Some trailers I've seen recently, and my thoughts on them. (Links are
to youtube. Opinions are thoroughly personal. Calibration: if you
don't know by now…)
Padre no hay más que uno:
I suppose at least we can be glad that this sort of shit isn't made in
English as much as it used to be.
Possessor:
this is trying very hard to look like generic horror. I think there's
perhaps more to it than that; at least I'll keep an eye out for more
information.
[Yellow Rose(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oI5sUWvFWo):
mid-trailer turnaround so it may be more than just the bog-standard
feelgood story, but it still doesn't look as though it has much to
say.
Rebecca:
what, yet another adaptation? Why did we need this rather than an
original story?
Dune:
I have no earwig in this fight. I don't think much of the book, and in
any case I'm used to rotten adaptations of good books. This looks…
frankly, just like recent Star Wars. Which might be the right thing
to do with it.
Freaky:
well, that at least is something like an original idea. Might even be
vaguely enjoyable.
Hubie Halloween:
while this just has nothing to say to me at all.
The Father:
mad old man is mad. If you are trying only to appeal to mad old men
then you don't need to get the sympathy of the audience. Maybe the
film will do a better job of this.
The Nest:
but I don't want to watch "a hyper-nuanced study of marriage mind
games". File under "not the target audience" I suppose.
Love and Monsters:
a remarkably casual post-apocalypse. Might work, and it looks good,
but I don't love it.
Synchronic:
looks potentially interesting, though it could still go horribly
wrong. Through the narrow slit that the trailer allows, it seems to
have possibilities.
The Last Shift:
the young black man is there for the old white man to learn an
Important Lesson. Uh-huh.
The Place of No Words:
has the air of being a Beloved Children's Book. (But apparently it's
not.) If it can avoid the problem of no tension because anything can
happen, might be decent.
A Rainy Day in New York:
pretty white people problems. Oh, right, they're still letting Woody
Allen make films. What a shame.
The Wolf of Snow Hollow:
might work, but like so many of these things it needs to build up
sympathy for its protagonist rather than just assuming I'm going to be
cheering for the handsome young man.
Another Round:
might work, but again it assumes I have some sympathy with these guys
who are running out on their responsibilities.
The Opening Act:
Ken Jeong isn't a good sign, and it looks as if there's a lot of
comedy of embarrassment here.
The Croods - A New Age:
people who like this sort of film will like this film.
The Trial of The Chicago 7:
is this the best treatment? Probably not. Is it better than no
treatment at all? Probably.
Sound of Metal:
impressive acting in service of a plot and characters that don't
engage me.
Supernova:
is "gay people also sometimes go mad and die" really all this has to
offer?
The Craft - Legacy:
so this bit was pinched from Carrie, and the rest feels like a
generic horror-flavoured stew. But then I quite enjoyed the original,
so I'm obviously not in the target market: remakes are aimed not at
people who watch old stuff but at people with an endless appetite for
a thing nobody has seen before. Still, at least they got an actual
female writer-director.
Minari:
will probably speak to people who aren't me.
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