FANTASTIC BEASTS: THE CRIMES OF GRINDELWALD (2018) – My rating: 8/10

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald is a fantasy film directed by David Yates and written by J. K. Rowling. A joint British and American production, it is the sequel to Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016). It is the second installment in the Fantastic Beasts film series, and the tenth overall in the Wizarding World franchise, which began with the Harry Potter film series.  The plot follows Newt Scamander and a young Albus Dumbledore as they attempt to take down the dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald, while facing new threats in a more divided wizarding world. If you’re a Harry Potter fan, you’ll love this sequel.

**** SOME SPOILERS BELOW ****

Fantastic Beast: The Crimes of Grindelwald is set in 1927 with the Magical Congress of the United States of America (MACUSA) transferring the powerful dark wizard, Gellert Grindelwald (Johnny Depp) from their maximum security prison to London to be tried for his crimes in Europe. While departing New York City, Grindelwald is freed by his follower and MACUSA employee, Abernathy (Kevin Guthrie). Grindelwald kills the guards and escapes.

Three months after Grindelwald’s escape, Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne) appeals to the British Ministry of Magic to restore his international travel rights, lost during his visit to New York City. While at the Ministry, he meets with Leta Lestrange (Zo Kravitz), an old Hogwarts friend who is now engaged to his Auror [a position equivalent to a cop against magic] brother, Theseus Scamander (Callum Turner). The Ministry of Magic offers to restore Newt’s travel rights if he agrees to work for them, alongside Theseus, in locating the Obscurial Credence Barebone (Ezra Miller), who has resurfaced in Paris. Many suspect that Credence is Leta’s long-lost brother, Corvus Lestrange, the last of a long pure-blood line of wizards. Grindelwald believes Credence is the only person who can kill his living equal, Hogwarts Professor Albus Dumbledore (Jude Law). When Newt declines, not wanting to choose a side, the Auror Grimmson (Ingvar Eggert Sigurðsson) is dispatched in his place. After leaving the Ministry, Newt is summoned by Dumbledore, who also asks Newt to locate Credence in Paris.

When Newt returns home, his American friends, Queenie Goldstein (Alison Sudol) and Jacob Kowalski (Dan Fogler) have unexpectedly arrived. Jacob has retained most of his memories from the 1926 events in New York City because MACUSA’s city-wide Obliviating order only erased memories from people who had bad ones.  Jacob’s memories stayed in tact since his were mostly good.  Queenie tells Newt that her sister, Tina Goldstein (Katherine Waterston), is in Paris searching for Credence and she and Jacob have followed her to Europe. Queenie also reveals that Tina believes Newt is betrothed to Leta Lestrange after reading a newspaper article announcing their engagement.  Newt explains that the paper confused him with Theseus. After Jacob and Queenie quarrel about the marriage ban between wizards and Muggles, Queenie, upset, leaves to find Tina. Hoping to reconcile with the women, Newt and Jacob follow them to Paris.

While the plot is fairly simple, Crimes of Grindelwald gets pretty involved with complicated subplots.  From the search for Credence in Paris to accidentally freeing animals and Credence’s birth mother search, it’s hard to keep up.  Many characters, join the film making it slightly more complicated.  There are strange animals and ruthless murderers also adding to the twists and turns of this movie. You really have to be a fan in order to fully enjoy Crimes of Grindelwald.  While I thought I was a fan, I was unable to make complete sense of all that was happening.  I did enjoy the cinematography and the fashions and most of the plot, despite the abundance of cast and over the top story twists.  The action was plentiful as was the special effects.  The acting was brilliant and many of the characters were British.  If you’re taking your youngster(s) to see Crimes of Grindelwald, you may have some explaining to do, or they may be explaining the movie to you — Overall, I think Crimes of Grindelwald is a pretty good flick, –Check it out!

 

BLACK MASS (2015) – My rating: 8.7/10

Being a big Johnny Depp fan, I didn’t want to see Black Mass.  I didn’t like the way he looked with the receding hairline and slicked back hairdo, nor did I want to see him as a villain.  Of course that’s ridiculous because Johnny Depp is an excellent actor who can play many different genres.  Black Mass is a long, long, way from Captain Jack Sparrow or Edward Scissorhands.  Not a hint of Johnny Depp’s brand of silliness is anywhere to be found in Black Mass.  This is not Depp’s first go round as a mobster type character (Public Enemies & Donnie Brasco) to name a couple.  Black Mass is a true story about James “Whitey” Bulger, (Johnny Depp) a small time gangster who reined on the South side of Boston in the 1970s .  Bulger controlled an Irish-American gang called the Winter Hill Gang along with his right hand man, Stephen “The Rifleman” Flemmi (Rory Cochrane), Kevin Weeks (Jesse Piemons) and hitman, Johnny Martorano (W. Earl Brown).  Whitey has a brother, William “Billy” Bulger (Benedict Cumberbatch) who was a Boston senator and not tied to any type of crime.  A lot of this film surrounds the details of a relationship between Whitey and a FBI agent who was also a childhood friend named John Connolly (Joel Edgerton).  Connolly became corrupt as he grew closer and closer to Whitey and the gang.   The Angiulo Brothers, a powerful family with ties to the Mafia controlled the Northern side of Boston and killed one of the members of Whitey’s gang.  After some pressure from Connolly, Whitey became a FBI informant against the Angiulo Brothers.  The plot runs deep, the crime and violence runs deep and the corruption runs deep.  I found Black Mass to be quite entertaining and a solid story about organized crime.  The end is wrapped up nicely, the acting was superb, the story was real and I heard some talk about Oscar.  BTW, Kevin Bacon plays one of the FBI bosses at odds with Connolly.  I didn’t know he was in the film, so it was a surprise and a treat to see him perform.  This was one of the better movies of 2015.  Definitely worth seeing!

INTO THE WOODS (2014) – My rating: 7.5/10

For one, I love these new fairy tale fantasies. Into the Woods is well done. Into the Woods sort of reminds me of “Once Upon a Time”, which I watch on TV. There are a couple of similarities however, Into the Woods is big budget and brought to you by Disney.  Need I say more.  There’s not even too much more I can say about Meryl Streep except that she is a phenomenal actress.  Into the Woods is a delightful musical fantasy that takes Cinderella (Anna Kendrick), Rapunzel (MacKenzie Mauzy), Little Red Riding hood (Lilla Crawford) and Jack and the Beanstalk (Daniel Huttlestone),  and merges them together to make a new fairytale, with a twist.  It all starts with the Baker (James Corden) and his wife (Emily Blunt) that live in a house that was cursed many years ago.  The witch (Meryl Streep) will reverse the curse if the baker and his wife bring her 4 items that they must retrieve from the woods.  From this point, everyone is engaged with doing their part to get the job done.  Many lessons are learned and many penalties are paid.  If you see Into the Woods, you’ll love Meryl Streep as well as the rest of the cast.  Tracey Ullman played Jack’s mom and Johnny Depp played the wolf.  Christine Baronski played Cinderella’s step mom and was also great.  Everyone seems so much younger than I thought they should be — good make-up.  I found this movie to be entertaining with a good message.  The singing was fantastic.  Worth seeing!

[Into the Woods is nominated for Best Supporting Actress, Costume Design and Production Design]

 

THE LONE RANGER (2013) — My rating: 9.5/10

Okay, everyone knows I’m a huge Johnny Depp fan so this review might be slightly bias.  I will try my best to be honest and true.  Did I love this movie?  The answer is YES, YES, YES!  Only Johnny Depp could have set the aura, the comedic moves, the sarcasm, the hint of silliness and the seriousness that made this movie so good.  I vaguely remember the Lone Ranger of yesterday — if it had been written like this, I would not have forgotten a thing.  From Helena Bonham Carter’s gun shooting, porcelain leg and foot, to Tonto’s dead bird head gear, The Lone Ranger was a total blast.  It wasn’t slap stick (which I don’t care for) and it wasn’t silly or stupid.  It actually has a strong story to tell and some history lessons to boot.  The Indians didn’t get blamed for everything evil and bad and the greediness and ruthlessness of our great country came into play.  Of course the actions of some are not the rule of the majority but justice prevailed all over this funny yet dramatic movie from the past.  Armie Hammer who always reminds me of Brendan Fraser, did an excellent job of portraying the “justice is not blind” lawyer turned lawman.  I really enjoyed it, laughed endlessly and anxiously awaited each scene.  I highly recommend you check out The Lone Ranger!

[THE LONE RANGER is nominated for Achievement in Visual Effects]

IRON MAN 3 — My rating: 8/10

Every critique of a movie is actually the opinion of the “critiquer” or the person doing the critiquing.  Having said that, I feel it’s okay to further interject with a personal opinion about certain actors portraying a character.  Iron Man 3 is the subject of this critique.

For a long while, I had given up on one of my favorite actors.  Writing him off to the wilds of drugs and too much partying.  Just when it looked as though he was about to cancel out of society, a remarkable thing happened.  As he had fallen, he got back up for the umpteen time.  Only this time, he stood tall and continues to do so.  Even though I don’t know Robert Downing, Jr. personally, I am so proud of his achievements.  In a strange way, he reminds me of Johnny Depp.  His larger than life personality and aura brings a uniqueness to every character he plays.  I believe he is up there on genius status.  He is brilliant to watch and quite pleasing to the eyes.

Iron Man 1 and 2 were so good, I didn’t want either to end.  I gave each a 10 out or 10 rating.  Iron Man 3 was also good, however I felt there was much to much destruction.  Too many scenes had us witnessing building after building being destroyed.  It really became tiresome.  The “one man’s revenge” thing has also been overdone.  Somebody has run out of fresh ideas on how to come up with a scenario that renders a good plot for evil vs. pretty good.  I know the Iron Man idea is a fantasy, however there are a select number of  folks who sometimes convince themselves that this might be possible somewhere down the line.  Therefore, some semblance of normalcy would be appreciated.  Suffice to say, I didn’t like this third sequel as much as the first and second films but I liked it enough to rate it 8 out of 10.

[IRON MAN 3 is nominated for Achievement in Visual Effects]