My overall impression of this film was that it reminded me too much of things I've seen before. Blindness and The Happening. I hate it when a build up of what the monster looks like is never fulfilled and overall it just felt like an amalgon of stories told repeatedly before. It's still a decent film and I recommend a view. Don't expect more than what you've seen before. The majority of what I felt about this film is on my youtube channel. Click Above to see my full review.
Plot: When a mysterious force decimates the population, only one thing is certain -- if you see it, you die. The survivors must now avoid coming face to face with an entity that takes the form of their worst fears. Searching for hope and a new beginning, a woman and her children embark on a dangerous journey through the woods and down a river to find the one place that may offer sanctuary. To make it, they'll have to cover their eyes from the evil that chases them -- and complete the trip blindfolded.
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I love the original Oceans trilogy, I felt Soderbergh was able to craft 3 incredibly enjoyable heist movies. It's pretty obvious by now that Hollywood is remaking loads of classic movies but replacing the men with women. This can either work or it doesn't, I appreciate Oceans 8 for not being a remake but rather a sequel. It's simply building on everything that's came before, it's more of what we've come to enjoy about these movies so if you didn't like any of the first 3 movies then you certainly won't find much to like about this one.
This time around we follow Danny Oceans sister, Debbie Ocean (Sandra Bullock). She's looking to pull of the biggest heist of her career, steal $150 million worth of diamonds concealed around movie star Daphne's (Anne Hatheway) neck. Before the pulls this off she needs a crew, a crew consisting of 8 females all carefully chosen for specific roles.
We rarely see Sandra Bullock in a lead role anymore so it's a breath of fresh air when we see her leading this heist. And oh does she do it well. One of my biggest joys of the movie was her, she was extremely likeable and determined to pull this thing off. The chemistry between all these character is brilliant, you can really see the friendship blossom throughout the movie. You really get a feel that Bullock and Blanchett have been friends for years, it is a shame that not every character is as fleshed out as I would have liked but I do see why that would have been hard considering the movies runtime. I'm not going to go into depth about every individual character like many reviewers have done because I don't think it's something that needs to be spoken about. If you've seen the trailer then you know every skillset every character has and how they play into the story. I will however say that it's so fun to see all these cast of characters come together and form a team. I especially liked how there's a little line thrown in that atleast tries to give an explanation to the audience about why it's only women working on this heist. I really appreciated the screenwriters for going that extra mile to write something like that into the movie.
Although Soderbergh only produced this movie his humour is still there. For anyone who's seen the original movies, Logan Lucky or Magic Mike. Then you know how unique and silly his style of humour can be. I definetely got that vibe here, watching them have to look at a diamond necklace for far to long that it becomes hilariously suspicious to everyone around them, all because they need to 3d scan it. There's even a scene where we see two of the characters trying out Tinder for the first time, in the midst of all this planning and we have two people swiping on Tinder. Now that is funny.
So how is the heist? The thing that everyone comes to see this movie for. It's incredibly engaging and riveting to watch, not in an action sense but in a Soderbergh type of way. Every character looks cool and slick as their plan works through each and everyone of them. It's just a shame that the heist never turns up the heat, there never seems like there's any danger that's about to happen as pretty much everything goes to plan with not even a small bit of it looking like it might not plan out the way they hoped. It's a real shame there wasn't any jeopardy to the heist, the movie might have really benefited if just for a moment the peril really ramped up,.
Overall there is a lot to like in this movie, otherwise I wouldn't be giving it a 7. The cast ensemble is great, I liked every single one of the actresses and felt the chemistry between them all was fantastic. Especially Sandra Bullock and Cate Blanchett, but Bullock is most certainly the stand out performance. It's very cliche and does nothing to reinvent the heist formula, but it is incredibly fun and has an upbeat tone that makes for a very enjoyable watch.
Evolving from single-celled yellow organisms at the dawn of time, Minions live to serve, but find themselves working for a continual series of unsuccessful masters, from T. Rex to Napoleon. Without a master to grovel for, the Minions fall into a deep depression. This is the part in the beginning of the movie that was also in the trailer. I was out buying popcorn.
Sandra Bullock as Scarlett OverKill was one of the funnier characters, the duo of Jon Hamm as Herb Overkill was a great dynamic. I didn't know that all the Minions were voiced by Pierre Coffin.
I'll have to watch this movie again to determine with was the better film, Inside Out or Minions. Though I believe Minions will make more money and take the top spot till Ant-Man will make the cut. My prediction for the week. Minions are number one, Jurassic World will take number two spot and Inside Out will be third.
***SPOILER ALERT***
The biggest surprise that I could have waited for was the return of Steve Carell as Young Gru. I was okay with it but I felt that it was too soon. If Minions spawns a sequel I would have rather Gru come then. But I can see that were leaning towards the adventures of Gru and Minions from the younger years.
