Tag Archives: 2019

May 5 2021

Silo (2019) Movie Review

Director: Marshall Burnette

Writer: Jason Williamson (Screenplay)

Starring: Jeremy Holm, Jill Paice, Jack DiFalco, Jim Parrack, Chris Ellis, James DeForest Parker

Plot: Disaster strikes in a small American farm town when teenager Cody Rose becomes the victim of a grain entrapment accident. As corn becomes quicksand inside of a 50-foot tall silo, the town locals must put aside their differences to save Cody from drowning in the crop they harvest. 

Runtime: 1 Hour 16 Minutes

There may be spoilers in the rest of the review

Story: Silo starts as teenager Cody (DiFalco) still recovering from his father’s death has become distant from his mother Valerie (Paice) working on a small grain farm to make money for his ambition to be part of a band.

On the farm dementia-stricken Mr Adler (Ellis) is being cared for by his son Junior (Parrack) believes he is on a normal working day, setting off a chain of events which will see Cody being trapped in the quicksand like grain silo, which will bring the whole town together in a desperate attempt to rescue him.

Thoughts on Silo

Characters & Performances – Cody is the teenager that finds himself trapped in the silo, he is trying to become a heavy metal singer, with his own dreams of being part of a band, he has suffered loss before with his father’s death and has found himself becoming distant to his mother. He might well be the one that becomes trapped, with his position being the thing that will bring more people together. Jack DiFalco is mostly trapped in this role, he does show the panic he is going through, even if he needs his character to remain calm. Valerie is the nurse mother of Cody who has been trying to keep themselves close, but has been in a constant battle and must watch over helplessly as the town tries to save her son. Junior is running the farm while caring for his father who once ran the farm and will continue to try to help around. He is left with guilt after what happens as the added stress on his life is going to continue to get worse. Frank is the former best friend of Cody’s father that is the local that will need to help rescue him, despite Valerie blaming him for her husband’s death. Each character does give us the great creation of the local community that would band together. Every performance is strong throughout the film.

Story – The story here follows a small farming town that must come together to help rescue a teenager that becomes trapped in a grain silo, in what is a race against time before he drowns in the grain. This is a story that is a mix of awareness of troubles that silos can and have caused throughout the years, it does also show us how a town will come together to save one of their own, no matter what the differences might have been in the past. We have a part of the story, which will show how dementia will be left to family to support, which can cause big problems too, as they can’t give the person all the time they need. Putting everything together, we get a very interesting thriller that will keep us wondering as to what will happen to the helpless victim.

Themes – Silo is a thriller that will keep us in the farm location, as the silo become the centre of the story, showing the dangers within the silo and what could happen to someone trapped in one. The location also helps bring the community feeling to the film, that will show us just how important supporting each other will become. (

 

Silo is a thriller that shows the importance of community.

May 4 2021

End of Sentence (2019) Movie Review

End of Sentence – Lovely Journey

Director: Elfar Adalsteins

Writer: Michael Armbruster (Screenplay)

Starring: John Hawkes, Logan Lerman, Sarah Bolger, Andrea Irvine, Olafur Darri Olafsson, Denis Conway

Plot: After being widowed, Frank Fogle reluctantly embarks on a journey to honor his wife’s last wish of spreading her ashes in a remote lake in her native Ireland and a promise of taking his estranged son, Sean, along for the trip. As Sean steps out of prison the last thing on his mind is a foreign road trip with his alienated father. What he needs is a fresh start in California. But when his travel plans collapse he reluctantly accepts his father’s proposal in return for a ticket to the West Coast and a promise that they never have to see each other again. Between a disconcerting Irish wake, the surfacing of an old flame, the pick up of a pretty hitchhiker and plenty of unresolved issues, the journey becomes a little more than father and son had bargained for.

Runtime: 1 Hour 36 Minutes

There may be spoilers in the rest of the review

Story: End of Sentence starts as Frank Fogle (Hawkes) wife passes away, with his son Sean (Lerman) getting released after her death, which will see Frank try his hardest to rebuild the relationship between the pair, as he looks to take Sean to Ireland to bury his wife and Sean’s mother’s ashes.

With the two constantly at each other’s throats, a family get together that reveals a secret from her earlier life and a mysterious woman Jewel (Bolger) turns the journey into an adventure, which will see the pair reconnect like they never imagined.

Thoughts on End of Sentence

Characters & Performances – Frank Fogle has always lived a straight-laced life, though his son ended up in prison and now his wife has passed away. He wants his son to clean up his act and he also wants to follow his wife’s wishes to have her ashes spread in Ireland, this will give him a chance to rebuild the broken relationship he has with his son and learn to show more fight in life. John Hawkes is wonderful in the lead role, giving us the character that needs to feel like a calm everyday person. Sean is the son of Frank that has been in prison, he gets the last visit from his mother before her death and once released he reluctantly agrees to go with his father to Ireland, he needs to learn to be more forgiving, but his newer tough side will help his father come out the box. Logan Lerman is great in his role, continuing to show himself breaking out of the teenage roles again. In the supporting characters we get to meet the different figures from Anna’s life in Ireland that Frank gets to meet for the first time, along with the mysterious woman that comes into the guy’s lives.

Story – The story here follows a father and son that look to honour their late wife and mother by putting aside their differences and travelling to Ireland. This is a journey about saying goodbye to a loved one, while learning to put aside the problems the pair have with each other, learning more about what has caused problems in life before. The story has a wonderful journey experience as the pair have to overcome different problems along the way, learning more about each other’s strengths too.

Themes – End of Sentence use the beautiful Irish countryside for the backdrop, which will be used to show the distance the guys must travel along the basic city locations in Ireland.

End of Sentence is on digital download 10 May from Blue Finch Film Releasing

 

End of Sentence is an enjoyable journey movie about saying goodbye and forgiving family.

May 1 2021

Chance (2019) Movie Review

Chance – Eye Opening

Director: Kenny Roy

Writer: Kenny Young (Screenplay)

Starring: (Voice Talents) Will Cannon, Peppur Chambers, Simone Baker, Eddie Goines

Plot: A peaceful pit bull struggles to maintain his values while surviving in the brutal world of dogfighting.

Runtime: 1 Hour 30 Minutes

There may be spoilers in the rest of the review

Story: Chance starts as we see Chance a pup in a pit bull litter, he is a dreamer still looking to learn from his mother before he gets bought and thrown into a pit bull fighting home. Here Chance befriends Sugar and Hannibal, where they learn to fight, looking to survive in this world.

The old Chance gets, the more determined he is to escape and live a life of freedom after seeing the horrors of the fighting pit and heading to haven, a place where dogs can live in peace.

Thoughts on Chance

Characters – Chance is the puppy taken and thrown into the world of dog fighting, he just wants to return to his life away from this world, one where he doesn’t want to fight and even in the ring, he finds a way to not kill. He spends his life searching for freedom to save other dogs, despite seeing the hopelessness the other dogs show in this world. Chance shows us just how innocent the dogs thrown into this world are before they are drained into become the dangerous fighters humans make them. Hannibal and Sugar are the two friends he makes in the pit, they both see his vision and want to support him, but know they must prepare for what could come next. Thor is the dog that teaches Chance how to fight in a deadlier manner, one where he won’t expose his weakness for the other dogs.

Story – The story here follows a pit bull puppy that is taken from his mother and forced into dog fighter, despite trying to hold onto his dreams of being free from this world. This is not an easy watch for anyone, but it is an important watch, it shows us the brutal reality these dogs will face if they are thrown into the dog fighting world, forced to fight to the death, not given a chance to live their normal life an animal should. This does show the barbaric behaviour humans do towards dogs, giving them little chance of a life, they should have where they can be loved. We do get the clear message here that this film is here to try and help make a change, to stop these horrendous actions happening.

Themes – Chance is an animated movie that might not have the standards of animation we would be expecting from the major studios, but it does get over the horrific side to everything that these dogs are being put through, the cuts, wounds and damage show the scars these animals must live through without proper treatment. With the locations being shown as fortress like yards or the fighting pits. Each one will give the dogs little hope of a bright future.

Coming to streaming & cable platforms May 4 and DVD June 8

Chance is a hard hitting highlight to the horrendous actions people do to dogs.

Apr 27 2021

ABC Film Challenge – Action – # – 10 Minutes Gone (2019) Movie Review

Director: Brian A Miller

Writer: Kelvin Mao, Jeff Jingle (Screenplay)

Starring: Bruce Willis, Michael Chiklis, Meadow Williams, Kyle Schmid, Texas Battle, Lydia Hull

Plot: A crime thriller that centers on a man whose memory has been lost due to a bank heist gone wrong. The character will need to piece together the missing 10 minutes from his memory in order to determine who sabotaged him.


Tagline – Keep your enemies close.

Runtime: 1 Hour 29 Minutes

There may be spoilers in the rest of the review

Verdict: Badly Shot Cliché

Story: 10 Minutes Gone starts when Frank (Chiklis) puts together a team to rob a bank for Rex (Willis) to get a bigger deal done, while the deal doesn’t go as planned, Frank finds himself knocked out and his brother dead, needing to track down the case.

Frank must go on the run as he searches for the missing case, while having Rex’s employers start hunting him down, before he gets eliminated by more power people that want the case.

Thoughts on 10 Minutes Gone

Characters – Rex has been hired to arrange a team to complete a heist, he is the middle man and once things go wrong he needs to send his fixer to clean up the mess, not knowing who he can trust to bring him the case. Frank is the man that is hired, he brings in his brother to run point, uses the normal team and is considered one of the most professional men in the business. He must search the city for his crew to find out who took the case from him and left everyone trying to kill him. We have the girlfriend Claire who must work with Frank, Ivory the fixer for Rex that is hunting Frank and Richard who has hired Rex knowing he should be the best in the business.

Performances – Whatever happened to Bruce Willis, that is the question we must ask because he portrays one of the blandest character you could have ever seen in this film, while Michael Chiklis does the best he can with his thief looking to clean up. The rest of the cast struggle to make an impact in any of the roles in the film.

Story – The story here follows the leader of a heist that has gone in searching for the rest of his team once the latest job goes wrong, trying to figure out who was behind the problems, while his own boss is searching for the package. This is a story that is meant to give us a few twists along the way, it shows how if you have too many people involved in a large robbery, you will never know who to trust. If we are being honest, this is a messily shot story that is all over the place, we have a whole sequence of someone watching the news about what had happened, even though we have just seen the events for the last hour. It wants to be so slick and ends up sliding downhill quickly.

Action/Mystery – The action in the film is slow, we have shootouts which go nowhere, with people missing badly all over the place, it isn’t even remotely close, with the mystery only being about who took the score.

Settings – The film uses Cincinnati city as the background to make use feel like we are in the big screen, while not giving us anything to make the locations feel fresh.


Scene of the Movie – Nope, nothing here.

That Moment That Annoyed Me – Camera work.

Final Thoughts – This is poor action film that is completely sluggish, poorly shot, poorly acted and instantly forgettable.

Overall: Instantly Forgettable.

Apr 25 2021

ABC Film Challenge – Action – Y – The Operative (2019) Movie Review

Director: Yuval Adler

Writer: Yuval Adler (Screenplay) Yiftach R Atir (Novel)

Starring: Diane Kruger, Martin Freeman, Cas Anvar, Rotem Keinan, Lana Ettinger

Plot: A woman is recruited by the Mossad to work undercover in Tehran.

Runtime: 1 Hour 56 Minutes

There may be spoilers in the rest of the review

Verdict: Stuck in First Gear

Story: The Operative starts when handler Thomas (Freeman) is called back into action when his operative Rachel (Kruger) contacts him, which sees her needing to go back undercover getting close to Farhad (Anvar) in Iran.

As Rachel complete her mission, we flashback to how she completed the mission, as Thomas is filling in the blanks that he was made aware of during the mission, showing how difficult to control.

Thoughts on The Operative

Final Thoughts – The Operative is a spy thriller that doesn’t get into the interesting side of the movie quick enough, with most of the film being circling around, you must talk to this person or that person, we never get into any situation which sees us believing Rachel is under any sort of peril, leaving us feel like nothing it happening. This isn’t against the performance of Kruger, because she does all she can with the poorly written character, Martin Freeman does feel like more of a footnote, with most of his character being someone looking back on events, when it seems like he could have a lot more to do. In the end this is one of the dullest spy thrillers you will see, never capturing any of the tension it seems to want to imply.

Overall: Dull.