“It’s a Bug’s life’, the weekly post when I tell you what films we’ve watched both on our film Sundays and other parts of the week (I will talk about TV shows elsewhere). Please if you haven’t read the introduction page to this series go take a look that’s where you’ll learn the history of our sorely missed Bug.”
There are no spoilers for the films listed
We’ve had a busy week but managed to watch a few films and even some premiere’s (for us). We started the week by watching Con Air (1997), I’d not seen this film for a very long time. It’s basically Nicholas Cage doing what Nicholas Cage does with some John Cusack and John Malkovich chewing a bit of scenery. It’s an enjoyable if a bit of a forgettable action film.
We didn’t watch anything then until Friday when it was our first premiere of the week, Fast and Furious: Hobbs and Shaw (2019). We are big fans of the F&F franchise, yes they’ve got more outlandish as they have gone along but they are fun. The introduction of Dwayne Johnson and then Jason Statham has really added to them in my opinion which made us excited for this film. I’m sad to say we were both disappointed, yes Jason Statham and Dwayne Johnson bounce off each other well. The problem was the script, a dangerous virus trope that has been overused, add to that some dodgy CGI and strange editing made the film confused and a wasted opportunity.
I know physics of how things move can be very flexible in these films but it became so ridiculous it was difficult to suspend belief. The editing felt like it had been put together by committee and that they just wanted certain scenes without considering how that worked for the narrative. It’s not a terrible film and I will probably watch it again at some point but it just felt a little lazy, which is a thing I cannot say about any other Fast and Furious film.
On Sunday we only managed 2 films, the first was Christmas with the Coopers (2015) strangely called Love the Coopers in many other places, it’s like they were trying to hide the fact it’s a Christmas film. A Great Cast including John Goodman, Diane Keaton, Alan Arkin and Steve Martin as a Dog. It’s nothing particularly original or ground breaking but it is a well put together Christmas family Comedy/Drama. I may have to use the Q word now, O.K. It’s quirky but in a good way and it was an interesting idea to have the dog as the narrator.
Our final film of the week was another Premiere, Brightburn (2019) after the let down of Hobbs and Shaw I was hoping this would offer some redemption. The concept is basically what would happen if Superman came to earth (as in his origin story) but was in fact was evil instead. It sets a suitably creepy atmosphere and is well written and acted. We both really enjoyed this and as an alternate take on the super hero genre was a hit in our books.
So we’ll see what next week holds, I’m guessing a few more Christmas films could be on the cards 🙂 and I also picked up an amazing find in the charity shops…the brand new Men in Black film for 25p!!!! So of course we’ll be wanting to watch that one as we have enjoyed the previous Men in Black films so it will be interesting to see what the International one is like.
