Mini Reviews of Movies I’ve Seen Lately [1]

Sicario

I came into this thinking I would love it, but I was pretty disappointed. 

First, by the fact that the story was underdeveloped. I felt like they spent the first hour and half setting up the story, by finishing it in two scenes and in an unsatisfactory way. Props for Benicio del Toro, but overall the story didn’t stick.
Second, because I ended up hating, or better said, disliking Emily Blunt’s character. She spent most of the movie feeling confused, insecure and weak. I get that the actions she had to go through didn’t follow her values and moral compass, but I still would have liked to see more from her. 

Actually, this got me thinking right now: maybe we are used to seeing women, especially leading women in movies, portraying strong roles, so when we do come across a weak one, we put her down, to say so. Hmm..something to think about in the future. 

Overall, I didn’t like Sicario, and I won’t be seeing the second part.

The Big Short

I stumbled upon this one randomly one night, going through Netlix’s recommended movies. I’m glad I did, because it was pretty educational and the cast was great. I mean, Ryan Gosling, Steve Carrell, Brad Pitt, Christian Bale, Marissa Tomei, and two underrated actors I really like, Finn Wittrock and John Magaro. Acting-wise, it’s great. 

Story-wise, although very interesting, it was too detailed. It really got into the nitty gritty of how and why the crisis happened and at times it used too many specific finance terms to fully understand the situation. They tried to fix it by making Margot Robbie, Anthony Bourdain and Selena Gomez explain certain concepts, but it didn’t save it that much. Also, the editing was crazy. And the whole narration of the side felt a bit weird at times. 

I have mixed feeling about this one. 

The Assassination of Jesse James by the coward Robert Ford 

I loved this movie. First thing I have to mention is the great casting, which provided amazing performances, especially by Brad Pitt, Casey Affleck and Sam Rockwell. Each one of them deserved an Oscar.

The cinematography (Roger Deakins) and direction (Andrew Dominik) were amazing, it’s one of the most visually beautiful movies I have ever seen. The only thing that kind of bothered me was the pacing of the story, it was rather slow. But I guess it was a conscious decision, because the whole thing felt impending, like something bad was about to happen, we were just waiting for the bullet to hit.

Definitely recommend this movie, if you haven’t seen it already.