sevendoc23 Reviews

Murder Party (2007)

What is art?

[6 February 2020]

Murder party has a fairly nonsensical plot as Chris (Chris Sharp) finds a mysterious halloween invitation to a murder party while walking home from work and through misguided horror logic, decides to whip up a costume and go, only he soon finds himself "tied" up and surrounded by 5 artist with a bloodlust.

The film itself is nothing special, and the films jabs at the art world, as nonsensical as it can be, amounts to no more than, artist weird, which is unfortunate because it makes up no small part of the script. That being said, I did find myself enjoying the film by the time the second act rolled around and though at times poorly paced it had an intriguing premise and a cast of characters who played off of each other quite well. I also commend the sparse use of violence or buckets of blood (excepting a scene in the third act) and feel it added realism to the wacky world the movie takes us through and allows the dialogue to carry the script. The biggest problem I think the film has is poor pacing, with an almost 21 minute chase scene that does start to over stay its welcome. Despite a few set backs, Murder Party manages to be a fun watch so long as you don't try to take it too seriously.

Stuber (2019)

Predictable in many of the right ways

[6/10 · 13 January 2020]

Stuber will certainly not gonna go down as a comedy classic however it still managed to be a fun buddy film. The film itself is shot like your typical summer comedy with a few scenes that look straight out of a YouTube video but the chemistry between Bautista and Nanjiani manage to pull a few laughs and ultimately allows the movie to avoid being another "C.H.I.P.S ." It's predictable; borrowing heavily from many other similar comedies but the film itself isn't trying to be subtle and never takes itself too seriously allowing the plot and the actors to really have fun with their roles and you can see it in the performance. Speaking of the plot, it's your basic violent buddy cop movie but with the good cop being replaced by an insecure and witty Uber driver (played by Nanjiani). There are some over the top scenes and quite a bit of violence along with most of the jokes consisting of lowbrow humor but it makes for an enjoyable movie.

Fear, Inc. (2016)

A predictable roller coaster

[6/10 · 17 January 2019]

Where to start with this movie. Fear Inc. is a movie for horror fans that don't want to watch a horror but still crave references. I can say, personally, while I don't think it was a great movie, it was entertaining and the concept left me intrigued. Horror/Comedy is hard genre to pull off with each being the anthesis of the other, however this film made the smart movie and leaned more towards comedy, as abysmal as some of the jokes were but it at the very least kept consist with it's tone until the ending which is where a majority of my problems with the movie lie. In the end I can say, if you watched the trailer then you should already know you're not getting another horror classic for the books, but if you're just looking for something to watch some Friday night and you stumble across this, it might just be have enough to keep you hooked.

Unbreakable (2000)

Mister glass and broken story

[6/10 · 10 December 2018]

This is quite late as a review but still I thought I'd write it anyways. Unbreakable is a film by M. Night Shyamalan and comes with all the things you'd expect with his earlier work. A slow burner drama, dark and brooding atmosphere, and a great story concept. The only real issue with this film is how stunted everything feels. The characters, the dialogue, amf the plot have no real sense of urgency that's needed to keep a slow burner drama alive and I feel that mostly hinges or the poor delivery from our main cast (excepting Samuel Jackson who has a stellar preformance). David (portrayed by Bruce Willis) doesn't care much for anything and based on the preformance he gives, it seems he didn't care to much about the film either. He almost always has a very non-feeling look and act to himself that makes him seem one demensional to the point that I was far more interested in the actor who played younger David than I was of David himself. Top that off with what seems like a borderline mentally abusive relationship he has with his son, and it spells disatster for a character were supposed to care about. The depression he had comes off less like he feels little to no importance or place in this world, and more like he's just a bit of an a**hole. Some scenes seemed to have no real internal logic within them and the child actor seemed to be afflicted with the same single emotion complex that Willis had throughout the film. While I enjoyed the movie, thanks in no small part to the eccentric preformance by Samuel L Jackson's, Mr. Glass, I was let down by a majority of the movie in the way it handled many scenes. It had such a tense atmosphere and great story hook but did very little with it to play on the actual drama of the film and a lot of investigative scenes in the film are handled very heavy handedly with Shyamalan treating us like we're children. With all that said, I still believe this is a must see if you enjoy Shyamalan, superheros, or slow burn dramas, so long as you go in with an open mind and focus on the storyline rather than the dialogue.

The Emoji Movie (2017)

I'm so f*cking p*ssed

[3 August 2017]

Okay, where do I begin with this film. Well it is a movie. One that was masterfully animated might I add. So let us dive into the film itself as a whole and the amount of plot points it has and doesn't need. For 1, it is first and foremost a movie about love an acceptance. Good for kids, until you have one of the villains straight up murder some guy. Yeah, there's a lot of murder in this movie, 16 deaths in total, all murder. This may have been the first time I yelled "Oh sh*t" in a kids movie, that's how out of place the murder was. Let's not forget that this movie isn't just about emoji love but human love too. Love between two freshmen high school who's entire life is their phone, as masterfully narrated by T.J. miller. In comes gene, the son of the emoji's whose only job is to do the "meh" face. They live in "Textopolis" a city just made out of emoji's. Don't fret about this place, it doesn't matter after about 30 minutes in. Gene messes up and puts the entire phone in danger for being deleted (Which in this case means death. The inhabitants of this phone would be murdered and understand this so they're pretty terrified) forcing gene to run away from angry murder bots out to ki- I mean delete him. So he goes to find a hacker (Hackers live in phones somehow) in the piracy app (I wanna apologize but there are so many issues I just have to mention in parenthesis like what is a piracy app?) where everyone who lives in that app is, you guessed it, f*cking pirates. Here they meet a hacker whose name is jailbreak cause "ha ha ha, I'm sure kids will get that reference," but hey at least they're treating their audience like adults even though it's directed at 1 to 10 year olds, I digress. Jail break says they can upload them to the cloud where they can be free, reprogram gene to not be expressive, and turn the high five emoji (his name is just high five) into a popular emoji again so he can end back up in the popular lounge where only the most used emojis go (this is his entire character arch). So they leave the piracy app and go to some other app, I don't remember although I do know they passed through the Facebook app which is why I have to write this stupid review. The movie is pretty much a giant ad for other apps. Like Facebook, twitter, Instagram, spottily, just dance app, etc. So here is where it gets contrived, there are way too many plot points. Let me run down a quick list before we get back to our snarky summary cause f*ck this movie

1. Being an outcast 2. Love 3. Emoji love 4. Not knowing how to talk to girls 5. The murder (deletion) of everyone and thing on this kids phone 6. Emoji marriage issues 7. Being a mess up (I'm looking at you gene) 8. Accepting yourself 9. feminism (this ones an issue cause there is one line about it before it's just never mentioned again, ever) 10. Asking a girl to a dance 11. Addiction

And not to mention any of the other throw away plots just doused in the film. Honestly this film is all over the place and has no real direction cause for every created plot point one is thrown away.

Let's get back to the movie, one of the apps they visit is "Candy Crush" cause that's a popular app that paid for time here. So gene almost gets murdered during a giant game of candy crush and you find out that high five emoji is a caffeine addict. Next app they go too is the just dance app where they're told they want to be very quiet cause murder bots are after them (Anti Virus bots) so of course they accidentally get caught in a really loud game of just dance where if you don't dance good you get killed. So jailbreak sucks at dancing and just when you thought the movie couldn't get worse there is a horrible dance number. Murder bots find them and download a dance mode so they can dance and catch up to our three hero's but the phone is playing just dance in real life too and so the kid deletes the app in a frenzy cause the entire world of that app to fall apart. High Five dies along with all the murder bots. Everyone is heartbroken for a few minutes and then onward on our quest to Dropbox. So we go through one last app, "Spotify" where all music is streamed. Because every movie needs horrible puns all the music is a stream that you can boat down. They boat down some song made in 2014 or something and then end up in a nice slow stream where gene and jailbreak are doing some major crushing. Then out of f*cking nowhere and I mean nowhere this kids downloaded whale song (which wouldn't even be on spotify cause it was a download) defies the rule this movie has where all music is a stream and becomes a go*damn whale. So they leave, go to the trash bin where they find out high five emoji is alive save him (but not the just dance girl who is obviously traumatized and was crying) leaving the rest of the trashed apps to die. Now I'm almost at my limit, there is a lot wrong with this movie but if your drunk or with a few buddies I'm sure you could have fun with it. There's too many extra plots to finish this review in under 1000's words so I'll leave with this. the movie sucks.

13 Reasons Why (2017–2020)

A dangerous message to those in distress

[4/10 · 13 May 2017]

I WILL BE USING MYSELF AND MY OWN EXPERINCES AS WELL AS LOVED ONES AROUND ME TO BASE MY REVIEW AND PROVE HOW IT CAN BE DANGEROUS TO YOUNG AND IMPRESSIONABLE MINDS SUFFERING FROM DEPRESSION. IF YOU ARE FEELING SUICIDAL PLEASE CALL THE NATIONAL SUICIDE PREVENTION HOTLINE: [phone])

It was produced, written, directed, and acted (Most of the time) really well however, the story itself was one of the most suicide glorifying things I've ever watched and it isn't the right message for those who have suffered any of the traumas depicted in the show -- depression, suicidal thoughts or behaviors, sexual assault, rape -- as it did everything it was warned NOT to do when talking about a sensitive subject like any of the aforementioned ailments or events. It seemed to be graphic for shock value rather than to open a conversation and that's what my main problem with the show itself is. Many of the actors are quite and in fact in my eyes, played their parts quite believably however it was the shows diversion from opening a conversation to shocking the audience and delivering a dangerous message that ultimately for me ruined it and made it hard to finish.

SUICIDE- Being a 9 times suicide survivor I will tell you this show delivers a very dangerous and incorrect message. The show in short tells you to blame others for your suicide and that you will be missed and cared for more after your death than while you're alive. And yes, others did help sway her to choose suicide but teaching impressionable depressed teens that the show is ultimately targeting, it's a dangerous message.

RAPE- Knowing a loved one who has suffered through this forces me to have to address the scenes of graphic rape depicted in the show. My loved one (Name and connection to me with remain anonymous for their own privacy) very much was caught up in this show as most were however after it ended it brought back a lot of the trauma from the events of her rape. She had severe PTSD attacks for weeks on end and I'm fairly certain she was not the only one who was affected by these scenes.

GLORIFICATION OF SUICIDE- The show very much disgusted me with its blatant and unforgiving glorification of Hannah's suicide. After her suicide at the very start of the show, it revolves around 13 tapes that explain why she did what she did. Everyone who gets a tape (excepting one character) immediately regrets having mistreated or harmed Hannah in anyway and it almost shows as though they care about her more now that she is dead. While it is true if you drive someone to suicide you will be traumatized but the immediate depiction of her as a saint after the suicide versus the way she was treated beforehand (Shown in flashbacks) reminds me very much of my own beliefs that led me to try and commit suicide. The belief that everyone will regret what they did after you're dead and that people will care more after you're dead.

BLAME- The shows has Hannah place blame on 13 people as to why she committed suicide and some of whom did very little. Such as the (Spoiler) counselor who let Hannah walk out after she talked about a "friend" having been raped and her descent into depression and suicidal thoughts. It seems as though Hannah's first instinct was to blame all those who had done her wrong even in the slightest of ways. Yes I'm not going to refute bullying, rape, and other traumas are great contributors to suicide but you can't blame others for a decision you made (again this is all coming from a 9 time suicide survivor and who is very close with multiple rape survivors so I'm not just speaking with no experience in any of these areas) and that is a dangerous lesson. To blame others is a dangerous lesson because it excuses yourself- Hannah in the show- from taking responsibility for your actions.

OVERALL- This show was well made and well acted however the way it executed its approach to depict sensitive and possibly triggering events is dangerous and reckless. If you are a viewer who has never experienced the events depicted I can say wholeheartedly you have a high chance of enjoying the show but for all those out there who are survivors of rape, depression, suicide, sexual assault, and others depicted in the show it can be very triggering. It is also dangerous as the show is pitched at teens and any teen who has suffered suicidal thoughts or tendencies may be given the wrong message and could ultimately cause suicide. I give a 4 out of 10. Well made but dangerous. Would not recommend to those who suffer a mental illness or have experienced very traumatic events.

Horns (2013)

Great crime triller, with a twist

[7/10 · 23 July 2015]

In a Small Town, Ig Perrish (Danial Radcliffe) Has Been Accused of Murdering His Girl Friend Merrin Williams (Juno Temple). Only His Childhood Friend and Lawyer Lee Tourneau (Max Minghella) Believes He Is Innocent. Ig Wakes Up One Morning with Horns That Lead Everyone He Meets to Confess Their Sins and Dark Secrets to Him, While at First Ig Is Afraid He Soon Learns the Horns Are a Blessing in Disguise.

This Movie Is a Great Crime Thriller! the Story Was Told So Well by the Cast That I Couldn't Tell What Was Going to Happen Next. the Movie While Being Quite Emotional Following Ig Perrish's Attempts to Clear His Name and Find Merrin's Killer, Also Throws in Some Comedy That Works Very Well with His Character and I Feel Made Some of the Characters More Human and Less Stereotypical Crime Movie character. I Loved the Concept Although the Ending Could Have Been Better, So I Give This Movie a 7 Out of 10