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Kids Song -Over 160 English Kids Song With Lyrics
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- Over 160+ English Kids Song. - 11 Disc Catalogue, 16 Songs each Disc. Over 160 Songs. - Random...
Idioms and Slang Dictionary - Word History & More
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Idioms and Slang Dictionary by Farlex gives you definitions and examples from top sources like...
Bob Mann (459 KP) rated Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021) in Movies
Apr 5, 2021
At over 4 hours it's still bloated and sprawling (1 more)
4:3 ratio is a needless gimmick
Does Lipstick on the Pig work?
In Zack Snyder’s much-discussed director’s cut of “Justice League”, Superman (Henry Cavill) is dead (post the events of “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice“) and a grieving Lois Lane (Amy Adams) can’t move on. Even Martha Kent (Diane Lane) has had the family farm repossessed. But the world is in deadly danger due to the work of Steppenwolf and his army of parademons. They are trying to reunite three ‘Mother Boxes’, previously hidden on earth. If joined and synchronized they will form ‘The Unity’, creating a gateway for Steppenwolf’s boss – Darkseid – to arrive and control the universe by invoking the “anti-life equation” (basically lockdown 3!).
Only the Justice League’s combined talents might be enough to stop them – but Batman (Ben Affleck) is having trouble in getting Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot), Aquaman (Jason Momoa), Cyborg (Ray Fisher) and The Flash (Ezra Miller) to work together. And even then, they reckon they might be a man short!
Positives:
- Well - it's so much better than the original 2017 version of "Justice League", but then that's not saying much! (I realise that I never did a review for that movie, which I saw on a transatlantic flight - - I put the whole incoherent mess down to my jetlag. But no.... it really was an incoherent mess!).
In the Snyder cut, we gain a much broader introduction to all of the main characters, especially to Barry Allen (the Flash) - in a very entertaining pet shop interview scene - and Victor Stone (Cyborg). And Steppenwolf gets more air time to flesh out his character.
- The story I find very similar to the Marvel equivalent: with Darkseid = Thanos; boxes = stones; Avengers = Justice League! But the story is at least now coherent and flows well. Its action set pieces, especially the ultimate defeat of Steppenwolf (nice decap!), are exciting.
- Some of the distracting scenes (the trapped family in the Russian ruins is a key example) have been excised from this version, making for a significant improvement.
Negatives:
- I'm with Mark Kermode in being a little bit mystified by all of the rave 5* reviews for this one. By anyone's imagination, a run time of 242 minutes is over-indulgent.
- Although the epilogue scene, featuring Jared Leto's Joker and a Batman f-bomb, is entertaining, it actually adds nothing to the exposition and could have been dropped to reduce the bladder-testing run time.
- That 4:3 screen ratio! JUST WHY SNYDER, WHY? There's one scene in particular, where all six members of the Justice League line up in the sunset to dramatic swelling music. The screen ratio forces Snyder to film it at a 60 degree angle to get them all in! "Galaxy Quest" intelligently used three different screen ratios, to great visual effect. So I could perhaps understand it if the 'flashback' scenes had been 4:3 and the rest in 16:9. But as it is, the usage is gimmicky, making (imho) no sense for a big fantasy spectacle like this.
- The Junkie XL (as Thomas Holkenborg) soundtrack I'm afraid did nothing for me.
Summary thoughts:
It's a film, for sure. Is it a watchable film now... hmm, yes just about. And it has scenes which indeed are highly entertaining. But if you follow my One Mann's Movies blog you should know by now my view on movies that extend beyond 90 minutes... they need to justify that delta running time. And by outstaying this target by another 90 minutes... and then by ANOTHER 62 minutes borders on taking the <proverbial>. It's not Shakespeare!
(For the full graphical review, check out the One Mann's Movies review here - https://bob-the-movie-man.com/2021/04/04/zack-snyders-justice-league-does-lipstick-on-the-pig-work/).
Only the Justice League’s combined talents might be enough to stop them – but Batman (Ben Affleck) is having trouble in getting Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot), Aquaman (Jason Momoa), Cyborg (Ray Fisher) and The Flash (Ezra Miller) to work together. And even then, they reckon they might be a man short!
Positives:
- Well - it's so much better than the original 2017 version of "Justice League", but then that's not saying much! (I realise that I never did a review for that movie, which I saw on a transatlantic flight - - I put the whole incoherent mess down to my jetlag. But no.... it really was an incoherent mess!).
In the Snyder cut, we gain a much broader introduction to all of the main characters, especially to Barry Allen (the Flash) - in a very entertaining pet shop interview scene - and Victor Stone (Cyborg). And Steppenwolf gets more air time to flesh out his character.
- The story I find very similar to the Marvel equivalent: with Darkseid = Thanos; boxes = stones; Avengers = Justice League! But the story is at least now coherent and flows well. Its action set pieces, especially the ultimate defeat of Steppenwolf (nice decap!), are exciting.
- Some of the distracting scenes (the trapped family in the Russian ruins is a key example) have been excised from this version, making for a significant improvement.
Negatives:
- I'm with Mark Kermode in being a little bit mystified by all of the rave 5* reviews for this one. By anyone's imagination, a run time of 242 minutes is over-indulgent.
- Although the epilogue scene, featuring Jared Leto's Joker and a Batman f-bomb, is entertaining, it actually adds nothing to the exposition and could have been dropped to reduce the bladder-testing run time.
- That 4:3 screen ratio! JUST WHY SNYDER, WHY? There's one scene in particular, where all six members of the Justice League line up in the sunset to dramatic swelling music. The screen ratio forces Snyder to film it at a 60 degree angle to get them all in! "Galaxy Quest" intelligently used three different screen ratios, to great visual effect. So I could perhaps understand it if the 'flashback' scenes had been 4:3 and the rest in 16:9. But as it is, the usage is gimmicky, making (imho) no sense for a big fantasy spectacle like this.
- The Junkie XL (as Thomas Holkenborg) soundtrack I'm afraid did nothing for me.
Summary thoughts:
It's a film, for sure. Is it a watchable film now... hmm, yes just about. And it has scenes which indeed are highly entertaining. But if you follow my One Mann's Movies blog you should know by now my view on movies that extend beyond 90 minutes... they need to justify that delta running time. And by outstaying this target by another 90 minutes... and then by ANOTHER 62 minutes borders on taking the <proverbial>. It's not Shakespeare!
(For the full graphical review, check out the One Mann's Movies review here - https://bob-the-movie-man.com/2021/04/04/zack-snyders-justice-league-does-lipstick-on-the-pig-work/).
Lee (2222 KP) rated El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie (2019) in Movies
Oct 13, 2019
When we last saw Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul), he was driving away in an El Camino car, having just been freed from six months or so of captivity and slavery. It was the final moments of what is arguably one of the greatest TV shows of all time - Walter White (Bryan Cranston) had come to the aid of his long time friend, and collaborator in the meth business, freeing him from the clutches of a gang of Nazis in what turned out to be a bloodbath. Jesse, clearly a broken man, drove away from it all, into the night, fighting back tears as he let out a scream of pain and relief.
As with all great stories, whether in a book, a movie or a TV show, you do naturally wonder what might have happened next to the characters who have taken you on a journey with them. If the finale is good enough, you can feel satisfied simply by drawing your own conclusions. In the case of Breaking Bad, did Jesse turn a corner, only to be met by a bunch of cops who then lock him up for the rest of his life? Or did he manage to find well deserved peace and solace, a chance to finally live out his days with some kind of normality? Series creator and writer Vince Gilligan clearly had some ideas of his own, and the result is this 2 hour Netflix movie, titled El Camino.
We’ve not been without our fix of the Breaking Bad world since the show ended in 2013 though. Better Call Saul, about to start its fifth season, has acted as a prequel, telling the story of the rise of Saul Goodman, the seedy lawyer who helped Walter and Jesse throughout much of Breaking Bad. It shares much of the same style and tone as Breaking Bad, magnificently scripted and proving to be compulsive viewing. It has also gradually begun weaving other familiar characters from Breaking Bad into the story too, helping us to understand what brought these characters to the point they were at in Breaking Bad, but never (so far) featuring lead characters Walter and Jesse.
El Camino picks up pretty much where Breaking Bad left off. Jesse is clearly a person of interest with the law - not only for his drug crime days, but also because they know that someone fled the scene where a machine gun massacre took place, resulting in nine dead bodies. It’s neither an immediate capture, or an escape to a happy ending though. Instead, we’re treated to something that’s a little in between, and El Camino closely follows Jesse to show us just how that all plays out for him.
There was some big news recently when it was revealed that a large number of Breaking Bad characters would be appearing in El Camino and speculation was rife as to who those characters would be. They appear either in flashback form, or in present day situations, and all justifiably serve to drive the story forward, whether it be as a moment of reflection and poignancy, an aid to understanding Jesse’s current actions, or just as a cool little Easter egg for fans of the show. I must admit though, I had to resort to Google to try and remember how some of the characters fitted into the Breaking Bad show, but that could just be down to my lousy memory!
El Camino is packed full of the steady, confident, detailed pacing that we know and love from Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. Action, drama, emotion, it’s all there as a determined Jesse tries to acquire enough money to be able to start over. There’s a constant feeling throughout though that this is a story we didn’t really need, but it is certainly a welcome one, and a real joy to be back in this world and in the company of these great characters once again, if only for a short while.
As with all great stories, whether in a book, a movie or a TV show, you do naturally wonder what might have happened next to the characters who have taken you on a journey with them. If the finale is good enough, you can feel satisfied simply by drawing your own conclusions. In the case of Breaking Bad, did Jesse turn a corner, only to be met by a bunch of cops who then lock him up for the rest of his life? Or did he manage to find well deserved peace and solace, a chance to finally live out his days with some kind of normality? Series creator and writer Vince Gilligan clearly had some ideas of his own, and the result is this 2 hour Netflix movie, titled El Camino.
We’ve not been without our fix of the Breaking Bad world since the show ended in 2013 though. Better Call Saul, about to start its fifth season, has acted as a prequel, telling the story of the rise of Saul Goodman, the seedy lawyer who helped Walter and Jesse throughout much of Breaking Bad. It shares much of the same style and tone as Breaking Bad, magnificently scripted and proving to be compulsive viewing. It has also gradually begun weaving other familiar characters from Breaking Bad into the story too, helping us to understand what brought these characters to the point they were at in Breaking Bad, but never (so far) featuring lead characters Walter and Jesse.
El Camino picks up pretty much where Breaking Bad left off. Jesse is clearly a person of interest with the law - not only for his drug crime days, but also because they know that someone fled the scene where a machine gun massacre took place, resulting in nine dead bodies. It’s neither an immediate capture, or an escape to a happy ending though. Instead, we’re treated to something that’s a little in between, and El Camino closely follows Jesse to show us just how that all plays out for him.
There was some big news recently when it was revealed that a large number of Breaking Bad characters would be appearing in El Camino and speculation was rife as to who those characters would be. They appear either in flashback form, or in present day situations, and all justifiably serve to drive the story forward, whether it be as a moment of reflection and poignancy, an aid to understanding Jesse’s current actions, or just as a cool little Easter egg for fans of the show. I must admit though, I had to resort to Google to try and remember how some of the characters fitted into the Breaking Bad show, but that could just be down to my lousy memory!
El Camino is packed full of the steady, confident, detailed pacing that we know and love from Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. Action, drama, emotion, it’s all there as a determined Jesse tries to acquire enough money to be able to start over. There’s a constant feeling throughout though that this is a story we didn’t really need, but it is certainly a welcome one, and a real joy to be back in this world and in the company of these great characters once again, if only for a short while.
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Bob Mann (459 KP) rated Army of Thieves (2021) in Movies
Nov 4, 2021
“Did He Just Say Gulp?”
I have Covid-19, and am confined to quarters. So time to catch up on some streaming films. New on Netflix is “Army of Thieves”, a quirky prequel, of sorts, to Zac Snyder’s “Army of the Dead“.
Plot Summary:
Sebastian Schlencht-Wöhnert (Matthias Schweighöfer) is a geek obsessed with the work of legendary safe-manufacturer Hans Wagner whose magnum opus was a series of four intricate safes named after the four parts of his namesake’s Ring cycle: The Rhinegold, The Valkyrie, Siegfried and Götterdämmerung.
Seeking more the glory of cracking the legendary safes (rather than the riches within), high-class jewel-thief Gwendoline (Nathalie Emmanuel) teams with Sebastian to crack the three known safes (in Paris, Prague and St Moritz) before they are officially ‘retired’. Together with Korina (Ruby O. Fee), muscle-man Brad (Stuart Martin) and getaway driver Rolph (Guz Khan) the gang try to stay one step ahead of obsessed Interpol agent Delacroix (Jonathan Cohen).
Certification:
US: TV-MA. UK: 15.
Talent:
Starring: Matthias Schweighöfer, Nathalie Emmanuel, Ruby O. Fee, Stuart Martin, Guz Khan, Jonathan Cohen.
Directed by: Matthias Schweighöfer.
Written by: Shay Hatten (from a story by Shay Hatten and Zack Snyder).
“Army of Thieves” Review: Positives:
I really wasn’t expecting much from this offering. For me, the character of Dieter in “Army of the Dead” was an annoyingly quirky comedy character in a zombie-actioner that you just wanted to punch in the face…. repeatedly. But in contrast, this Dieter-centric film is deliberately quirky throughout and it just all worked for me. Under his own direction, Schweighöfer’s Sebastian/Dieter becomes a genuinely quirky, lovelorn and loveable loser that you want to root for.
The look and feel of the film is utterly glorious. The wonderful cinematography by Bernhard Jasper makes the introduction to the European locations feel Bond-like and the combination of Production Design and Special Effects make the safe-cracking scenes tense, dynamic and beautiful to watch. It’s all nicely rounded off by a quirky Steve Mazzaro / Hans Zimmer score.
Shay Hatten’s script delivers a nice balance of action and exposition. It actually – shock horror – takes time to flesh out some character behind the generic heist-movie stereotypes. Setting the movie in the same timeline as the emerging Nevada zombie-apocalypse as “Army of the Dead” is neat: (although those expecting extensive zombie-action will feel short-changed). And having the Las Vegas safe as the mythical Götterdämmerung is a nice touch. Above all – “SURPRISE!!!” – the script surpassed the essential six-laughs test.
The acting is above par, with Schweighöfer putting in a fabulous turn and the stunningly beautiful Nathalie Emmanuel (best known for being Ramsey in the Fast and Furious series) gets to be a lot more than mere window-dressing here. Stuart Martin is notable here for looking astonishingly like Hugh Jackman…. I mean, really, they could be twins.
Negatives:
I mean, honestly, there are more holes in this story than a St Moritz swiss-cheese. Why would all of the safes, owned by different private institutions, be being “decommissioned” due to a Zombie outbreak on the other side of the world? Can the Interpol team really be that incompetent? And however clever he is, I don’t buy that you can open safes like that!
Although I liked the balance of the script overall, the story is pretty simplistic and linear.
Summary Thoughts on “Army of Thieves”
Sometimes a little movie appears that surprises and delights you, and this was one of those for me. It’s not big and it’s not clever. But it is very nicely made, thoroughly entertained me and was – for me – way better than its source movie. A recommended watch on Netflix.
Plot Summary:
Sebastian Schlencht-Wöhnert (Matthias Schweighöfer) is a geek obsessed with the work of legendary safe-manufacturer Hans Wagner whose magnum opus was a series of four intricate safes named after the four parts of his namesake’s Ring cycle: The Rhinegold, The Valkyrie, Siegfried and Götterdämmerung.
Seeking more the glory of cracking the legendary safes (rather than the riches within), high-class jewel-thief Gwendoline (Nathalie Emmanuel) teams with Sebastian to crack the three known safes (in Paris, Prague and St Moritz) before they are officially ‘retired’. Together with Korina (Ruby O. Fee), muscle-man Brad (Stuart Martin) and getaway driver Rolph (Guz Khan) the gang try to stay one step ahead of obsessed Interpol agent Delacroix (Jonathan Cohen).
Certification:
US: TV-MA. UK: 15.
Talent:
Starring: Matthias Schweighöfer, Nathalie Emmanuel, Ruby O. Fee, Stuart Martin, Guz Khan, Jonathan Cohen.
Directed by: Matthias Schweighöfer.
Written by: Shay Hatten (from a story by Shay Hatten and Zack Snyder).
“Army of Thieves” Review: Positives:
I really wasn’t expecting much from this offering. For me, the character of Dieter in “Army of the Dead” was an annoyingly quirky comedy character in a zombie-actioner that you just wanted to punch in the face…. repeatedly. But in contrast, this Dieter-centric film is deliberately quirky throughout and it just all worked for me. Under his own direction, Schweighöfer’s Sebastian/Dieter becomes a genuinely quirky, lovelorn and loveable loser that you want to root for.
The look and feel of the film is utterly glorious. The wonderful cinematography by Bernhard Jasper makes the introduction to the European locations feel Bond-like and the combination of Production Design and Special Effects make the safe-cracking scenes tense, dynamic and beautiful to watch. It’s all nicely rounded off by a quirky Steve Mazzaro / Hans Zimmer score.
Shay Hatten’s script delivers a nice balance of action and exposition. It actually – shock horror – takes time to flesh out some character behind the generic heist-movie stereotypes. Setting the movie in the same timeline as the emerging Nevada zombie-apocalypse as “Army of the Dead” is neat: (although those expecting extensive zombie-action will feel short-changed). And having the Las Vegas safe as the mythical Götterdämmerung is a nice touch. Above all – “SURPRISE!!!” – the script surpassed the essential six-laughs test.
The acting is above par, with Schweighöfer putting in a fabulous turn and the stunningly beautiful Nathalie Emmanuel (best known for being Ramsey in the Fast and Furious series) gets to be a lot more than mere window-dressing here. Stuart Martin is notable here for looking astonishingly like Hugh Jackman…. I mean, really, they could be twins.
Negatives:
I mean, honestly, there are more holes in this story than a St Moritz swiss-cheese. Why would all of the safes, owned by different private institutions, be being “decommissioned” due to a Zombie outbreak on the other side of the world? Can the Interpol team really be that incompetent? And however clever he is, I don’t buy that you can open safes like that!
Although I liked the balance of the script overall, the story is pretty simplistic and linear.
Summary Thoughts on “Army of Thieves”
Sometimes a little movie appears that surprises and delights you, and this was one of those for me. It’s not big and it’s not clever. But it is very nicely made, thoroughly entertained me and was – for me – way better than its source movie. A recommended watch on Netflix.