Wonder Woman

If you follow me on Twitter, you'll know how big of a deal Wonder Woman was the night I went to go see the midnight premiere. I am, or at least bare a resemblance to, an adult man with a job that requires me to get up at 6 in the morning. When I started this blog, I was in college and had the schedule to go off and see movies whenever I wanted to and all I had to do was schedule it on a day that I didn't have class or just skip class all together in order to catch up on sleep from a night like one you have after seeing a midnight show of a movie. I don't have that luxury anymore. But Wonder Woman is the exception to that frame of mind now and there's multiple reasons for that.

So there's this little thing called, The Justice League coming out later this year. This is the display of a pantheon of heroes that are very beloved by not only me but a lot of people. And so far, the reviews for the films that have taken place building up to The Justice League have ranged from mediocre, to just god awful. Of course my reviews differ a little bit as I absolutely love Man of Steel, but it doesn't negate the fact that historically, Man of Steel, Batman v Superman, and Suicide Squad have not been critically received well. And yet people keep going to these movies, even when they're not good. It's because we as fans want these movies to be good and we want to get a similar feeling with the Justice League as we did when we saw The Avengers team up all together for the first time. The heroes in The Justice League, I would argue, historically have been more revered heroes and they're the ones that we've wanted to see for such a long time. So when the reviews for the past few DCEU movies have not been great, we get a little bit worried for the future of the Justice League.

On top of all of that, Wonder Woman is significant because this is the first time this character has ever been given her own standalone film.

Wonder Woman is a beloved character and has been around for about 74 to 76 years (I'm not sure which one, she either just had her 75th birthday or is about to have it) and yet we have not had a standalone film about her.

Think about this. We've had 5 standalone Spider-man films (a character that has been rebooted and played by 3 different actors), 6 standalone Superman films (a character that has also been rebooted and played by 3 different actors) and a whopping 7 standalone Batman films (a character that has been rebooted multiple times and played by five different actors.)

Even the Hulk has had two standalone films and had three different actors play him and we just brought Wonder Woman onto the big screen last year with Batman v Superman. Needless to say this was a long time coming.

Now to be fair, the caliber of female led superhero films in the past has not been great or profitable (Catwoman, Elecktra, Barb Wire and Tank Girl are objectively horrible films) and I would say if you're going to do a Wonder Woman movie, you need to do it right. But in a time where one of the highest grossing film franchises, The Hunger Games, was led by a female lead and you have shows like Supergirl on the CW that are doing incredibly well, it's about damn time this movie happened.

So there's your background, how is Wonder Woman?

Wonder Woman follows the story of Diana (played by Gal Gadot), Princess of an island called Themyscara, a mystical island inhabited by the Amazons, a group of warrior women created by Zeus to bring love to the world of man but has been hidden away from the rest of the world for many years after man proved to be weak and prone to the influence of the god of war, Ares.

Right off the bat, I want to mention that the mythology was done really well in the beginning of this film. They basically say, "You know that Greek Mythology, yeah that's all real in this universe". It brings Wonder Woman in the category of not just being a superhero, but a goddess and I'll talk about that more in my spoilers commentary. I do think they kind of glance over that whole, Greek Gods are real thing and I hope it's explored in other movies, but I thought it was a great quick run down of the mythology done in the form of a story Diana hears as a child from her mother Hippolyta (played by Connie Nelson).

Diana is trained by her Aunt Claire Underwood or Antiope (played by Robin Wright who I will say was criminally under utilized in this film) until she becomes a fierce amazon warrior, ambitious in her desire to fight and bring good to the world.

Well she gets her chance when a pilot by the name of Steve Trevor (played by Chris Pine) crash lands on her island straight from the battlefield of World War 1. He tells Diana and the Amazons about the war happening and Diana believes it to be the work of Ares. She is convinced that if Ares is defeated, the war and the suffering will stop. So she goes with Trevor to Europe in the hopes of finding and defeating Ares.

The rest of the movie is pretty much a fish out of water story where Diana traverses the landscape of 1918 during World War 1, eventually displaying the full strength of Wonder Woman, while a villainess named Doctor Poison (played by Elena Anaya) develops a deadly poison that will bring the German armies back to primacy in the war.

So the first question I had to answer with this movie was, is Gal Gadot a strong enough actress and does she play the role well enough to carry this film? While for a lot of people she was one of the highlights of Batman v Superman, I couldn't help but feel like that was just because it was the first time we had seen Wonder Woman on screen and we were excited. She really only had about fifteen minutes of screen time and doesn't do much for the plot of that film besides set up for The Justice League.

The answer to the question is she the right for this part is unequivocally: yes.

Do I think Gal Gadot is a world class actress? No but I do think that she put a lot of work into this role and I think it really worked out for her. I loved Diana's naiveté and her misunderstanding of our world. But she is by no means stupid. Wonder Woman walking around stingy 1918 London is both a hilarious image and a commentary on where we used to be on our views of women and their role in the world. Like I said, she's not stupid and when all the stingy Army generals are talking about an Armistice and refusing to do the right thing, she goes full blast on them and minces no words on their lack of action to save lives.

 And then when you finally see her say F this and take matters into her own hand by walking into no man's land in her costume for the first time in the film, I have to say, even though I had seen that in the trailer, I had goosebumps.

On top of that, she's a very well developed character throughout.

It's very apparent now what they saw in Gal Gadot when they casted her as Wonder Woman, and while DC has had a lot of missteps and missed opportunities, Gal Gadot was not one of them.

Now I do think she has a lot of work to do and I hope she's as compelling of a character when she's fully integrated into the Justice League, but I get the feeling that the momentum of this movie is going to propel Wonder Woman into being a central figure of the Justice League if not the catalyst for the rest of the DCEU.

Then you've got Chris Pine as Steve Trevor and man I liked him in this movie. Steve Trevor has been fighting in this war for a long time as a spy and he also has an understanding of it that is complicated due to him living within a grey area of this war. He creates a perfect dynamic with Diana who is naïve and sees it as a simple conquest to root out evil.

The more I think about these two, the more I really enjoyed them. From the get go, I liked their chemistry and the duality of them. He's there to guide her through our world and the exchanges they have are both hilarious and genuine. Like I said before, Diana is a well developed character and so is Steve, but together they really do make a good arc that works well within the film.

I'm gonna put on my "feminist" hat for a second and analyze how Steve Trevor is a good male supporting character in a female driven story.

There's a point in the movie where he realizes, he's not as badass as Diana is. He knows she can kick ass and she doesn't need saving. But the element of the movie that I really liked was how well these two work together. Just because Diana is basically a god doesn't mean that Steve can't help her. He's okay taking second fiddle to a woman and that's not an issue at all in the film. He doesn't have any kind of small penis syndrome thinking that it's not a woman's place to be behind him, he is totally cool with taking the back seat when it comes to her kicking ass while still managing to do his job.

Now that does create conflict when the things that Steve believes are necessary to win the war conflict with Diana's views and goals to find Ares and end the war in her mind, but that has nothing to do with their sex. These are two smart individuals and they're on the same playing field the entire time. Nobody is above the other, they're just partners.

I'm going really in depth with this film and I'm gonna try and hold some of this back for my Spoilers review, but I think this was exactly the kind of film Wonder Woman needed to be and I think a lot of that is due to the performances of the two leads, and a lot of it is due to the direction of Patty Jenkins.

Dear Lord... Thank you for this woman.

If you don't know who Patty Jenkins is, she's obviously the director, but prior to this movie she was a pretty sought after name by big studios to direct some of their films after her direction on the movie Monster, and her work as director of the pilot episode of the show, The Killing. Both I have not seen but plan on it after this film.

Back in 2011, she was slotted to direct Thor: The Dark World but exited citing creative differences. Jenkins is one of the many directors who have cited creative differences as a grievance of working with Marvel and Jenkins in particular cited that she would have loved to make a Thor movie but Marvel wanted her to make their Thor movie not hers. (paraphrasing of course, she was very cordial about the exit so who knows, we could see Jenkins direct a Marvel movie in the future).

If I'm the executive at Marvel who stifled Patty Jenkin's creative ideas while working on Thor, I would be eating my heart out after watching Wonder Woman because you can tell this was the movie she wanted to make and I'm glad DC let her do it. I hope this is a wake up call to DC because if they try and control things the way Marvel does with their films, you stifle people like David Ayers and you get movies like Suicide Squad instead of Wonder Woman when you didn't stifle Patty Jenkins.

This review is getting a little bit off track. There is always a spoilers review.

So what are the problems with this movie? Well... um... the beginning I guess is maybe strangely paced? The first half of this movie is just a fish out of water story where Diana is mosing around London with a sword and a shield trying to figure out how we as regular people live. I actually really liked the first half before all the action began because it gave us some time for Diana and Steve to get to know one another, it gave the opportunity for the villains to develop an evil plan that Diana would eventually foil, and it gave us some good build up for the awesome scene when Diana finally reveals herself as Wonder Woman.

I guess the villain of the film is not exactly the strongest, but at the same time I actually think that the villain(s) served a purpose and were pretty good in the context of the film. I'll talk about this a little bit more in the spoilers review as it is a little bit of a spoiler to talk about the villains in length, but DC seemed to be taking a page from the Marvel movies in this one to focus more on the development of the protagonists and the villains take a secondary role. If they're good, the movie only benefits, but as long as the protagonists are strong, we're good to go.

One thing I will mention and this of course will be paired with something of the film that I really enjoyed and that was the action. I thought the action in the film was exciting and pretty well done. I guess a criticism I had with the film is that it really liked their slow motion. There were a couple of scenes where I was watching the action and suddenly it goes into slow motion and it kind of took you out of the action for a quick second. Slow motion can be used in action sequences but it has to be for a purpose and I felt like they were really embellishing that slow motion button in this movie.

Honestly, the criticisms I have to the movie are criticisms I've heard from other critics since watching the movie. There are actually very few things I felt were wrong with this movie and I just had a really enjoyable experience with this film.

So is it a perfect movie? No. Is it a great movie? Honestly, the answer to that question is I don't know.

I think this goes into the reason why this movie is so hard to review. There was so much riding on this film and within the context of the DCEU and the other movies that have come out before it, this is such a breath of fresh air that it is hard to be objective and point out the flaws in this movie.

I will need to rewatch this movie to really gain the full breadth of how good it really is and I'll have to watch it with a clearer mind, setting it apart from it's predecessors. I'm sure there are flaws in the movie, I just think that I was blinded by the hope for a good DCEU and Wonder Woman movie that it's hard to really point out a lot of flaws.

But then there's the fact that you could watch this movie without watching Man of Steel, Batman v Superman, and Suicide Squad and be totally fine. I'm sure there are elements of this movie that might play into later films but for the most part it serves as a standalone Wonder Woman film that doesn't even really need to exist within a extended universe. The fact that it does is just a bonus but I honestly don't think this movie is going to have huge if any implications on the Justice League besides giving Diana a backstory.

I find it really interesting that despite a lot of people saying that we're sick of origin stories, out of the 3 superhero films I have really, really enjoyed the most within the last 2-3 years, this film, Logan, and Deadpool, two of those were origin stories.

That's not to say that origin stories should be the only superhero films we make now, if that were the case we wouldn't get films like The Avengers, Logan, and The Dark Knight.

But Wonder Woman is an example of giving momentum to a franchise without throwing everything comic book people love at the wall and hoping it sticks.

We've seen this happen twice with movies like The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Batman v Superman, and Suicide Squad. These movies want to throw as many recognizable characters are the audience, not really explain them at all and say, "I know you liked this character in the comics, well here they are!"

Wonder Woman is an example of a film that takes its time and just gives us a good story. I could count one reference to other films in the DCEU in this film. ONE! There wasn't even an after credits scene! This movie was focused on the here and now and it succeeded.

While I will need to watch the movie again without the initial awe I had blinding me to any real criticism, I will say that Wonder Woman is definitely a movie worth checking out and was able to yell "CLEAR", press the charge button, and bolt some life into the DC extended universe, something it badly, BADLY needed.

But what did you think of Wonder Woman? Was it a fluke? Is the DCEU still in trouble? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. One thing I forgot to mention is that Wonder Woman continues to have one of the most badass theme songs. And yeah, it's in this movie. Enjoy!

Heavyweights

When Heavyweights came onto Netflix, I heard a bunch of people getting really excited. Apparently, which Heavyweights wasn't a commercial or critical success at all when it hit theaters, it has since gained a cult following. This was a very early movie in Ben Stiller's career and it's interesting seeing him back in the 90s and how he's grown and developed since. So many people raved about this movie that I felt it was about time I went and checked it out for myself. 

Heavyweights follows the story of a kid by the name of Gerald Garner (played by Aaron Schwartz).

He is a portly young kid and because of that and his lack of athletic skills, he is a social outcast and a pretty unpopular kid. As the school year comes to a close, his parents (his father is actually played by Jeffery Tambor) decide to send him to a fat camp that goes by the name of Camp Hope.

While Gerry is hesitant to go to fat camp, he soon figures out that the experience looks more fun than he thought with fun water activities and go carts. When Gerry gets there he meets a couple of nice kids and a small group of scrappy underdogs form (one of them being a very young Kenan Thompson). With fun camp counselors (one of them played by Tom McGowan), and fun activities, Gerry starts to think that maybe his summer won't be so bad after all.

But that soon changes when the kindly owners of the camp (played by Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara) announce that they were forced to sell the camp to a hyper fitness guru and infomercial maker by the name of Tony Perkis (played by Ben Stiller). On a side note, I know it was for dramatic purposes, but why would the counselors like Tom McGowan not know that the owners had sold the camp? I'm really not surprised that they lost the camp.

If you're trying to visualize what kind of character Tony Perkis is, imagine Ben Stiller's character from Dodgeball, White Goldman. I am convinced that Heavyweights is just a prequel to the character of White Goldman. Both of them came from rich families and both of them were fat at one point and overcame a lot of personal growth and challenges to become the fitness guru they are in both films. I really almost expected Tony Perkis to show up during the end credits, be really fat, and end up singing Milkshakes with his man boobs. I'm glad I didn't have to subject myself to that for a second time, but that was the mindset I had for the character of Tony Perkis the entire time.

The rest of the movie is this scrappy group of fat kids trying to survive the horror that is Perkis and work together to bring him down and bring Camp Hope back to the level of fun it used to be.

I do want to talk about the good things of this movie because while there are a lot of things that I need to say about this film that might make you think that I did not like this film or I think that it's bad, that isn't entirely true.

Heavyweights was made by Disney in the 90s. Heavyweights was right on the heals of another live action Disney classic, The Might Ducks. Something about those films were just fun and they all centered around a scrappy group of social outcasts and misfits. Heavyweights creates another group of scrappy misfits and they actually do a really good job at it. These kids weren't the cool kids, they establish that from the beginning. These are your underdogs and everyone likes a good underdog story. There's multiple moments in the film where it's just kids having fun.

The only downside of this being a Disney film is that its a pretty safe PG rated movie. There's a lot of jokes they could have made throughout this movie but they couldn't because this is a family picture. That doesn't mean the writers didn't have fun with veiled humor and going to extremes that most realistic films can't go to. However, the movie as a whole is pretty tame.

Those not as memorable as kids in other movies about scrappy misfits, Heavyweights does have a pretty decent cast and at the very least, creates a cast of kids you want to root for. The emphasis is more on the normalcy of the kids and their desire to just have fun juxtaposed with the batshit insanity of Ben Stiller's character.

Apart of me thinks that Kenan Thompson wasn't originally in the script but they wrote him in as a token black kid. I say that not because I don't think he should have been in the movie, I only say it because all of Roy (Thompson's) lines and actions in the movie really could have been replaced with Josh (Shaun Weiss's character). And then I realized that any of these characters could be interchangeable. With the exception of the British kid and the big dumb kid who doesn't say anything, these kids could be pretty interchangeable. It's not a matter of having a token black friend, it's the matter of having a token fat friend, and that's kind of difficult when EVERYONE is the token fat friend.

Funny side note, Aaron Schwartz is now incredibly fit and not a bad looking individual. Good for him.

Now inevitably I would have to talk about the issues this movie has and there are a good amount of them. 

The first is that the movie is in all senses of the word, pretty predictable. 

Heavyweights is in reality just a by the numbers kids film and there isn't a lot that can't be predicted

or to be expected for an eventual outcome. The only exception to this rule isn't even done in a way that I really want to give them credit for.

Eventually in the film, they finally get tired of Tony Perkis's evil ways and decide to take matters into their own hands and take Tony down.

Now since, there have been multiple movies that have had kids taking down authority figures. Usually these movies have a G or PG rating holding them back but if done correctly, that can make for some really funny circumstances in which the kids get back at the adult. In Heavyweights though, they kidnap Tony, make him fall into a hole and hold him prisoner in a barn on the camp. Not only do they hold him captive, they hold him captive in a fenced in area that is protected by electricity. They basically Guantanamo Bay the shit out of this guy and it is definitely torture. I don't really think this movie could be made today with all the questionable things these kids do to this guy who has been shown to be a little bit mentally unstable. And the worst part is, the adults totally go along with it.

I mean I get it, the adults are affected just as much by Tony as the kids are, but there's a difference between hating your boss and not letting him out of an electric fence that he's being tortured in.

And then there's a part in the movie where the kids are basically in charge. Now I knew that this was

a Disney film and that it wouldn't get too out of hand. At the end of it Tom McGowan says I think we've all learned a valuable lesson about self control and implores the kids to start thinking about their weight seriously.

I think in reality, this scene would have gone a little bit differently. In reality, I think the kids would have seen Tom McGowan as trying to tell them what to do and before you know it, he's right next to Ben Stiller in an electrical cage as Gerald and the rest of the kids devolve into a Lord of the Flies scenario where all the adults are murdered and then there's a game of politics to decide who really runs Camp Hope. I mean they already put Tony in an electrical cage and tortured him, I wouldn't put it past these kids to drop all conventions and just let loose after that.

But of course, that's not how a Disney movie is going to end. The plunky kids learn a lesson, Stiller gets his cumuppins and even the good guy adult Tom McGowan even gets the girl... even though he really shouldn't be a role model for these kids. I mean I don't wanna knock someone for being overweight but the guy had been at the camp for 12 years and never really lost weight. I mean his lanky buddy should have run the camp but Noooooooo he wasn't as cool as Tom McGowan.

Obviously I would have done things a little bit different with a story about some lovable misfits torturing Ben Stiller but as it is, Heavyweights is a fine movie. It's cute, it's short, and simple. It's not something you really need to look too hard at because if you do you're probably not gonna like what you find. Is it a great movie? I don't think so. I guess I understand if it has a cult following but I think it's a small cult following. The humor is childish and not really as funny as it could be and the story, while unique, is really predictable. Check it out if you want, it's on Netflix, but you don't really NEED to see it.

But those are my thoughts on Heavyweights. What did you think? Are you part of the cult following? Tell me what you think of this film. Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. If you haven't noticed, I've been falling behind a little bit, I actually watched Heavyweights a while ago. But I'm back now and I'm going to be doing a review for Wonder Woman tonight because I saw it last night! Enjoy!

The Infiltrator

So I am of the mindset that everything Bryan Cranston does is gold. I don't know how he does it but ever since Breaking Bad opened up a lot of serious opportunities for him as an actor, he's taken that opportunity and run far with it.

I didn't see a lot of trailers for The Infiltrator, but when I heard Bryan Cranston, I assumed it was at the very least going to be pretty entertaining, but I wondered if this was just an opportunity for Cranston to get involved with an action movie like actors of his age like to do from time to time like Liam Neeson in Taken, Pierce Brosnan in November Man, etc. While I don't hate that idea, some might consider a route like that to be selling out and it seemed like The Infiltrator could possibly be an entertaining movie but nothing special.

How foolish was I to ever doubt the talent and choices of Bryan Cranston.

The Infiltrator follows the true story of Robert Mazur, a US Customs agent who has had a long career going undercover to bust drug dealers and is coming towards a time in his career where he's thinking about retiring with his wife (Juliet Aubrey) and two kids.

However, he gets wind of a new opportunity to go undercover with the Colombian Cartel and instead of following the drugs to the criminals, he has the idea to follow the money to the criminals.

He creates the cover of Bob Musella, a corrupt businessman, in order to infiltrate the money laundering operations of Pablo Escobar and his Colombian Cartel and he finds himself in the midst of an intense and complex undercover mission to take down one of the largest criminal enterprises in the 80s.

The Infiltrator is following a slight trend that I'm seeing where it's a historical crime story set int he 80s following the police work to bring down the Colombian Cartel. You're seeing it more in shows like Narcos and other mediums and it's a niche of crime films that I am actually starting to really dig. You don't really realize it these days, but the 80s were almost 40 years ago and they're getting the same treatment I think the 60s got with movies like Catch Me If You Can, Forrest Gump, and JFK. I don't know if more things are getting unclassified or maybe when you reach a forty year mark things become historically interesting but it's also a sign I'm getting really old.

But The Infiltrator, like I said, is actually a deceptively intense movie. I mean some of the movie is stuff that you've seen before and stuff that you come to expect when watching a movie about a guy going undercover, however, The Infiltrator is written and Bryan Cranston performs in such a way that it feels new and it is incredibly intense.

This is also very surprising because Bob isn't going undercover with the drug dealers or the people who go and kill people, he's going undercover with the highest rungs of the Colombian criminal enterprise.

A big part of the movie is him schmoozing with Benjamin Bratt's character who is one of Pablo Escobar's inner circle. Still a dangerous guy and Bratt plays him in a way that you feel that intensity still, but honestly a lot of the movie is Bob and the female customs agent playing his wife (played by Diane Kruger) just getting to know and making friends with Bratt's character and his character's wife. And I know you're thinking that sounds incredibly boring, however, it manages to keep the intensity up, especially when you overlay it with reminders of what could happen to Bob if he or his partner say one wrong word.

John Leguizamo is in this movie and he plays a fellow Customs agent by the name of Emir. Emir sets up a cover that is a more traditional one. He goes undercover with the guys selling the drugs and doing a lot of the day to day operations, kind of what you would expect and undercover mission to go down as.

I've seen Leguizamo in a lot of films. Some of them he's been good, some of them he hasn't been so good. But I'm pretty sure this is the performance of his that I love the most because he represents a side of the job that Bob is teetering on. Emir loves his job and the danger that comes with it. He almost gets off on it and he both serves as a warning to Bob and how he could get sucked up in this job, as well as a safeguard. There are moments where even Emir has to stand back and say that Bob is cutting it close and risking things with this job and it's a really interesting relationship these two have.

And then there's Diane Kruger.

 So believe it or not, I actually like Diane Kruger. She was very good in movies like National Treasure and Inglorious Basterds. I think in a role where she is playing someone where they can explain why she has that German accent, I think she does a very good job.

However, I've noticed in movies where she is playing an America, she can't help but sneak that accent out and it's kind of noticeable while she's playing American customs agent, Kathy Ertz.

Which is a shame because she actually does a good job in this film. I think that her character was kind of thrown into the movie very quickly with very little introduction, especially with how important her character becomes to Bob. She and Bob develop a very close relationship and it's because they are pulling the cover as though they are married. There is an element that makes it a little bit weird, especially since Bryan Cranston is about 21 years older than Kruger, however, I think that these two work together very, very well and especially in the moments where they delve into Bob's relationship with his wife, Diane Kruger has an opportunity to really shine.

And speaking of Cranston's age. I don't want to knock the guy for being 61. I think as long as he's able to perform as great as he does all the time, it doesn't matter what his age is. However, something that I picked up on in the beginning was I think Bob Mazur was supposed to be in his forties during the events of this film. You can add all the black dye to Bryan Cranston's hair all you want, he still looks like he's in his fifties and even maybe his sixties at times.

Is this a big deal for the film? Not really. Bryan Crantson has proven time and time again that he is one of the best actors out there today and he gives such a dynamite performance that I really forgot how old he is once the story started rolling.

I think there's a possibility that this could be one of the last opportunities for Cranston to play a character like this because of his age so it's a good thing that it happened. But even that I'm skeptical of due to how great of an actor he is.

What are my problems with the movie? Not a lot honestly, I think that this was one of the hidden gems of 2016 that really went under the radar for a lot of people.

Maybe one of the criticisms I could have is that it does pull a lot of conventional undercover cliches that remind me to always take the words "Based on a True Story" with a grain of salt. But at the same

time I think they also manage to pull out some interesting relationships and twists and turns with that undercover story that make it really interesting.

I really do think that it's a hidden gem of 2016 and something that people should check out. If you're a fan of the show Narcos, you will definitely like The Infiltrator, but even if you're not, you get a bunch of really great performances from a wide range of actors like Cranston, Leguizamo, Bratt, Kruger, and a lot of other really great actors throughout.

Something I didn't mention is the emotional drama of this film. I don't want to give away the ending but like I said earlier, a lot of the movie is Bob and Kathy getting to know Benjamin Bratt's character, Roberto Alcaino and his wife and that does have some emotional strings to it. Nothing you're going to cry over, but it is interesting and does make for a good thriller drama combination all around.

Overall, I really recommend The Infiltrator. I think it was marketed as an action film from what I can gather from the trailer, but it actually is a really intense thriller about the US's investigation and take down of the Colombian Cartel in the 80s.

But what did you think of The Infiltrator? Did you like it? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @MovieSymposium as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

Doctor Who: Season 1

So this review might seem random and out of place but my decision to watch the first season of modern Doctor Who was really random and out of place too. I am on a little bit of a fantasy sci fi kick right now and I had been watching random episodes of Doctor Who here and there, but I wanted to go back to where it started. I wasn't originally planning on doing a review on this season, especially since I've watched this season and random episodes of Doctor Who sporadically over the past few years that I didn't review. I changed my mind after I finished the last episode because there is a lot to say about this season and the impact it had on Doctor Who back in 2005 and today.

After multiple attempts to try and revive Doctor Who with film and I guess an attempt to reboot the series in the states, BBC regained the rights to Doctor Who and aired the new rebooted season in 2005. Now I did not watch the show back in 2005. I actually didn't jump onto the Doctor Who train really until 2012, well into Matt Smith's tenure, but I always wanted to start the show from the beginning, no matter how difficult that was.

Doctor Who begins centered around a young girl named Rose (played by Billie Piper). She has a pretty normal life in London, she lives with her chatty mom Jackie (played by Camilie Coduri) and has a boyfriend named Mickie (played by Noel Clarke).

One day her life is turned upside down when a strange man enters her life, calling himself The Doctor (played by Christopher Eccleston). After a brush with death and the end of the world involving living plastic and killer mannequins, he offers her the opportunity to travel with him on his spaceship called The TARDIS (Time And Relative Dimension In Space) which looks like a 1970's British Police Box. Rose joins him and the two go on adventures through time and space, fighting aliens and trying to help people across the universe.

I have no shame in saying this because I know I'm not the only one. When I first started Doctor Who, it took me a while to really get into it. The first season is very different from the rest of the series and the budget was so minimal that visually, it really didn't age well. On top of that, the acting is pretty

hokey and the first three episodes, while I have come to appreciate The Unquiet Dead, are not exactly the most compelling episodes ever. It wasn't really until the episode, Dalek, that the show started to intrigue me and that's the 6th episode. If you're a normal person, you usually don't sit through 5 episodes of television if you don't think it's good. I however am not a normal person and that hasn't really changed (hence why I'm still begrudgingly watching Iron Fist right now).

However, what I have found recently is that Doctor Who does build on itself. The perfect example of this is the episode in Series 4 called Silence in the Library, the first episode to feature the character River Song. I remember watching that for the first time and thinking that it was a really good episode. Watching it now, the episode only gets better and is frankly heart breaking. All these episodes compound on one another and they gain significance after future episodes air and things are revealed.

The same can be said about the first series. While visually it probably hasn't aged well, the stories and the character development definitely has. You can tell that they went back and watched old episodes of Christopher Eccleston and incorporated his performance and story arc into future episodes and it really makes his performance better with future context.

However, when looking at this show objectively (at least as objectively as I can) I do have to think about both the historical context this show finds itself in in regard to the rest of the series, as well as the experience someone might have if they're watching Doctor Who for the first time and have no previous knowledge, like I did.

And in that mindset, I will say, the first series is still a little bit of a handful and it takes some getting used to.

The series starts with the episode Rose, which while it has a great introduction to the character of The Doctor and Billie Piper as Rose, it's a little bit cheesy with the acting. Furthermore, the production value and the visuals really haven't aged well and you're going to feel that the entire season. Now this eventually becomes a subject of nostalgia because Doctor Who prior to the Matt Smith years had this very dirty and almost cheap feeling to it. It wasn't until Season 5 in 2010 when the show's budget was raised and the visuals actually catch up with the science fiction material Doctor Who could create. This is a good thing and a bad thing, especially in Season 1. There's a running joke that the Doctor and Rose are in The TARDIS, a machine that can travel anywhere in time and space and they keep on ending up in Cardiff for half of the episodes. It's obvious the budget was limited when you start seeing the same sets and the same characters reappear, even though there's only 13 episodes. The other episodes would set the standard for what future Doctor Who seasons would look like, a mixture of The Doctor and his companion going to new worlds, meeting strange aliens, and going back in time to either meet historical figures or witness historic events.

Something that I kind of forgot about when watching this season again was the incredibly dark turns this show takes in this first season. A lot of people die in this first season and that's one of the elements that they worked the limited budget into well.

For example, during the Parting of the Ways, did you recall that the Daleks actually attack Earth and we watch the continental shapes change as they bomb Earth. I really forgot how dark those episodes, especially the series finale really was. I think it worked well however, because in probably the best two part episode in the Season, The Empty Child and The Doctor Dances, Eccleston has this great line where he says, just this once, Everybody lives.

Now if you've followed Doctor Who consistently since this season, you know that it's a little more than just this once. There are several episodes actually where Everybody lives and everyone is risen from the dead by the Doctor in some mcguffin method, however back in the day with this first season, this actually meant something. Like I said, there are a lot of dark episodes in this season and this actually meant something to see everyone live at the end of the episode.

And this segways well into my thoughts on Eccleston as The Doctor himself. The Doctor has had many personalities and many experiences that shape who he is as a character. Eccleston's Doctor appears at a time where he has lived through the Time War and has seen the destruction of the Time Lords. The experience is very new to him and he holds that guilt in.

Everything from his performance to his U-Boat captain clothes shows that he's a man used to war and is now settling into "peace time" and that takes some getting used to.

You can tell that he feels like he doesn't exactly need a companion or Rose in particular, however, you can tell that he wants one and that proves to be necessary down the road as Rose begins to show him his humanity.

Now all of this is pretty high concept for someone coming in cold and not having the rest of the series in mind but it still is something that can be caught onto, especially in the performance of Eccleston himself.

He is very kind but at the same time there are several points in the series where his guilt shows for what happened during the Time War. There are several creatures who were displaced from the Time War and Rose and The Doctor's adventures put them in the path of these creatures.

This performance is only made better if you've been watching the show for a while and you see the fallout of his decision, the events that have happened since, and the 50th Anniversary where you actually see The War Doctor fight in the Time War and make the horrible decisions that The 9th Doctor comes to regret so much.

Watching this season just makes me really bummed that Eccleston did not return for the 50th Anniversary and did not reprise his role as the 9th Doctor. As much as I like The War Doctor, I don't know if he would have existed had Eccleston returned. I could be wrong on that, but even if he had, it would have been fun to see all three modern Doctors interacting together, with or without the talent of the great late John Hurt.

The thing that makes the 9th Doctor so fun is that he's both very serious but at the same time incredibly goofy. He's not Matt Smith goofy where he falls down or makes a fool of himself, but he's got jokes and he brings a lot of comedy to the show as well as some really deep and profound performances. He is unapologetic of who he is and when Rose says in the last episode that he taught her the importance of standing up and fighting for what's right, you see it in his character.

Something that I thought was missing from Peter Capaldi's Doctor was a sense that the Doctor cared for the people he was trying to save as opposed to just saving them because he could. Again, Eccleston struck a balance between being a serious character to having incredible empathy for those in need.

I think back to the episode Father's Day where the couple getting married say that they're not important and the Doctor refuted that saying that their far from unimportant. It was lines like this that I felt were missing from the 12th Doctor's tenure and something Eccleston did really well.

And that empathy was brought out by his relationship with Rose. And my thought was, between the 9th Doctor and Rose, it never NEEDED to be romantic.

I always thought the kiss at the end of The Parting of Ways was always a little bit strange, especially since Rose is supposed to be 19, which is legal, but Eccleston looks like he's in his forties so it was a little bit of an age gap. It made sense with Tennant because they looked as though they were closer in age and there was a little more chemistry between the two of them, but with 9 and Rose, I never felt like it needed to be a romantic relationship. They were just friends traveling and he was like the Magician and she was his apprentice. There's even an episode where the Doctor miscalculates and Rose goes missing for a year and her mom actually questions what a 19 year old girl is doing with a guy like the Doctor, and yeah, it's a valid question.

I have to keep reminding myself that a lot of people who have watched Doctor Who since the beginning were very young when they started. I think having such a young protagonist with such a naive look and feel was necessary to introduce new people to the series, especially those who had never seen the old series.

Rose has always had some awkward lines here and there, especially in season two, however in season 1, it fits in as she is just a regular girl. She's not really special in any way, she's just a regular girl and in that way she relates to the audience in that we are just normal and yet there's a possibility of jumping into the TARDIS and going on an adventure, and that's very appealing to people.

Rose is still my personal favorite companion but objectively I understand why there are two camps when it comes to her, people who love her and people who can't stand her. I've met both kinds of people and I understand both arguments. I personally think that at the very least, Billie Piper was phenomenal in the first season of Doctor Who and she was a great companion to begin the series with.

So what does this season of Doctor Who mean for future seasons and where we're at now?

I personally think the first season of Doctor Who is quite the underrated season. Is it the best? Far from it. While I have found an appreciation for all the episodes with the Slytheen and the repetitive Satellite 5 episodes, let's live in reality, they're not the best episodes Doctor Who has to offer.

But if you're an avid Doctor Who fan, I suggest going back and checking out the first season. It only gets better with more context and the knowledge of later episodes.

If you have never watched Doctor Who before, I will warn you, the first season is not the best. There are some really slow episodes and yeah there is an episode where the bad guy is a stretched out piece of skin. However, I highly recommend pushing through and enjoying every minute of the first season as you can because it really does pay off later. It creates a foundation for what Doctor Who is and while it definitely is not the best season, it creates a lot of room for growth, especially for the characters they introduce in it.

I want to continue rewatching seasons of Doctor Who and give full season reviews. Unfortunately now that I've said it I can't say it will come true, however, I'm on a pretty big Doctor Who/Sci Fi Fantasy kick right now so every so often a review like this might pop up.

I want to know your thoughts on this seriously though. Where does the first season land on your list of favorite Doctor Who episodes? Did you start with the first season? Or did you start later on? Let me know what you think of the first season with the knowledge and viewing of later seasons and how it lives up today.

Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films and TV shows I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. I actually don't think I ever watched this short. If you're familiar with the end of the first season, you'll know that Christopher Eccleston regenerates into David Tennant. This is the interaction that happens after that regeneration. Enjoy!

Marvel's The Defender's Trailer

So I haven't done a review in a hot second and unfortunately it's because I haven't had much time to watch many movies. I've been watching a lot of Doctor Who though. I went back to the first season and I actually am thinking about doing a review on that and give my thoughts on that season. I haven't done a review on Doctor Who for a while and with the news of Peter Capaldi leaving the show, it might be good to look back before I really get into the new season.

However, I do want to do a review, if only a really quick one and a reaction to the new trailer for The Defenders.

I do have to say, it is really cool to see all four of these guys together.

We've seen characters cross over in these series. Rosario Dawson's character has been in each season as her character Claire. But with the exception of Luke Cage in Jessica Jones (and maybe someone who made a cross over in Iron Fist... I'll be honest I haven't finished it) there hasn't been any real cross overs yet that have meant as much as this one does.

It looks really cool to see these four misfits come together and be this super bad ass super team.

The interesting thing about this trailer was that there was nothing really mature rated about it. This did not necessarily feel like the dark series that I've seen in the past, it felt like a comic book movie. Which is good and bad.

On one hand, I have really gotten used to these shows being dark and gritty. While I haven't finished Iron Fist, that is one thing I have noticed, that there isn't as much mature content and it feels more like a comic book. I'm sure that once The Defenders actually airs, it will display the same grittiness and matureness that I saw in shows like Daredevil and Jessica Jones and less of the comic book campiness from the first two episodes of Iron Fist.

Another thing that I really like from this trailer is the very little set up it offers and yet at the same time it is showing exactly what we needed to know to go into this season.

Obviously, there is the team up. Like I said, seeing all four on screen together is pretty cool. But the conflict and villains in the series is something that is very intriguing.

As expected, The Hand is back and it is clear that they are bringing Elecktra (played by Elodie Yung) as a sort of villain. Which was to be expected when she "died" in the second season of Daredevil and The Hand put her in that catacomb or whatever. I personally liked Elodie Yung as Elecktra and I'm glad they'll be bringing her back. I don't really know how she will manage to be a threat against a team, especially one with Luke Cage in it. If his series showed me anything, it's that nothing really can kill him. But it's good to see returning characters back.

And of course the biggest conflict is that of Sigourney Weaver being the villain.

I don't know what Weaver's role in the whole thing is going to be and frankly I don't care right now. I think they handled her appearance in the trailer perfectly. They showed us that she is going to be the villain, she looks bad ass, but I have absolutely no idea what she's going to do as the villain or what her plot is.

That is what you need when you make a trailer like this. Keep it vague, show some of the conflict but not all of it, just enough to keep the audience wondering and get me pumped for when this show finally drops.

As I've mentioned, the team looks really great together, but more importantly, it doesn't seem like any of the characters (based off the trailer alone) lose their personality by being in a team. They seem like they're going to clash and that was expected to happen, especially with these 4.

Luke Cage, Jessica Jones, and Daredevil are all characters that are really well done characters and it's good to see them again, especially Jessica Jones who we haven't seen since 2015. I think not only will these four look really good fighting side by side, but I think they're going to play off one another very well. They all are phenomenal solo acts and great as individuals. The intrigue is going to be when they all come together and have to interact with one another. It could be great, it could go terribly. I don't know. But I'm excited to check it out.

Now... you may have noticed that I really haven't talked about Iron Fist yet...

Here's the dilemma I find myself in...

I'm already really not interested in watching the rest of Iron Fist. I have finished 2 of 13 episodes and I am really dragging my feet on watching the rest of it. The trailer for the most part was a reminder that I needed to finish that season before I could start this, so in a way it's a motivator to push through and watch it.

But even in this trailer I already hate Iron Fist more.

I might have mentioned this in the review I did for the pilot of Iron Fist, but I really hate the character already. I call him Hipster Tyrell. In the few episodes I have seen, he comes off as an immature idiot who sounds like a crazy person with all the mumbo jumbo he mentions about being the immortal Iron Fist... and then he goes off and mentions it in this trailer.

This is a really good trailer, especially for a Netflix series, especially one trying to recreate the same magic that The Avengers did, but for TV series. I just can't quite get over the feeling that Marvel really screwed up Iron Fist, and now it's too late to get him killed off or something. Maybe they would have done that in this series if they knew how much of a bomb the first season of Iron Fist was going to be but now it's too late and we're stuck with stupid Danny Rand.

I mean Netflix is supposed to come out with a season for The Punisher, a very popular character played by Jon Bernthal in the second season of Daredevil as well. I mean can't you imagine this Defenders poster with these characters instead?

I should lay off knocking Iron Fist, I'm sure that that show has already garnered enough criticism from the people who have actually watched all 13 episodes, that was the only thing that bothered me about this trailer.

But what did you think? Are you excited for The Defenders? Is there anything that was missing from that trailer? What would you like to see happen to these heroes? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films and TV shows I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. So I wanted to put the trailer for the new Dark Tower movie up for my last video, but you know me, I can't always do that on my blog. So instead I'm going to leave The link to that video here and instead you get a funny video that Dan Harmon, the creator of Rick and Marty and Community made a while ago. Enjoy!

The Giver

I remember when this book came out. I never read it, but I do remember it being a popular book. Now here's the thing, there's a reason why this movie didn't come out until 2014 and it's because 2014 was the height of the Young adult book to movie adaptations that were started by The Hunger Games and someone wanted to take advantage of that with The Giver. I don't know if the book is as YA as the movie makes it out to be, but if it is, this is the OG YA novel and I'm actually a little sad it didn't get at popular as the other movies that have come out recently because it does have a poignant point to make... it just got bogged down by wanting to be the next Hunger Games, which is ironic because it kind of was the first Hunger Games...

The Giver takes place in a future where humanity has seen a horrible "calamity". Because of the calamity, remaining humans band together in communities that are artificially created and all emotion and feelings are not only outlawed but they are expunged from them.

The movie starts off in black and white, to show the view point of our main character Jonas (played by Brenton Thwaites). Him and his friends Fiona (played by Odeya Rush) and Asher (played by Cameron Monaghan). The movie starts right before they are going to go through the process of adulthood and they are going to receive their jobs that they will do for the rest of their lives.

Fiona ends up being a doctor or sorts, Asher becomes a drone pilot but Jonas is given a very strange job because he meets all the qualities that are expected of the people in this community (Divergent much?). He is given the job of receiver of memories and is put under the tutelage of a man called The Giver (played by Jeff Bridges). The job is essentially to be the only one who holds memories of the world they used to live in and advise the elders, the main one played by Meryl Streep, on the mistakes of the past.

As Jonas spends more time with the Giver, he starts to see the beauty, pain, and emotions that make us humans and the lengths this government has gone to squash it out in order to avoid conflict and in order to avoid the pain and calamity of the past.

As far as I understand, the villains in this movie are not exactly villains or corrupt like a President Snow from The Hunger Games, but instead of just bought so far into the system that their ways of thinking can only be changed by them seeing the things that the Giver and Jonas can see.

Oh... and Taylor Swift is in this movie...

I thought I was really going to hate Taylor Swift in this movie and I figured I had pinned down why this movie didn't get the following or acclaim of The Hunger Games and it was all pinned down on Taylor Swift. But she's honestly barely in the movie and the only reason I know she was in the film was because it's Taylor Swift, a famous person who is not an actress and the scenes she is in are not that good. She's incredibly inconsequential to the entire plot. They really could have taken her out entirely and nothing would have changed.

So... put Taylor Swift aside, is this a good movie?

On face value, yes.

It's not a masterpiece and it stinks of trying to be a franchise and trying to ride on the coattails of The Hunger Games, but when it's just trying to emulate the story, a story that I haven't even read the book and I know it's an interesting story, it does a pretty good job at portraying that.

I really wish I had read the book first because I'm pretty sure I'm going to read the book now and just think this movie is a piece of garbage. I'll have to let you know when I do read it, but on face value, this is really not a bad film. It's set in a futuristic world that seems pretty original and just sets itself apart from the rest of the YA films.

I really did like the transition they make from black and white to color to portray the slow progression Jonas goes through as he starts to see the new emotions and feelings. Now I think that the progression could have been show a little more than just color coming into his world, but I really liked it nonetheless.

I think when you think of the cast of this film, its actually not that bad. Except for Taylor Swift... she

wasn't in this movie. Katie Holmes is also in this movie and so is Alexander Skarsgard as Jonas's parents.

When you have Jeff Bridges and Meryl Streep, you're really not going to have a bad performance. I know that Jeff Bridges tends to pull out a grumbled mumble a lot of the time but I thought he did a good job with this one. I really liked Jonas and Fiona, I thought that they worked well together.

I don't think the cast and the film was overly exceptional. I think overall, everyone was good. Not great, but good. The movie served a purpose to entertain and make you think a little bit. It's very interesting watching someone like Jonas start to color his reality with the true feelings and facts of life, something he was hidden from. It makes for a good adventure and decent story. Nothing exceptional but not bad either.

I feel like I'm doing really short reviews but honestly when you finish a long review like the one I did for Beauty and the Beast everything feels short. Overall, the Giver is on Netflix. If you're a fan of the book, I'm not sure what you'll think about this film, but if you have never heard of The Giver, and especially if you're a fan of YA films like The Hunger Games, you actually might really like The Giver.

But what did you think? Does The Giver hold up against the other YA movies that their source material received from this story? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. Again, I'd like to read the original book. Here's a short interview with Lois Lowry the books author. Enjoy!