Ready Player One Review: Steven Spielberg Almost Got Away with It, AKA the Movie Equivalent of a Bunch of Titties

This is a hard movie for me to accurately assess. I bet it’ll be that way for a lot of people. Mostly the fans. Not just fans of Ready Player One, the book. I mean fans of literally everything .

Let me be clear. I’ve never read Ready Player One, although I have almost bought it every single time I’ve been in an airport bookstore. I just could never bring myself to do it. I have no idea what stopped me. Maybe the premise felt too good to be true, despite good reviews and friend recommendations. It promised too much to execute, like when your grandma tells you that she bought you a bunch of new video games, but it just ends up being one of those 100-games-in-one games for PC that you can get for $5 at Staples. Or maybe the premise felt like it was barraging my senses the same way a strip club does. We know you like titties, so here they are. Here they are in such high abundance and so gratuitously that you must question whether you ever even liked titties. I’m sorry to say titties so much, but whether you’re a fan or hater of RPO, I think you can understand how this is the movie equivalent of a bunch of titties (that’s the last time I’ll say it. I promise.)

Now, I have yet to say whether I liked the movie or not .Let me make this clear:

I loved this movie.

I knew I’d love this movie once I saw this in the trailer:

That being said, I don’t care to defend this movie, because I can’t. If you asked me why I liked it, all I could really muster is a caveman-like response of, “I liked seeing the stuff.” The stuff being the Terminator 2 reference, the Gears of War gun, the Akira bike – you know, the titties (sorry). Plot-wise and relationship wise, this movie should have left me as baffled as Wrinkle in Time, though Wrinkle in Time is a lot more garbage of a film. No, I’m not just taking an opportunity to knock Wrinkle in Time for no reason. I think they are both worth discussing together as  male and female-centric hero stories respectively. This movie won’t land for everyone because of that. Not to say it’s a clear cut male/female issue, but at the risk of being hetero-normative, this is what you would call a “boy movie.” If you don’t like  “boy movies” and “boy stuff,” I think the flaws will be much more apparent and unforgivable to you. Let me again be clear, I’m using terms like “boy stuff” as shorthand, not to say that girls can’t or shouldn’t like this type of movie. Nor am I saying “boy stuff” to mean penis and balls, but I digress.

Regardless of the fanboy-ism of it all, no one can knock the expert pacing in this movie. I had zero time to question plot elements in the moment. As a screenwriter I’m constantly watching movies aware of time, what page in the script we’re at, and which story beat we’re on. There was simply no time to do that under this movie’s blistering pace.

I’m not going to tell you if you should see this movie or not. I don’t need to do that. You’ve most likely already made your decision weeks ago (on that token, I highly suggest you go see Thoroughbreds starring Anya Taylor-Joy and Olivia Cooke. Support great movies), but here two final points, one of which is the films most condemning moment.

It’s a Gundam!

Slight spoiler: As I stated before, I knew Gundam (RX-78 specifically) would be in the movie, but I never expected more than a cameo shot. That’s not the case here. What we get is a demo for a CGI Gundam movie. I’m talking about the fact that Gundam full on fights Mecha-Godzilla. Not just a punch or two. They have a battle. Now, it’s no Obi Won versus Anakin – it’s not 15 minutes – but its a big moment. I practically broke my girlfriend’s hand squeezing it from the excitement.

The only issue is that I don’t recall anyone screaming, “It’s a Gundam!” Shame. Shame.

Steven Spielberg Almost Got Away with It

It’s no doubt this is a male-fantasy story. That’s, in a nutshell, the big controversy over the book. Especially as women fight for better representation in film, these types of stories stick out as continuing the status quo. Now, I don’t have a problem with male-centric stories. I love them. The issue to me is that we need more female-centric stories so that we all get our jams. I could write a whole blog post on that alone, so forgive my very simplistic breakdown, especially on the RPO controvery. End of the day, let more female filmmakers into he fray and let’s see what we get, but please don’t stop making movies for 30-year-old boys like me.

Enter Steven Spielberg.

For the most part, this movie isn’t problematic in its handling of gender or its female characters UNTIL what I call the birthmark scene. If you’re someone who thinks all of this gender bologna is, well, bologna, don’t tune out just yet. The moment in question assaults everyone’s intelligence.

Let me set this scene up as quickly as possible. Parsival (Tye Sheridan AKA beat up Nick Jonas), our main character, meets Art3mis (Olivia Cooke) in the form of their avatars in the game. They have no idea what each other look like in the real life. As the movie progresses, they grow closer. Parsival’s friends bring up the fact that Art3mis could be anyone. She could be a fat, old guy. Parsival is understandably worried.

Then they finally meet and Art3mis is non other than Olivia Cooke. Jackpot, obvi. Right?

Well, no. Because Art3mis has a birthmark on her eye, so she thinks she’s hideous. A birthmark that, if anything, adds a unique sparkle to her already beautiful features. It’s essentially the same as putting glasses on the hot girl and calling her ugly. With one fell swoop of a birthmark, the character is weakened. The birthmark is irrelevant other than in that moment, so what does it do? Just makes Art3mis ugly, thus weaker? It’s a moment that, for me, is just plain stupid, but also brings up a lot of problematic qualities we see in female love interests. Worse of all, it could have easily been avoided.

A stronger decision would be to give Art3mis as much agency as Parsival. Wouldn’t she be just as worried that he could be a fat, old guy? I’d rather see them both have fun with the realization that they are both two attractive people. What luck! Or maybe she isn’t happy with how he looks. What a twist!

I assume the birthmark scene in the book, where it may play better since we can imagine the character as ugly without having to cast and look at an ugly person the entire time. After all, in Hunger Games Katniss is described as plain and unremarkable, not Jennifer Lawrence. We just don’t want to watch plain and unremarkable on the screen for 90 minutes so we put a slight birthmark on a an actress who is arguably one of the most stunning young women working today.

These problematic moments are worth thinking about, not just for societal implications, but for the story as well. Art3mis is a great characters outside of this one moment, so I don’t want to take away from the character as a whole, but I think pointing this out brings to light the bigger point outside of this film: Weak female characters make weak stories.


Forgive any typos, grammatical errors, or nonsensical things. Had to bang this one out quickly. Would love to hear your thoughts. Don’t be shy to comment or tweet at me.

Follow me on Twitter @joecabello
My podcast, The Joe Cabello Show comes out Wednesday on Itunes and Soundcloud.

 

Pacific Rim: Uprising – A Sequel Better than Its Predecessor that Could Not Work Without It

Note: I’l be talking a lot about the first Pacific Rim. I will clearly notate Pacific Rim 2 if talking about 2.

I’m a fanboy of a lot of the ingredients in the stew that is Pacific Rim – Mech, monsters, campy sci-fi action-adventure – but the first movie has always left a bad taste in my mouth (to keep the stew analogy). For a movie designed for my tastes, Pacific Rim is barely fun for me. The uninspired mech design and bad casting set it back for me (they had to cast only the boring white people?). Guillermo Del Toro can do monster design like nobody else, but his lack of imagination with the robots was apparent.

Bow down to the king, everyone. This is Gundam from Ready Player One, which in the half a second that its shown in the RPO trailer, it is already more exhilarating than anything Pacific Rim has given us.

I can’t say that I don’t leave it on whenever I scroll past it on TV (Hell, I was watching it before I watched Pacific Rim 2). Still, it’s a movie that, in some ways, I wish didn’t exist. I love movies with mech, monsters, and all the aforementioned, but it has to be good or else you just wasted one of our bullets. I think a lot about the diminishing appeal of failed properties, like I had talked about in my Tomb Raider movie review. How many Spider Man (or any other property) movies until we give up and stop showing up? And how many failures until the studios simply stop making them?  If you’re gong to give us a mech movie, make it count. I don’t feel Pacific Rim was what it needed to be to make it count. (note: on an artistic level. The movie obviously did well enough to warrant a sequel).

Pacific Rim 2 is a better movie in every way, and I’d even go as far as to say it’s a very good movie, but only because of its predecessor. Certainly that’s true of any sequel to a degree, and it’s not as if you can’t watch this without having seen the first, but what makes the meaningful moments of the film actually feel meaningful has less to do with what we’ve seen on screen, and more to do with knowing the history of the first film. The first movie never felt especially emotionally resonant, for example when Charlie Hunnam’s Raleigh Becket loses his father (brother?), we know this is, and should be, sad, but do we actually feel it? No. Pacific Rim 2 keys into emotion in a much more effective way, but I think a lot of that does come from the relationships from the first.I can’t say that’s a bad thing, or a knock on the movie, and I’d be interested to see the opinion of someone who had never seen the first.

I dipped my toe into calling it a “very good movie,” which I hesitate to completely dive into. There are issues, personal taste aside (I thought the mech design was even less inspired, but its’ amazing how much good story and acting counteracts that, though they are unrelated qualities). The movie is spread a little thin across its main characters. I actually think it could use an additional 20 or 30 minutes, but even in saying that, it doesn’t need it. That extra 20 minutes might add some welcome depth to some of the characters, but it’s not as if that would put the movie in the Oscar running. Ultimately, I think the genre/style of the movie allows for some rushed elements. We just want to see the fights with enough emotional backup to care about the outcome.

This one is an easy movie to decipher. If you liked the first one, you’re going to like this one. I don’t see how you couldn’t.

If you’ve never seen either movie, and this seems like your kind of thing, start with the first and move up from there.

If you’ve never seen either movie, and you’re in any way hesitant, I’d start with Pacific Rim 2 or I fear you may never give it a chance after seeing the first.

I also wanted to mention that this has been a great year for women in film. Cailee Spaeny who plays Amara Namani (awesome name) and Tian Jing who plays Liwen Shao will have little girls wanting to jump in a mech and pilot one themselves. So take your daughters, step daughters, cousins – whoever – to see this movie! I’m glad we’re slowly getting past strong female characters whose main obstacle is their womanhood. Both Spaeny and Jing play strong women whose judgement is never questioned (at least not for their gender). Stories that deal specifically with gender are important, but equally as important is seeing women in robust roles traditionally held for men without questioning it. I’m excited to see Cailee Spaeny’s next projects, as she was surprisingly great (only because I hadn’t heard of her prior to this).


I have a lot more thoughts about this movie, but honestly, no one’s paying me for this so 800 words sounds about good lol. Thanks for reading!

Follow me on Twitter @joecabello
My podcast, The Joe Cabello Show comes out Wednesday on Itunes and Soundcloud.

Ep. 2 Fabricated City – Korean Movie Review

Joe and Fred review Fabricated City starring Ji Chang-Wook, Sim Eun-Kyung, Ahn Jae-Hon, directed by Park Kwang-Hyun. Our special guest is LA comedian and writer, Lorraine DeGraffenreidt. You can see her sketch team perform at the UCB Sunset theater on March 8th. Follower her @lorrrrraine

Intro [o:oo-3:35]
Theater Experience [3:35-12:52]
Review[12:52-End]

Trailer: www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1DxUu6LMJU


or
Listen on Google Play Music

Play on itunes

Play on Stitcher

fabricated-city

Synopsis:
A gamer named Kwon yoo (Ji Chang wook) is unemployed, but in the virtual world he is a leader. Kwon yoo is then framed for murder. With the help of his gaming buddies they try to uncover the truth about this murder case.

Music by bensound.com
Donate to help keep the show going at www.patreon.com/joecabello . It does cost more money to do this podcast than a normal podcast, since we have to see these movies. Any bit helps and encourages us.

Also, feel free to email us your thoughts at KMR@joecabello.com

Korean-Movie-Review-Podcast

Hosts Joe Cabello (author Scrote One, The Farts Awakens) and Fred Le (Sherane Musical Comedy Show) review a new Korean film each week. They’ll be coming from the point of view of outsiders who don’t normally keep up to date on Korean cinema, nor will they know much about the movie before seeing it. What you’ll get is an earnest review.

As we record more episodes and watch more movies, I imagine our relationship to Korean cinema will change. So stay tuned and check us out!

Listen to the Podcast on Soundcloud (iTunes, Stitcher)

Donate on Patreon

TMNT: Out of the Shadows – Why It Sucked.

Some of these thoughts also apply to the 2014 TMNT. Also, spoilers ahead.


I didn’t have high hopes for the 2014 TMNT, yet was still disgusted by it once I saw it.

I had higher hopes for Out of the Shadows (OOTS) because it had Krang, Bebop and Rocksteady, and the Tartaruga Brothers truck. I knew I shouldn’t have had high hopes, but my desire to be contrarian made me want to love it before I even saw it.

I was wrong.

Twenty minutes into the movie I had a rash from all the face palms.

The Bad

The turtles personalities

The charm of the 1990s turtles was that they were caricatures of teenagers. They were silly and made jokes as if they had frontal lobe damage, and were teenagers in the most cartoonish way. These new turtles act more like real teenagers, which is absolutely awful to watch. No one likes teenagers. They’re moody, horny, and mean. This is exactly how the new turtles are.

I can’t understand why anyone would want to hang out with these turltes, other than the fact that there are considerable cool points if your friends are ninja turtles. I find nothing redeemable about them.

They are also horrifically ugly.

The CGI paradox

The CGI doesn’t look bad. It’s actually really good. The problem is that the CGI makes it easier to incorporate gadgets and give no weight to the turtles’ actions.

Rocket-powered skateboard. Holographic touchscreen computers. Electric boe staff. All of these gadgets ruin the charm of the turtles.

What’s so charming about the turtles is that all they have is their skill. They’ve practiced ninjitsu so long and with such discipline, that they actually stand a chance against gangs of men with guns and swords. Once you give them rocket-powered skateboards, high-tech weaponry, and abundant resources, it takes away from their real skill – ninjitsu.

It also wrecks the suspension of disbelief.
1990:
Friend: Wait, so they live under the sewer system and no one has ever found them. Seems ridiculous.
Me: Shut the fuck up. It’s a movie.

2014:
Friend: Wait, so they live under the swer system, have a dozen computer monitors, high tech computer systems, and rocket-powered skateboards and no one has ever found them. Seems ridiculous.
Me: You’re… right…. 😦

There is something profoundly awe-inspiring about seeing someone actually pull off a high kick, or take a blow. The CGI can’t effectively evoke the same level of mastery or peril. Although the CGI looked good, bring back the suits. Get Donnie Yen amd three of his friends and get it done.

Splinter

Splinter sucks.

One way to make a character instantly unlikable is to give him pure black eyes. He’s just a smug, almost-evil twat in this series.

The Shredder

He didn’t have his mask or armor at the beginning of the movie because he was incarcerated. I get that (though it would be absolutely bad ass if he was being transported while wearing his armor, even if it didn’t make any sense. If it’s bad ass enough, it doesn’t need to make sense.)

BUT for him not to have his armor on for the rest of the movie until the VERY END? Unacceptable. That’s. Not. Shredder.

Also, this is his armor. It sucks.

He’s so weak in this movie that there’s no resonance at all when he gets betrayed by Krang. We should be saying “The mighty Shredder was betrayed? But he’s the mighty shredder!” Instead it just happens and it’s like “of course. Look at his shitty armor. Why wouldn’t you betray him?”

Casey Jones

What happened here? His mask sucks. He’s not bad ass at all. He’s just a baffoon.

They made him a cop, which I hated at first then thought, “Oh maybe they’ll have a cool vigilante dichotomy about him. He’s a cop, but he’s also the crime fighter Casey Jones. That could be cool.” That’s not the case at all. He’s just a bumbling cop. He might as well have not been Casey Jones.

He also tapes rollerblade wheels to his shoes.

The Good

Tartaruga Brothers Truck

I know I complained about gadgets, but this one actually works.

  1. Its canon.
  2. It’s more analog than high-tech. Mikey has nun-chuk arms and it shoots sewer lids.

April O’neil

So there’s a lot of issues with Megan Fox’s April O’neil that I don’t care to get into, but her cartoonish acting was a breath of fresh air compared to the shitty turtles, Splinter, and Casey Jones.

Actaully a lot of the reason I liked her in it are sexist reasons, so I’m sorry.

Bebop and Rocksteady

They were funny, bad ass, and they felt canon. If anything I needed more of a brawl between them and the turtles.

Krang

Krang was on point. There needed to be more of him.

Everything Wrong with Captain America: Civil War

Spoilers ahead.

In the writer’s room:

Writer 1: Let’s have a big moment. How about War Machine dies during the fight between the heroes?
Writer 2: Great. That’ll be a huge moment. Let’s have him break his back instead.
Writer 1: Definitely! Then we’ll immediately give him robot legs and fix him.
Writer 2: Perfect. That way it’s like nothing ever even happened.

Writer 1: Remember all the heavy societal implications and themes from the comic book Civil War series?
Writer 2: Yeah?
Writer 1: Well forget about those. Let’s get started.

Writer 1: How should Zumo get access to the heavily guarded Winter Soldier?
Writer 2: A fake mustache that makes him sorta look like the guy he’s impersonating. We won’t put any guards in there either. And we’ll put Winter Soldier in a restraint he can break in one second and a glass enclosure that breaks in five punches.
Writer 1: Won’t people he a problem with that?
Writer 2: *leans back in his chair* I think we’ll be juuuuuust fine.

The scene that guilts Tony Stark:

Woman: You killed my son. You Avengers are terrible. You should have let those aliens, Ultron, and whatever else just keep doing what they were doing.

Tony convincing the Avengers to sign:

Tony Stark: We have to sign the accord! We’re dangerous! (to self): Please don’t bring up that it was me who created Ultron.

Tony Stark, Spider-Man and Aunt Mae Scene:

Tony Stark: Remember when the internet was confused how a hottie like Marissa Tomei could play Aunt Mae? Let’s do a scene all about that.

The final battle:

ME: This is going to be great. The heroes have already fought each other twice, now they are going to fight FIVE SOLDIERS (!) who are stronger than the Winter Soldier. This is the perfect way for them to come back together.
Zumo: I killed the five soldiers. Now you have to fight each other again 🙂 Could have been  cool though, huh?
ME: 😦

Iron Man: Hey, Winter Soldier, I’m going to make a Manchurian Candidate reference about you and then five minutes later get pissed off that you killed my mom while you were under mind control, something I was totally aware of. Fuck it though. I’m just mad beyond logic even though I’ve been logical this whole movie.

Zumo: Hi, everyone. I’m Zumo. I was a bad ass killer for these death camps and death squads and stuff, but I was also a family man with a wife and kids. I have time to kill people and be a good father, yet neither of those will get developed well. Bye! Have fun attacking each other for the third time.