The strongest message of the new movie "How to Rob a Bank" is: "A group of very angry bank robbers who have been greatly wronged by the injustices of medical insurance and banks decides to not only rob many banks but also broadcast how to successfully rob a bank and take revenge all over social media". Like Robin Hood, they use the money they steal to help people ruined by a greedy financial system that doesn't work. One of the bank robbers, Ryan (Nicholas Hoult), lost his son because of the greed of a bank that approved Ryan a predatory loan that drained his savings, and his son eventually died of cancer. Another bank robber, Vince (Pete Davidson), is dying of lung cancer due to a medical condition he got while fighting in Afghanistan. The other bank robber is Emi, Ryan's wife, who also lost her son to Cancer due to the inhumanity and greed of the bank.
The best idea in this story is teaching the world how to successfully rob a bank using social media (considering the group says the risk of getting caught is only 10%). Using social media to teach the world how to commit crimes is a new idea, never seen before, and it mostly works, with a payoff that was nothing we have not all seen before.
FBI agent West (John C. Riley), after years of being tricked by this gang of genius bank robbers, hires a software developer, Reagan (Zoe Kravitz), who invented a program that can essentially search the internet and identify where photographs and videos originated. Using this software, progress is made in tracking down where the bank robbers are, and it is the second good idea within a mostly average movie.
The Rotten Tomatoes give this movie a very low 33%, with my rating at 60%, mostly because of the message behind this story and a moderate pass.
Movie Reviews From a Screenwriter's Perspective
Saturday, November 14, 2026
Tuesday, November 10, 2026
Movie Review: Godzilla Minus Zero
Counting the new movie "Godzilla Minus Zero", 39 Godzilla movies have been produced, 34 of them from Japan. Why the entire country of Japan has had a fascination with this giant lizard creature since 1954 would just be speculation. Perhaps because the Japanese are generally shorter and this creature is so tall is a possible reason?
Anyone can easily estimate the special effects budget for any Godzilla movie, based on the total time with setup and build-up to the fighting and action scenes. For this movie, which runs for 2 hours and 15 minutes (too long), the build-up scenes are far too long and boring before the final payoff.
For this movie, there is a one-headed giant flying dragon who originally had one head, then, due to radiation and a series of electrical shocks, grows two more heads. This fire-breathing dragon is Godzilla's antagonist with the big fight/payoff at the end of the movie, which took far too long to see.
The problem with this screenplay is that there is not nearly enough explanation as to what is really going on (especially given the subtitles) and far too many long and boring scenes poorly explaining what everybody is trying to do.
The main characters include a young married couple and their five-year-old daughter, whom they have to leave on several occasions to keep her safe from the ongoing danger and explosions. I found the scene at the end, with the very cute five-year-old girl screaming and crying because her parents have to leave, both unnecessary and extremely disturbing. What were the producers thinking, greenlighting this nightmare scene towards the end of this movie?
Nobody should ever expect anything great from a Godzilla movie, both in terms of the quality of the production and the acting, but this one could have been so much better with some relatively obvious improvements. Starting with, there is no way this movie should be this long. The Rotten Tomatoes rating for this film is a way too high 90%, with my rating at 65% and a pass.
Anyone can easily estimate the special effects budget for any Godzilla movie, based on the total time with setup and build-up to the fighting and action scenes. For this movie, which runs for 2 hours and 15 minutes (too long), the build-up scenes are far too long and boring before the final payoff.
For this movie, there is a one-headed giant flying dragon who originally had one head, then, due to radiation and a series of electrical shocks, grows two more heads. This fire-breathing dragon is Godzilla's antagonist with the big fight/payoff at the end of the movie, which took far too long to see.
The problem with this screenplay is that there is not nearly enough explanation as to what is really going on (especially given the subtitles) and far too many long and boring scenes poorly explaining what everybody is trying to do.
The main characters include a young married couple and their five-year-old daughter, whom they have to leave on several occasions to keep her safe from the ongoing danger and explosions. I found the scene at the end, with the very cute five-year-old girl screaming and crying because her parents have to leave, both unnecessary and extremely disturbing. What were the producers thinking, greenlighting this nightmare scene towards the end of this movie?
Nobody should ever expect anything great from a Godzilla movie, both in terms of the quality of the production and the acting, but this one could have been so much better with some relatively obvious improvements. Starting with, there is no way this movie should be this long. The Rotten Tomatoes rating for this film is a way too high 90%, with my rating at 65% and a pass.
Sunday, November 8, 2026
Movie Review: Wild Horse Nine
In the new movie "Wild Horse Nine," two CIA operatives, Chris (John Malkovich) and Lee (Sam Rockwell), travel in 1973 to vacation on Easter Island, an Island about 2200 miles west of Chile's coast. One of the reasons why Chris and Lee go to Easter Island is to see the "big heads.", which are a series of about 900 giant heads carved from volcanic rock, constructed between 1250 and 1300 AD by the Rapa Nui people, the Polynesian inhabitants of Easter Island. The statues honored ancestors and protected their communities. The Rapa Nui believed their ancestors could provide spiritual protection and power, called mana.
While this big head story is the backdrop of this film, the real reason Chris and Lee are on Easter Island is that Chris is dying of what is probably lung cancer, and the CIA was involved in trying to undermine Chile's democratically elected socialist president, Salvador Allende, and the military coup that brought General Augusto Pinochet to power on September 11, 1973. Surprisingly, with all of this going on, this movie was too slow and too boring for a large percentage of its runtime. There is witty and sometimes funny dialogue between Chris and Lee but not enough to try and figure out what was the point of these two hours?
Chris and Lee run into two young women from Chile who were unaware of the huge events that would be unfolding in Chile in the next few days. Steve Buscemi, plays MJ, the CIA bureau chief in Santiago, Chile, who is also a Heroin addict. Buscemi is very good and funny in his role, with some of the best scenes in this movie.
Wild Horse Nine is another one of these "let's be different at all costs" movies that was too strange and unfortunately too boring for me to recommend. The Rotten Tomatoes rating is a way too high 94%, with my rating at 75% and a recommendation only for the biggest fans of Steve Buscemi, John Malkovich, and Sam Rockwell.
While this big head story is the backdrop of this film, the real reason Chris and Lee are on Easter Island is that Chris is dying of what is probably lung cancer, and the CIA was involved in trying to undermine Chile's democratically elected socialist president, Salvador Allende, and the military coup that brought General Augusto Pinochet to power on September 11, 1973. Surprisingly, with all of this going on, this movie was too slow and too boring for a large percentage of its runtime. There is witty and sometimes funny dialogue between Chris and Lee but not enough to try and figure out what was the point of these two hours?
Chris and Lee run into two young women from Chile who were unaware of the huge events that would be unfolding in Chile in the next few days. Steve Buscemi, plays MJ, the CIA bureau chief in Santiago, Chile, who is also a Heroin addict. Buscemi is very good and funny in his role, with some of the best scenes in this movie.
Wild Horse Nine is another one of these "let's be different at all costs" movies that was too strange and unfortunately too boring for me to recommend. The Rotten Tomatoes rating is a way too high 94%, with my rating at 75% and a recommendation only for the biggest fans of Steve Buscemi, John Malkovich, and Sam Rockwell.
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