RogerBW's Blog

Some trailers I've seen recently, and my thoughts on them. (Links are to youtube. Opinions are thoroughly personal. Calibration: I want a trailer to tell me what's different about this film; the marketers want it to tell me why it's like all the others…)

Hallelujah: interesting in that it's less overall biopic and more about a specific few events.

All Quiet on the Western Front: yeah, OK, but did anyone need a third filmed version?

Armageddon Time: Goodness, Anthony Hopkins got old. Otherwise, meh.

Luckiest Girl Alive: it appears to have something to say, at least, and Kunis is often worth watching.

Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile: without the nostalgia that I'm presumably meant to have, this looks a lot like generic kidvid.

What's Love Got To Do With It?: clearly heavy-handed but might actually be fun.

Wendell & Wild (Teaser): not Tim Burton but sharing a lot of his style. Probably not for me, but may well work for its intended audience.

Close: there is nothing more fascinating than middle-class white boys.

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One: looks exactly like all the other post-Bond actioners, with the added drag of Tom Cruise.

My Policeman: doesn't resonate for me, but the cast looks good.

The Good Nurse: all too plausible, really. Which perhaps means I'm less surprised than I should be. (Also most of the story is given away here.)

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery (Teaser): haven't seen the first one yet; this is too bitty to say much.

Meet Cute: I'm in for the basic idea but this seems like a very superficial implementation of it. Is there actually any more to the plot than we see here?

Disenchanted: it's Disney so they won't carry through, but this looks as though it has some interesting ideas at least.

Hocus Pocus 2: assumes I already love the characters. I don't already love the characters.

The Little Mermaid (Teaser): …still, if that's what Disney can come up with for "original", I start to get some idea why they keep doing these live-action remakes that nobody was asking for.

The Fabelmans: so Spielberg's fetishisation of childhood has now consumed his own childhood? Yay, I guess. This is his Danse Macabre. Maybe he'll stop now.

Babylon: too many of these people look very modern to my eye, especially Robbie, whose role seems awfully simplistic. Might have something to say to someone; might just be Mulholland Drive with more breasts.

MaXXXine (Teaser): that's a teaser all right, tells me nothing significant about the film.

The School for Good and Evil: yeah yeah just another magical school story, with lots of CGI.

Detective Knight: Rogue: what another Old Bruce actioner? Are we sure they didn't just make one long Bruce sequence and they're cutting his scenes in among other cheaper actors?

I Wanna Dance With Somebody: I suppose I can't reasonably complain about the unoriginality of the story when it's based on real life, but it does feel awfully standard.

Decision to Leave: Park Chan-Wook isn't a recommendation for me, but there seems to be something appealing here.

Mr. Harrigan's Phone: doesn't seem particularly fun, but you never know. (In reality of course we all know iPhones cannot be haunted, because they're sold already possessed by iOS; unless you jailbreak them and install your own spirit-trap.)

Piggy: yay fat-shaming as motivation.

The Loneliest Boy in the World: oh the overpowering agony of young white men who need everything handed to them. Might go somewhere but it's not promising.

Hellraiser: that this is to be released as a "hulu original" seems particularly perverse. Oh look, the pins are longer this time.

Strange World: generic CG kidvid, plus chosen-one fantasy.

Supreme Models: I suppose if you have to have models at all you might as well have black ones. As long as you don't have something really dangerous like models of a normal weight.

Knock at the Cabin: meh. Oh, it's M. Night, no wonder it looks meh. Plus some Sophie's Choice goodness, gosh I'm so thrilled zzz.

Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths: yeah, pretty, but do you have anything to say other than "I can make people do whatever silly thing I tell them to do. Also breasts"?

Rosaline: …actually I think this might be enjoyably silly.

Enola Holmes 2: I quite enjoyed te first one. As long as this can resist the urge to go back and re-tell the first story, it might be worth watching.

Extraction 2 (First Look): bigger and stupider, check.

Heart of Stone (First Look): big and stupid, check. That's what First Looks are for, I guess.

The Mother (Teaser): let me guess, she doesn't do that any more until she has to do it one more time?

They Cloned Tyrone (Teaser): why do we care? Just more sexy cool criminals in over their heads. Nice blaxploitation look, perhaps a little over-deliberate.

Aftersun: bored with coming of age. Girl's story, yay, but if it's the same old story anyway…?

The Letter: yes yes, but we know this. The people who claim not to know it are denying it. There's nobody you need to tell any more.

Hunt: looks like fairly standard stuff. There's been a lot of good Korean film lately, but this is a first directorial outing…

TÁR: this is a trailer for an arty film which nonetheless intrigues me. Hurrah! Also I like Blanchett's face here.

Bones and All: yeah, what would you have without Laughing Lenny on the soundtrack? These young actors don't look as if they've ever felt a strong emotion.

Spoiler Alert: is the gayness enough to distinguish it from every Nicholas Sparks film/book ever?

Stars at Noon: trailer seems to tell the whole story, and I've seen it before.

Raymond & Ray: of course they will be Forced To Come Together because Fambly. That's how these things always go. Seen it before, don't need to see it again.