As the spring semester went on, I found myself missing almost every major release in theaters because schoolwork kept piling up. If you are like me and haven’t been to the movie theater or rented a movie from home in ages, I watched most of the big films from this spring to see which are worth actually watching.
The films featured here will be “The Drama,” “The Devil Wears Prada 2,” “Project Hail Mary,” “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie,” “Roommates,” “Ready or Not 2,” “War Machine,” “Mortal Kombat II,” and “Michael.” Each of these will be placed in a category: the good, the mediocre or the ugly.
The Good
“The Drama,” starring Robert Pattinson and Zendaya, is one of the hardest that I have laughed at a movie all year. The blend of drama and comedy is perfect, and both performances are among the best of the year. With what the movie is about, it would be easy to make something incredibly edgy and completely miss the mark, but Kristoffer Borgli’s script and direction are near perfect.
“The Devil Wears Prada 2” was something that I was quite surprised by. The first film is a cult classic, and announcing a sequel to those rarely works out; it did here. Anne Hathaway and the rest of the cast, in particular Stanley Tucci, are very funny, with the latter having quite a few successful emotional moments. This is one of the few legacy sequels that actually justifies its existence rather than feeling like a blatant cash-in.
“Project Hail Mary” was one of the only films I made my way to the theater to see during the spring, and a review was already written about it, but I just wanted to mention it again here. One of the best movies of the year, so full of fun and hope that you can’t help but be won over by the end of it. The movie also looks spectacular visually and feels like a classic old-school Hollywood blockbuster in the best way.
The Mediocre
“The Super Mario Galaxy Movie” was a perfectly fun time at the movies. It is mostly just nostalgia baiting anyone who has seen or played a Mario game, but it was fun, which is more than I can say for most movies that were released this spring. The voice acting is still weird and not very good, but the animation is pretty to look at. The biggest downfall of this film is that it relies heavily on you turning your brain off to watch it. The movie lacks satisfying character arcs and a compelling narrative.
“Roommates” is a Netflix comedy, so your mileage may vary on how much you enjoy it. While filled to the brim with cliche plot points and not all of the jokes land, I thought it was fine until the third act goes a bit off the rails. Sadie Sandler and Chloe East are both quite funny, however, and I thought they had some great chemistry together that kept the movie afloat.
“Ready or Not 2: Here I Come” does very little to stand out among all the other horror films that have come out. The first film is a classic in the genre, but this one just feels incredibly formulaic. The first act of the film also takes quite a while to get going, but once the game starts, it becomes a little fun to watch. Samara Weaving in a horror movie is always enjoyable, but she is starting to get so typecast in the role that it doesn’t work as well as it did in the first. Not an awful movie, but rather boring and filled with cliches.
The Ugly
“Mortal Kombat II” looks nearly unfinished at times, especially with the computer-generated imagery. Not only is the CGI unfinished, but the film’s script may be just as bad. The introduction of game favorite Johnny Cage did little to improve this movie. I found Karl Urban’s performance very boring and not really funny. The fights are sometimes cool, at least the opening ones, before they devolve into everything looking like bad effects. You don’t go into any “Mortal Kombat” thing expecting a good story, but the story here is really bad as well.
“War Machine” is another Netflix original movie, this time an action film. The film looks and feels like it’s straight out of a bad “Call of Duty” campaign. Everything from the squad dynamics to the way that the CGI looks is all just bad. There isn’t anything to even recommend with this. It is incredibly boring with no fun action and flat, bland characters. Even when the aliens are revealed, the film could barely hold my attention.
“Michael” is a movie more concerned with selling Michael Jackson’s product than telling you anything about Michael Jackson the person. This movie is the amalgamation of all bad biography movies thrown into a big pot and mixed. The entire film barely fills you in on how Michael actually came up with the music or really anything about his life outside of his abusive father. The musical numbers work because of how good the music is, but they are filmed so boringly that they don’t leave a real lasting impression.
