Movie Review: 28 Days Later

I have often wondered how the late director George A. Romero would have reacted to the hundreds of zombie movies and long-standing TV shows his original "Night of the Living Dead" (1968) has spawned since its release. This original zombie movie was about as disgusting, disturbing, and horrifying as any horror movie could be. However, 1968 was 57 long years ago, and by now, anyone would think that we have all had enough of the living dead, and the living dead eating living people, and the shooting or stabbing the dead in the head to kill them. Enough already.

The new movie "28 Years Later" is somewhat unique for two reasons. Number one, the movie trailer is one of the most annoying and overplayed of all time. Number two, by far the most used method for killing the zombies in this story is by using a bow and arrow.

This movie is mainly about two acts. Act one is about a father, Jamie, leaving the confines of a protected human camp and teaching his 11-year-old son Spike how to hunt and kill zombies with a bow and arrow. Obviously, this is an absurd idea, risking the life of a young boy like this, but for some unknown reason, this is the longest part of this movie. This first act consists of running, stopping, and shooting zombies in the head with a bow and arrow, resulting in repeated scenes that get old very quickly, in this remarkably bad movie.

The second act unfolds after a significant argument between Spike and his father. Following this conflict, Spike ventures out with his sick mother, Isla, into Zombieland for reasons that mostly lack clarity. By the end of the second act, they encounter Dr. Kelson, played by the film's only well-known actor, Ralph Fiennes. To protect himself from the zombies, Dr. Kelson covers himself in iodine, which I found amusing, almost as if Fiennes was trying to disguise himself for participating in this surprisingly bad and boring movie.

It is anyone's guess why the Rotten Tomatoes ratings for this film are as high as 90%, with a far more accurate audience rating of 67%. My rating for this waste of 2 hours is 30%, but only for the most die-hard zombie movie hobbyists.

Movie Review: The Life of Chuck

The new movie "The Life of Chuck" is based on the Steven King book of the same name. This film successfully creates several new movie ideas that have never been seen before. There are three acts, with the acts told in reverse.

The third act is told as if the entire universe exists with the dying mind of the main character Charles 'Chuck' Krantz, played by Tom Hiddleston, and as Chuck slowly dies at age 39, there is an apocalypse that results in the end of the world. This idea is by far the riskiest of the three acts which also includes many billboards througout this act that show Chuck with a caption, "Thank you for 39 great years".

In the second act, we find out that Chuck is a banker in his adulthood, and at age 39, he is diagnosed with a terminal brain tumor. In another unusual scene, while Chuck is walking to work, he sees a street musician playing the drums, and he starts dancing, eventually being joined by another woman. The dancing was well done, despite its highly unusual presence in this movie.

The first act is about Chuck's tragic childhood, with Chuck played by Jacob Tremblay. Chuck's parents are killed in a car accident, and then Chuck goes to live with his grandparents. Chuck learns to dance in high school and demonstrates his unique ability to backwards moonwalk. Actress Mia Sara (one of the main characters in "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" (1986), appears in her first acting role in 14 years. Also highly unusual is a room in the upstairs of the house Chuck lives in that has supernatural abilities that we find out about at the end of this story.

Given that this movie is entirely based on a Steven King short story, there is no workaround as far as making this movie more mainstream and less insane. Overall, this film was well shot and engaging enough to sit through without getting bored. The Rotten Tomatoes ratings of 82% is mostly accurate with my rating around 80% and a solid recommendation.

Apple TV Movie Review: Echo Valley

The new Apple TV movie “Echo Valley” is one of the few movies I have ever seen that explores the lengths a parent will go to protect and save their child. Echo Valley stars Sydney Sweeney as Claire Garretson and Julianne Moore as Kate Garretson in a story where Kate is desperately trying to save the life of Claire, who has fallen into drug use and is associating with dangerous criminals.

There are several well-played scenes of intense, high-emotion acting where Claire is begging Kate for money and lying about her reasons for needing the money, which is obviously to buy more drugs. Kate is divorced, lives on a horse farm, and has big money problems, even asking her ex-husband for money to fix the roof on her barn before it collapses.

The casting of two extreme criminal lowlifes for the parts of Jackie and Claire’s boyfriend Ryan was very well done, as these two actors both played and looked their parts perfectly. There is the standard movie trickery and sleight of hand in this story, which should be considered too outlandish to believe could ever happen. Far too often, it seems to be more important to fool the audience rather than come up with an original and coherent idea. I did like the ending, because it reminded me of one of the reasons we all go to the movies, because real life rarely has a satisfying ending where the evil people get what they deserve.

Due to reviews like this one on Rotten Tomatoes: “Strong performances are squandered on a sub-par script and characters who are too grating to feel a modicum of connection to.”, Dana Han-Klein, the average rating is only 51%. I am giving this film a mild recommendation with a 70% rating only because of the strong acting by both Sydney Sweeney and Julianne Moore.