suhstayn Reviews

Big Bet (2022–2023)

Kinda dull

[4/10 · 10 April 2024]

I thought there would be organized crime & violence. It was more bumbling business advantures into gambling. Feels drawn out and would've been better as a 2 hour movie instead of a long TV series.

Choi Min-Sik was top class as usual. The rest of the class was more lackluster.

The humour did not land as well as in other Korean shows. Nor did the general dialogue. You were often waiting for some action instead of interested in the conversations. That is why it was kinda dull. Also why it would've worked better in a shorter format like a film.

Overall, it was a disappointment. There is better stuff out there. I'd skip it.

The Outfit (2022)

Solid Mob / Mystery Movie

[6/10 · 13 May 2023]

Solid mobster movie / mystery movie. The lead Mark Rylance does a terrific job and carries the movie. I thought the rest of the actors were poorly cast. Zooey Dutch didn't fit in or act well. The main mobster guy and son did not fit either. The boss seemed like a lovable uncle who tell you jokes while he buys cake for after dinner. The son was too much of a pretty boy. Neither looked like they could strike fear in violent men or get violent men to follow them. The only supporting actor who did well was Francis. The lack of quality actors around Rylance held the movie back and made it a 6 instead of an 8. Better actors could have this a more tense thriller / mystery. Still = solid script, good setting, great lead actor.

Enjoyable enough movie but you're not planning your night around it. It's more if you have nothing to do, you will be pleasantly surprised by it.

Lucky Day (I) (2019)

Terrible

[1/10 · 13 July 2020]

Lots of terrible irritating fake french accents. Intended I assume to be terrible in an effort to be funny -- but it doesn't work. It is just damn annoying. And it is annoying throughout the whole film. And then those mustaches ... ugh!

The acting across the board was poor. I often wonder when this happens does it say more about the director's qualities than the actor's.

Anyway. Bad acting. Bad dialogue. Mediocre plot. Over the top irritating fake french accents. Put it all together and you have an awful film that is a complete waste of time.

Treadstone (2019)

Started Brightly then Trailed Off

[5/10 · 8 January 2020]

Exciting and interesting opening episodes. Struggled to keep it going.

It would have been fine as a 3-4 hour series but having 10 episodes requires more interesting characters / relationships. The problem with this is you got multiple characters who are all "woken up" not remembering their past like Jason Bourne and the amnesia. So there isn't much you can do with that. They don't know. How can you? All characters become too similar. Too one dimensional / two dimensional. No complexity. And far too repetitive.

The action scenes and shaky camera gets annoying after awhile. Repetitive. Too much of a good thing. Needed to mix it up more.

The storyline and mystery is good. That is the only thing keeping the show going.

Meeting Gorbachev (2018)

Interesting but lacking ...

[5/10 · 16 December 2019]

Interesting in parts but largely devoid of meaningful conversation. A few headlines on various topics is all you get most of the time.

8 Heads in a Duffel Bag (1997)

Terrible

[1/10 · 30 July 2019]

Andy Comeau ruined this film for me. His acting was awful. Cringe worthy. Every time he had to show any emotion he was a train wreck. And unfortunately he was the main guy in the movie. Could have been a solid movie with a decent actor in his place.

Joe Pesci was very good. As always. Dyan Cannon and George Hamilton were very good too.

Zoom (2015)

Clever idea badly put together

[1/10 · 30 July 2019]

Clever idea but it didn't come together until the end and everything up until that point was utterly boring.

Worst film I have seen in some time.

The Hurricane Heist (2018)

Mediocre

[4/10 · 8 June 2018]

Pretty Solid for the first 45 mins or so but then things go from bad to worse for the final 45 minutes.

The acting is dreadful almost across the board. The actors who played the brothers (Breeze, Will?) were dreadful. The main bad guy awful (Perkins). Maggie Grace looked a great actress in comparison to the dross she was surrounded with but really was nothing great herself either.

The characters were cartoonish. No depth at all.

The hurricane was a nice gimmick but it turned into CGI overkill as the movie went on. Ruined the movie.

4 stars is generous. This is an action movie junkies only movie.

The Humanity Bureau (2017)

Terrible

[2/10 · 31 May 2018]

I cannot understand the solid score (5.9 6,800 votes) this movie has gotten. It was terrible.

The film is not engaging at all. You don't care about any of the characters. Nor the story / plot. There is just nothing to hold your attention. There is clear opportunities to build tension and interest (when they are in danger) but almost all of them fail to deliver. The mystery angle through the first hour of the film fails too. You just don't care enough about what is happening in the film.

The characters are one dimensional. The dialogue is awful. There is absolutely no conversation between anyone that gets your attention. There is no chemistry between the actors. Again, nothing to make you give a damn about what is happening.

A complete waste of 1hr 30 min. Avoid this film.

Lowriders (2016)

Good film. Could've been better.

[6/10 · 29 May 2018]

Good film but could've been better.

Too many camera close ups on people's faces. It was constantly happening in scenes and taking you out of situation/moment & away from the tension of the situation.

I enjoyed the lowrider cars. That was something different. Something unusual in films. All the cool cars and the great designs.

The cast was great as well. Demian Bechir. Theo Rossi. Melissa Benoist. Eva Longoria. The main character / actor was a bit weaker than the rest of the cast but he was not too bad.

The plot / story / family drama was solid but nothing we haven't seen before.

Overall, a bit more to the story and better camera angles / shots would've made this a much better movie. Even so, a solid movie.

Happy Anniversary (I) (2018)

A pleasant surprise

[7/10 · 12 April 2018]

I had just watched Woody Allen's Wonder Wheel a day earlier (another romance film) and I have to say this movie was so much better than that.

The chemistry between couple was superb (unlike the other film where they had none). The acting from Noel Wells (1st time seen her in something) and Ben Schwartz (he was the reason I watched the film, I really liked him in other shows I have seen him in) was very good. They worked together well. Bounced off one another. Looked and felt like a real couple. The friendship between Ben Schwartz and Rahul Kohli was high quality too.

I wasn't expecting much from this film. I was hoping for passable and wasn't even truly expecting that. So to get a film that was watchable and enjoyable was a nice surprise.

I liked the characters. I liked their chemistry together. I liked the dialogue in the movie. The pacing was good. Kept it short and that worked well. I liked how the movie told the story of the couple's 3rd anniversary but also included flashbacks to give you an idea of what their relationship was like (the good and the bad) to let you the viewer understand how they arrived at this point. And how hard it was for them to figure out whether this relationship was simply good or marriage worthy.

A pleasant surprise. Worth a viewing.

Wonder Wheel (2017)

Wonder Wheel .... failure

[3/10 · 12 April 2018]

Dialogue = weak.

Acting = weak. Kate Winslet was disappointing. She struggled to play the neurotic Woody Allen woman (unlike Cate Blanchett a few years ago). Surprised given how good an actress she is. Belushi was bad. Never became the character. Timberlake was miscast. Unable to cope with the character. He was out of place throughout the movie. Juno Temple a few good moments but was hurt by the script/dialogue and was poor overall.

Chemistry of actors = never believable. The relationship between father-daughter. The marriage between Winslet-Belushi. The affair between wife and Timberlake. None of it worked. The relationship between lifeguard and Juno Temple. Nothing worked.

A disappointing film. Not worth watching.

A Bad Moms Christmas (2017)

Last 40 minutes ruins a decent movie

[3/10 · 19 February 2018]

The first hour of the movie was pretty good. I was giving the movie a 6/10 at that point. Good jokes and relationships between the friends and their mothers.

However, the last 40 minutes was painfully bad. Just awful. A load of mom-daughter nonsense and oversentimental crap. Lots of melodrama nonsense. Awful. Absolutely awful. Unwatchable level bad.

They should have just ended the movie at the hour.

Anyway ... avoid this one. Not worth wasting your time on.

Joshy (2016)

Load of Crap

[1/10 · 15 August 2017]

What a load of crap! It was like watching a couple of guys hanging out on a reality TV show chatting to one another. Only with worse dialogue. The script was awful. The characters were uninteresting.

Seriously, the film should have been about 15 minutes long. The rest was filler.

Awful movie. Not entertaining at all. Nor was insightful about the characters / situation. Waste of an hour and a half. Should have stopped watching earlier instead of finishing this garbage.

Live Cargo (2016)

Artistic Film

[2/10 · 30 July 2017]

A bit too artsy for me I have to say.

If you are a fan of excellent cinematography then this is well worth checking out. It is a very well made film in this area.

However, the story is limited. The characters are limited. The dialogue is limited. The acting is good but there isn't enough meat there for them to work with.

It is filmed in black and white. That disappointed me because I was looking forward to all the beauty of the islands. All the colours. The black and white detracted from that most of the time. Although sometimes it definitely added to landscapes and to the film in general.

Again, if you are a big fan of interesting & high quality cinematography, then this film is well worth checking out.

If you need more to enjoy a film, then I'd give this one a miss.

Ride Along 2 (2016)

Better than the first film

[7/10 · 27 January 2017]

Much better than the first Ride Along movie.

Kevin Hart is much less annoying in this movie. Ken Jeong complements Hart nicely and gives us a second funny guy. Olivia Munn is very good. Less of just Hart + Ice Cube. More of a cast. No Leguizmo who was supporting actor in the first one and was awful. Kevin Hart's girlfriend / fiancé was good again. Sherri Shepard was good in a small role. Fighting Kevin Hart (verbally). Good back and forth.

Much more of a cast and not just Hart + Ice Cube.

The story is interesting. The hacker. Benjamin Bratt as the bad guy. The parties. The Miami scene. All enjoyable. Good action scenes. Not just Hart running his mouth non-stop.

Hardly any of Kevin Hart endlessly asking Ice Cube why he doesn't like him which was not funny at all in the first one. Less of Ice Cube sneering at Hart and occasionally even liking Hart which was nice. There were so many dull boring parts in the first one between those two. Much less of that in the 2nd film and this film is much better off for it.

Hard Target 2 (2016 Video)

Lead Character was

[3/10 · 24 September 2016]

I came into this with low expectations ... hoping for an average run of the mill action movie.

And frankly this film couldn't even achieve that.

The lead character / actor was just so dull. I never found myself rooting for him to succeed. Hoping he doesn't die. Nor do you want him to fail. He was not even bad enough to root against him. He was just completely bland. Uninteresting. Bordering on irrelevance.

It's hard for a movie to get any traction when the lead character is so dull. He has no charisma. No enjoyment. No real relationship. One pointed to in the beginning but sped past at full speed so you never get any feel for either the lead character or the friend. Then there is the obligatory love interest which comes too late in the film and there is never any spark on screen between the two actors.

So bad lead character. No charisma. No relationships to get the lead out his shell. Thoroughly uninteresting individual and the whole movie revolves around him. When you do not care about the lead character it makes everything else less interesting. When you do not have a strong story (not that you would expect one in an action movie like this), you cannot overcome that.

Even when you do some of the other things right.

So overall, a 3 or 4 out of 10.

Thor (2011)

Dodgy Story

[4/10 · 20 August 2016]

So the start - the backstory - was boring. Spent 30 minutes waiting for the movie to start. No need for it. Could have been said in 30 seconds instead of 30 minutes.

The middle part when Thor is on Earth was very good. I enjoyed the character and how he interacted with the humans and how they interacted with him. That was fun to see.

The character story arc was good to this point. Then came then finale which, again, was boring.

So a bad start and a bad finish with a good middle. There is some promise here for a better sequel but this is not a good movie.

Mediocre = not due to idea / character (Thor) but due to plot / storytelling not being up to par.

12 Dates of Christmas (2011 TV Movie)

Not worth watching

[1/10 · 22 April 2016]

I choose to watch this movie because (1) Amy Smart - who I have liked in everything I have seen of her (2) Christmas movie - which I generally enjoy even when a lower standard (3) good IMDb reviews.

I didn't have big expectations are anything. I just wanted something close to average with a Christmasy feel to it with Amy Smart as the headline attraction.

But this movie could not even meet those low standards.

Despite only being 1hr 25min, the movie dragged on and on. The Groundhog Day stuff where Amy Smart relieves the same day over and over got very irritating. I rarely felt like Smart was making progress from Day to the next.

None of the characters were the type you would adhere to. You were never rooting for anybody. The love interest was a paper thin character who was too perfect. Smart was the only other character developed in the story. Nothing about her was particularly interesting beside how pretty she was.

I would never watch this movie again. It was a struggle to get through even once and would be even harder a 2nd time. I have been flip-flopping between 1 or 2 stars.

Miss Bala (2011)

Brutal portrayal of life amid the drug trade in Mexico

[9/10 · 25 February 2016]

An amazing film.

It does an incredible job of making you feel the tension and fear of the lead actress. Of how powerful the drug cartels are and how helpless and lost Mexico's citizens are.

The camera work is great. At times it lingers on so you can see and feel the gravity of the various situations. It does a good job of showing the violence without being too graphic. Turning away the camera at certain moments and letting our mind imagine what is happening based on the sounds.

Very well put together movie. You can feel the emotion throughout. The pain. The feat Very impressive. Much higher quality production than many Hollywood movies.

Misfire (2014)

Low grade action move

[3/10 · 22 February 2016]

Limited movie. Basic story line and plot is good.

The telling of the story leaves some to be desired. The screenwriter never gets you to care about the main characters. Not the main character (Gary Daniels) or either of the female characters. No believable relationships between any of the characters in the film. Dialogue isn't up to much. Characters paper thin. Little to no emotions shown. The film fails to get you the viewer to ever really care about any of characters. To even care whether they live or die. They are not likable. Paper thin. Limited emotions. The main character (Gary Daniels) - all he does is snarl / be angry. The is his only setting. He is not likable.

I liked the soundtrack. Some of the action scenes were good. Like I said, the basic plot was good and kept the movie going. The had some material there that they could have made better use of. I like drug cartel movies and action movies.

Overall, it is definitely below average. Either a 3 or a 4 out of 10. It is not a movie you go out of your way to see. If it's on TV and nothing else is, it's worth checking out if you are big action movie watcher.