try to get off 
 island when they meet a wacky Navy pilot (Reilly) whose been stranded there
 for almost 30 years. His quips during the film make for a good comic relief.

     The cinematography is amazing and the panoramic shots are incredible along with 

some great closeups. The CGI used during the monster battles looks fantastic. While

it plays out like an average monster film, the story is nothing to write home about. 

The film focuses more on King Kong fighting the monsters that inhabit his island 
than the characters who aren't fleshed out as one hoped. They're just fodder to move 
the story along.

    All in all, it's a fun popcorn movie that doesn't take itself seriously. You can turn
off your brain for awhile and enjoy it for it is. While it may not win any major awards.
it's serviceable in it's own right in the WB/ Kaiju universe. 

  Grade: B+ (7/10)

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Director: Gareth Edwards

    Cast: Felicity Jones, Diego Luna, Donnie Yen, Forest Whittaker, Mads Mikkelsen,

 Alan Tudyk (voice)

       When Disney bought out the Star Wars franchise in 2012, it set out to not only 

  make more movies but spinoffs as well. Rogue One is set just before A New Hope.

       Felicity Jones plays Jyn-Erso, a young woman who learns her father worked 

 for the Imperials and helped building a moon sized weapon called the Death Star.

 She and a few handpicked soldiers from the Rebel Alliance guide the effort to 

 destroy what her father had created. A reprogrammed droid, K2-S0 (Tudyk) joins

 them and provides comic relief during the intense battle scenes.

        

      While the movie is quite long, clocking in around 2h/15m, it doesn't shy away 

 from the grittiness that is war. While I enjoyed most of the movie, I couldn't help

 but think that this was nothing more than a big budget fan film. Director Gareth

 Edwards took the beloved Star Wars franchise and made it completely dark. 

  

       Despite the PG 13 rating, this movie is definitely not for small children who

 are easily scared. Not that it's gory but is just grim and serious in tone. It's not 

 a story worth telling. 

Grade: C (6/10)