aaronmorgan-28895 Reviews

The Beach Bum (2019)

Non-event

[22 April 2021]

Started with potential, but they lost the plot. You need to be high to enjoy this one. A pile of dribble with a top notch cast.

Mindhunter (2017–2019)

Binge worthy

[7 November 2019]

If you're going to indulge in nasty crime drama, at least make it the smartest one on TV. It seems gruesome serial killers never go out of fashion. Addictive!

Vox Lux (2018)

Fail

[7 November 2019]

New entry to my Top10 worst movies I have seen in the theatre. I'm almost speechless, this was a major let down. No plot. Dislikeable characters. Terrible music. Anticlimactic. Don't understand what it was trying to say. Gold sequined masks. That's all.

The Revenant (I) (2015)

Badass epic

[7 February 2017]

Leonardo DiCaprio gives his all in this survival movie. He walks, then walks some more, and then does a bit more walking. If an actor putting himself through hell equals awards glory, then DiCaprio deserves his name on the trophy for his performance representing a kind of progressive frontier man. Part of the entertainment of watching The Revenant is knowing its cast and crew went through the same crazy conditions and endurance tests the actor went through in the various middles of various uncharted wilderness.

Director Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu transports us to another time and place in this depiction of First Nations people. The movie is based on historic fiction, when a fur-trapping expedition in the Midwest gets attacked by a Native American tribe and history gets written in blood. Excellence in art should always be rewarded and Leo sure is in the right role with the right director at the right time.

Kurt & Courtney (1998)

There is no definitive movie on Cobain.

[4 February 2017]

"Who killed Kurt...?" Every time someone dies, an intriguing conspiracy theory arises from the ashes. I only saw this movie recently, and not knowing what to expect, let me say if you are looking for definitive answers about the death of Cobain, well you won't find them here. Kurt's death was very tragic, but even his Aunt claims the whole conspiracy theory is a load of bunk and it is clear to me that his addiction and depression killed him. Neither Dave Grohl nor Krist Novoselic are featured throughout the movie but I was impressed how director Nick Broomfield handled it. He exposes the hypocrisy of Hollywood and manages to dig some pure oddballs out of the woodwork. Fans of Courtney Love are likely to despise this movie, she get ripped into and the disdain for her is evident throughout. My final view is that it's interesting but sometimes flawed and proves again that there is no definitive movie on Cobain.

Zodiac (2007)

Mind-bending Movie

[29 November 2016]

This is a long one that never takes off, but not a total snore-fest because it never collapses. Based on the actual case files of one of the most intriguing unsolved crimes in the nation's history, this doesn't break new ground and it's not a thrill ride but it's a mature movie. The Zodiac killings captivated the Bay Area, in large part because the killer used the media to hold the city hostage, forcing newspapers to run cryptic puzzles under the threat of further violence. The men who chased the phantom leads couldn't leave the puzzle unsolved. Smart casting, precise detail, historically authentic, and outstanding performances from Jake Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo and Robert Downey, Jr. who are totally awesome. To be honest I did check my watch at times, so you'll need patience, but it's never really boring, more of a mind-bending movie.

Slow West (2015)

Endurance test

[11 November 2016]

"Slow West" kinda disappointed me. From first till last it's calm, cool and collected and the cinematography was very fresh and original but it it means nothing and totally lives up to its title. The lack of any real dramatic incident left me indifferent to where events are heading but did the Brits making this movie not realize these were actual people American viewers would recognize? In some scenes we see "Wanted" posters with the faces of real-life 19th century Americans such as Robert E. Lee. The back story doesn't answer questions like why the girl is an outlaw or how the boy knew how to find her, and how he got from Scotland to America considering his youth and lack of funds. Would a real 19th century bad-ass really shave a young man. It's one poky Western, on a death march to a pointless ending without actually saying much of anything except that things were very dangerous in the olden days

Idiocracy (2006)

We Have Become an Idiocracy

[8 November 2016]

The world has already become very similar to the one depicted in this movie, like how we're going to build a wall. Are you kidding me? This is a spot-on match for modern culture. I'll still be discussing this with my buddies 30 years down the road. The movie provokes so much thought about the direction of mankind. It is social satire at its best with dumb humor, but that's the point of the movie. Never before has a stupid movie been so smart with dead-on observations the entire time. The movie centers around two ordinary people being frozen and waking up 500 years in the future, only to realize that instead of evolving, mankind is dumber. Much dumber. Some reviewers don't get it. Maybe it touches too close to home with them. If you already understand extremely dry satire, you'll probably like it. If you don't, you'll hate it.

Bowie: The Man Who Changed the World (2016)

All The Not So Young Dudes

[4 November 2016]

I'm a die-hard Bowie fan from before Ziggy Stardust. This new release confirmed my hopes & desires to see something different about Mr. Jones so I was pleasantly surprised. It may not be especially interesting to casual fans, but Bowie zealots will treasure these new interviews with friends who document the making of an icon. It examines how Bowie was responsible for pioneering the most groundbreaking fashion trends of the twentieth century. How he refused to conform to 'masculine' expectations and ended up changing the face of music. His shifting identities served a purpose, but even when all the "confusion" is stripped away, he still retained an enigmatic mystique. Sadly, there's no Bowie music in this, but it's well constructed and overall, the movie serves to help illuminate to Bowie fans on who the man really was.

David Bowie: Five Years (2013)

Golden Years

[4 November 2016]

A lot of well deserved praise has been heaped on the work and life of David Bowie since his very sad death in January this year. One of his great gifts was spotting trends and seeing the way the wind was blowing before anyone else, a facility he retained right up till he passed on. This great documentary uses personal quotes from the legend, as well as his songs.. It was released just three years before he died, and there are some unexpected highlights, like a sequence of Bowie filmed at Andy Warhol's Factory, which suggested that Bowie's talent for mime wasn't all it's cracked up to be. The structure of Five Years makes it a lot more interesting than your usual pop documentary. Rather than try to talk about 50 years of pop super-stardom in two hours, the movie gives us five year-long snapshots. Things are brought up to speed at the end with a snippet of what we could call The Next Year. The follow up "David Bowie "The Last Five Years" is out next year