I was really looking forward to this movie based upon the fun I had with Deadpool 1. But I was disappointed to the extent that I found myself yawning at least a couple of times and laughing very little. My negative reaction goes very much against the grain in that it got high critics’ reviews ( 84% on Rotten Tomatoes) and mosyly praise from theater goers. My review is heavily based upon a review by  Alex Doenau of Trespass Magazine which I found expressed my sentiments almost exactly and to whom I give credit.

 DEADPOOL   2.7***

       You think you’re doing something different, and you make 15 times your budget back. Success! So you bring back your star, give him a writing credit and you think you’re getting more of the same, for only a little bit more money. That’s the theory behind Deadpool 2. Little did they know that they were essentially getting another X-Men movie, but with swearing and gore.  

Immortal mutant Wade “Deadpool” Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) takes a break from killing bad guys internationally so that he can protect an angry young pyrotechnical mutant Russell  from the wrath of time-traveling assassin Cable (Josh Brolin, Avengers).

The whole thing about Deadpool is that he’s supposed to be irreverent and rude. Deadpool 2 sees him plunged into a deep depression almost from the very start, and the way the writers, including  Reynolds, have fashioned the character means that he doesn’t really have the capacity for drama. Deadpool is designed to be annoying to his enemies, but he becomes irritating to the audience as well.   Fourth wall-breaking (speaking directly to the camera/audience) for the sake of it helps no one, and it does not cloak the fact that this movie is  about helping a misfit mutant to feel like he belongs in a world that has been cruel and tortuous to him; in other words, the themes that have defined 18 years of X-Men films. 

 Deadpool 2 is strangely charmless, as if they thought they’d worked hard enough in the first, so that henceforth they only needed to be cruel, trot out some of the same jokes and struggle for relevance. While it is true there’s more than one way to be funny, Deadpool 2 is not particularly so. The worst crime, however, is the inability of Deadpool 2 to strike a tone, or balance pathos with comedy. It is a movie that cancels itself out..

    Deadpool 2 is everything that it is supposed to rail against: a generic comic book movie that is only a step above the lesser entries in the Marvel/Fox continuum. The best scenes come after many will have already left the cinema — not having been trained to stay for the credits  and these credits make you wonder why the rest of the movie wasn’t much better. Deadpool 2 is vulgar enough to entertain less-demanding audiences, but the discerning viewer knows from experience that you can incorporate these elements into an overall stronger film. Perhaps  Deadpool 2 is merely the difficult second album; but to me whatever good will Reynolds had built up in Deadpool 1 is quickly squandered here.

AVENGERS  INFINITY WAR  3.0 ***

      This year the Marvel Cinematic Universe ( MCU) turns 10 years old, and Infinity War (the 19th film in the MCU series) represents the culmination of  a carefully constructed story that started with Iron Man. With the exception of a few characters, the gang is all here (about 35), and an effort is made to give everyone a  role or at least a moment. It's not an easy task, but Infinity War (with it's 2 1/2 hour runtime) does manage its cinematic roll call reasonably well. At times the massive cast comes at a cost, as characters fall out of the story for large stretches of time, but the film itself never stops to catch its breath. 

A BIG mean, ugly purple dude named Thanos scours the universe for the precious crystals to fit into his snazzy metal gauntlet, intent on using the massive power of the stones for his own horrible scheme. If he can get all the crystals he will have the power to and will eliminate half (1/2) of the population of the Universe which he believes is the only way to save the Universe. It is up to the assembled team of brave superheroes (most all of Marvel’s Avenger characters and the Guardians of the Universe team) to try and stop him.

For the best part of two hours I was reasonably entertained by what unfolded, despite not knowing the backstory to several of the characters. The plot was pretty easy to pick up, the action scenes were visually impressive, and there was never a lull in pace. It is a “super” slick, big-budget popcorn fodder designed to appeal to the masses, but which hardly qualified as revolutionary or indeed, all that memorable. Eventually, I could feel tedium creeping in from the repetitious massive battles. And then the last act was a BIG downer…a shocker in a bad way to me.

 If the MCU movies have had a consistent criticism it’s the villains, but that's not an issue here. Thanos is not only impressively rendered physically, but he's got a depth and a mission that go beyond your standard baddie. Our heroes are the same characters we've grown to love, and it was nice to see a few of them known more for their humor get some dramatic depth.  

There's a lot to like about Infinity War, but for me the whole was less than the sum of its parts.

THE THREE FACES OF EVE  (1957)  3.5***

        For dramatic effect many Hollywood movies about mental illness  have the psychiatrist coming up with a miracle cure of the patient. In reality cure is often difficult to achieve,  but it does make for good cinema. To give credit where it is due, The Three Faces of Eve is about a real case of multiple personality disorder and the cure takes a matter of years .

In only her third feature film Joanne Woodward (virtually an unknown at the time) won Oscar’s Best Actress award for the 1957movie, ironically beating out Elizabeth Taylor who played a woman descending into madness in Raintree County instead of being cured. I read somewhere that the Southern born Ms. Woodward remarked ironically that it took years of training for her to lose her southern accent and then she had to find it all over again for her role in The Three Faces of Eve to win the Oscar. Obviously the Academy voters were quite impressed with how she was able  to so easily change into three very different characters . She's a drab boring homemaker Eve White, a sexpot who hates her husband and loves to dance at local dive bars as Eve Black, and as Jane who's a balanced level-headed woman. The question becomes which one will ultimately dominate.

As good as Woodward is ( and she’s outstanding), my favorite scene in the movie is when the psychiatrist played by Lee J. Cobb tries to explain to Woodward's working class husband about multiple personality disorder. The “he doesn’t understand a thing I’m saying”  look on Cobb's face and the blank uncomprehending expression on the husband's face say more than ten pages of dialog.  

The movie is somewhat dated but is still an excellent early docudrama about a rare form of mental illness. 

NOTE: According to information on the DVD : "When the real Eve signed the contract for the movie, the studio had her sign three separate contracts under each of her personalities, so that they would be covered from any possible legal action. In fact, when she signed the contract, they actually had her go into the personalities, and the signatures were all different on the contracts."

I FEEL PRETTY  3.0***

   In the reviews for this movie some people were offended by the way Schumer’s character, Renee, is supposed to be perceived. That is as an insecure young woman because she isn’t skinny enough, pretty enough, etc. But the movie tells a different story. Yes, in the beginning, Renee is very insecure about her appearance. Her eyes well up with tears when she removes her cute outfit and reveals the uncomfortable pair of Spanx hidden underneath or when she run errands in a sweatshirt and yoga pants  and is mistaken by a customer as a store employee.  She makes a Big-style in a thunderstorm wish and hopes to magically transform herself into someone with supermodel looks.  

Renee is a regular New Yorker with a dull desk job doing online work for Lily LeClaire, a high-fashion cosmetic firm run by  the gorgeous Avery LeClaire ( played marvelously by Michelle Williams as an entitled but smart woman with a high squeaky voice). Renee joins a fitness club where she’s fat-shamed by an employee and tries to sweat her way to the smile and shape of her dreams. But in the process, she falls off the bike and takes a hard knock to the head and when she comes to, the face and figure she sees in the mirror are the ones she’s been dreaming of, although only she can actually see herself that way.. Everybody else just sees Renee as she’s always been.

Convinced that she’s now a goddess, Renee proceeds to dazzle people — although they’re  impressed by her amazing self-confidence, not her looks. Over time Renee starts to have it all. She gets the dream job working at  the LeClaire Headquarters, winds up with a boyfriend who adores her and even wins the respect of her sleek and stylish co-workers. Renee’s positive self-image is infectious and draws others into her orbit. They are dazzled by her sincerity and conviction. Unfortunately, her success goes to her head and jeopardizes her friendship with her two girl friends who have always loved her just the way she is.  

When she hits her head again, the effects of the first injury are reversed. Once again, she is plagued by self-doubt. But the feelings of everyone who has come to love and respect both versions of Renee have not changed. To the outside world, she’s still amazing. Sadly, she is once again crippled by her insecurity and she is the only one who can change that. This notion of self-acceptance is the hard lesson that Schumer’s character, Renee, must learn . How it ends, you have to see for yourself,

This film shows how most  women feel insecure about their looks to some extent, even the gorgeous ones who are perceived to be perfect. At the end of the day, what truly matters is how you feel about yourself. Nobody can make you really, deeply, honestly feel pretty except for you.

Schumer shines in I Feel Pretty by completely and fearlessly buying into the premise, and delivering  funny lines that slice into the shallowness of valuing beauty over brains and celebrities over common folk.

 I Feel Pretty finds a whimsical, funny, relatable, and entertaining way to convey that message. It isn’t easy, but it  feels a whole lot better to embrace your imperfections and love your unique self.

Rated PG-13 for sexual content, some partial nudity, and language | 

BEFORE I FALL  2.8***

          A great look at today's teen youth, which at first is mainly about the negatives. It quickly moves into something more serious as it tackles the question of what would you do if you thought you only had one day to live and that day keeps repeating? In a way this is similar to the classic Groundhog Day, but has more drama and very little comedy. Ultimately this is a film teens and over should see if you're serious about discovering what's really important in life.  

It’s a mystery-drama based on the popular 2010 Young Adult novel, of the same name, by Lauren Oliver. It tells the story of a high school senior who discovers she's reliving the last day of her life, over and over again, apparently until she can figure out what she needs to do to make things right. The film stars Zoey Deutch with, believe or not, Jennifer Beals, playing the mother. The film has received mostly positive reviews, from critics and fans alike.
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Samantha Kingston (Deutch) is a popular high school senior, who’s planning to lose her virginity on the night of Cupid's Day.  She goes with her  “mean friends” (and she is too) to a wild party that night,  skips the sex ( the guy gets too drunk) and then dies in a car accident  with her other popular friends. The next day she wakes up to find out she's reliving the same exact day, and then the next several days she keeps waking up to find out the same exact thing. Samantha slowly realizes that she needs to set things right, in her life and with those of her friends in that repeating day in order to hopefully change things finally.

The movie is surprisingly insightful in dealing with high school life and the dynamics of being popular verses being an  outcast or the object of bullying. It's something the  flawed main character has to learn, and then  better herself by learning, in order to finally set things right. This movie  has a  moving, message about how we  treat others (and how we should treat them).    

Rated PG-13 for mature audiences for content involving drinking, sexuality, bullying, some violent images, and some  language all involving teens. 

CHAPAQUICDDICK  2.5***

      

 “Chappaquiddick is based on the real life incident in July 1969 involving the death of Mary Jo Kopechne and the events following. Basically, Mary Jo (a former secretary for Robert Kennedy), died when Senator Ted Kennedy crashed the car he was driving into a small wooden bridge late at night and the car flipped into the water. He escaped although you never find out how. She dies, and the  tragedy was greatly compounded due to what happened next---Kennedy quickly left the scene and failed to report the incident until the next day…more than 8 hours after the event.  It's unclear whether Kennedy actually made attempts to save Kopechne himself (he maintained that he did) but he did go get his friends, Joe Gargan and Paul Markham, fairly soon after who did dive into the water but were unsuccessful in extracting the Mary Jo.

If Kennedy had an excuse for not contacting the police immediately ,certainly his behavior the next day was disgraceful. The movie shows how Kennedy's efforts to cover up the incident were quite involved, from his initial plan to tell the authorities that Kopechne was driving, that a doctor prescribed sedatives for him for a non-existent concussion and then his wearing a neck brace at the Kopechne funeral, attempting to play the part of the victim.

Even more fascinating is the gathering of a Kennedy "inner circle". The power players included Robert McNamara and Ted Sorensen and it shows them trying to manage/manipulate the authorities and the press coverage.

The film can best be classified as a docudrama and  sticks to the chronology of events that occurred.  The problem with this approach is that the narrative  becomes a dry rehash of the events that transpired. The movie does put its own spin on things and ends up drawing a complex but negative portrait of Ted Kennedy (played  convincingly by Jason Clarke, a dead ringer for the Senator). 

I CAN ONLY IMAGINE   3.2***

        First recorded in 1999, MercyMe’s “I Can Only Imagine” is the best-selling, most-played contemporary Christian song since the invention of the radio. Written by a Texan named Bart Millard who fell into singing and songwriting after a high school injury ended his football dreams. Millard’s life story, culminating in the composition of the song, is the subject of this polished, faith-based drama named after it, a movie that caters to Christians and other people who enjoy wholesome stories about redemption.

I Can Only Imagine is based on the life story of Bart Millard. After living a traumatic childhood caused by an abusive father , young Bart finally reaches the last straw and storms out of his Texas home, leaving everything behind to distance himself from his toxic dad and to chase his dream of a musical career. Bart's story of how the band started and what led him to write the chart-topping single, I Can Only Imagine, is an inspiring journey of redemption, hope, and forgiveness. Unlike most Christian films this is not preachy and the acting is good.   

The actor in the starring role, J. Michael Finley, is spot on believable  & since he's a Broadway actor/singer he can sing quite well. Dennis Quaid, as the abusive father, and Trace Adkins, as the manager of the band, add to an excellent cast. . It's a down-home type of movie that doesn't depend on special effects but on good story-telling. The richness of the color photography is pleasant in this day of hyper-CGI stuff   

This movie will touch your heart, move you to tears and have you singing out loud. Take your family to see this movie, it's a good one. My wife saw it with me and thoroughly enjoyed it.