Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Review Written By Michael J. Ruhland


















Michael's Movie Grade:F

Review: Pure and utter boredom, easily the worst Star Wars movie and yes I am including the prequels in that.

The biggest problem with this film is the characters. All of them are completely devoid of any personality. This is especially true of our two main protagonists. After watching the movie, I still can't tell you what their personalities are, because they don't have any. The side characters though are not much better.

As I've stated in previous reviews, if I don't like the characters, the action scenes are extremely boring. This is even worse in this film, because the action scenes are the slowest, and longest seeming scenes in the movie. In fact the pacing in this film is awful. I like Star Wars movies for the atmosphere more than anything else. However with the exception of the action scenes, the film jumps around from place to place and character to character much too quickly. This allows us no time to soak in what is the best part of these movies, despite making us sit through some of the most boring action scenes imaginable.

The only things good I can say about this movie is that I liked a very brief scene involving Darth Vader, and the score wasn't bad. That is it though. Everything else in this movie is awful and a pain to sit through. I sat through it all because I heard the movie gets better as it goes along. Well it didn't at all.

Since this takes place before episode 4, we know all that is going to happen. Combined with the boredom of the characters and action scenes. This gives me nothing to even care about.

To say this movie is a disappointment, is being kind to this horrible movie.

-Michael J. Ruhland

La La Land

Review Written by Michael J. Ruhland



















Michael's Movie Grade:A+

Review: Pure movie magic. Probably my favorite film of this year.

This is an incredibly passionate love letter to 1940's and 50's Hollywood movies (particularly the musicals), and to just the beauty of music and art. What makes this film so great is that you can tell writer/director Damiem Chazelle is truly passionate about what he is paying tribute to. The last musical number, a scene in a museum and quite a bit more of the movie captures nearly perfectly the art of an old movie musical. While there may be clichés in the story, these never feel like they are here because they are expected, but because Chazelle truly loves this type of film and wants to make a film close to the spirit of the classics, and due to his passion he actually captures it. Also very important to this movie being so good is that Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling are perfect in these roles. The perform the serious and the fun scenes with an equally commitment and excellence. Their performances of the musical numbers are especially excellent. As this film is a tribute to classic movie musicals, it looks fantastic. Color here is used much better than it is in most current movies. We are so used to color in movies that we take it for granted. However this movie doesn't it truly uses color to it's full advantage.

One of the best musical films in years a must watch for all movie lovers.

By the way the ending, while I won't give it away really made me cry.

-Michael J. Ruhland

Moana

Review Written By Michael J. Ruhland












Michael's Movie Grade: A+

Review: Directing team John Musker and Ron Clements helped redefine Disney feature animation with such films as The Little Mermaid and Aladdin. However they may have dine it again here, this film is an incredible mixture of what made previous Disney animated features so good and great new ideas as well . In fact this may stand as their best film and it is one of my favorite post-Walt animated Disney films.

The look of this film is incredible. The designs are very appealing, and the characters are very well animated. On top of this the film has a brilliant combination of CGI and hand drawn animation done through Maui's tattoos (the head of hand drawn animation was Eric Goldberg, who had previously been the supervising animator for the Genie in Aladdin).

The story is also excellent and told through brilliant filmmaking. The story is told using so many great devices. Making the first few villains comic for instance works fantastically. This makes the climax all the more exciting and makes the threat feel much stronger. In fact the whole mixture of comedy and drama is near perfect. The humor is not only quite funny but it always is there in service to the story and characters. The comedy uses a lot of self referential humor, this is not only quite funny but makes the fantasy all the more acceptable by also talking to the cynic in us that recognizes the clichés of this type of story, while not insulting them to the point of where we don't take them seriously enough. All this of course would be wasted if the characters weren't so likable and luckily they are.

The songs in this film are fantastic. They are in a more modern style quite different from what has been used in many previous animated Disney features. However they work perfectly and like many classic Disney films they are completely at the service of the story and characters. They work brilliantly. This is probably the best use of modern style music in a Disney film.

I think this movie does for me, what Frozen did for so many other animation fans (Don't get me wrong I loved Frozen but I am blown away by this film).
 
If you can't guess I liked this movie.

But don't go away we have a short to Review too.

Inner Workings

Michael's Movie Grade:C

Review: Entertaining little cartoon. 

This film a good message and great animation.

However this cartoon seems almost too short and the jokes miss as often as they hit.

Overall an enjoyable little cartoon, but not much more.

-Michael J. Ruhland

I Am Not Ashamed

Review Written By Michael J. Ruhland











Michael's Movie Grade:B

Review: Good character study.


When this movie really works is when it is simply a character study of Rachel. This character is very relatable and likable. Her struggles are very much like are own struggles, and even non-religious people could relate to her yearning to be excepted. This film does a great job at letting us feel what the character is feeling.

On the downside this film features some clumsy acting and a group of bullies are very poorly written. I also have to say saying someone knows Shakespeare real well because they can quote the whole "All the World's a Stage" silique from As You Like It is quite clumsy writing. That shouldn't be a big fault but it is repeated too much this small fault gets very annoying.

While some may criticize this film without seeing it, because they are offended that a movie would use this tragedy for Christian propaganda. It is done in very good taste. Neither the Christian message nor the tragedy are forced into this movie and both are treated with the upmost respect. In fact the ending is extremely moving and will allow some who understandably have trouble with this films faults to forgive them.

Trolls

Review written by Michael J. Ruhland


















Michael's Movie Grade:B

Review: Very fun movie.

What really makes this movie work so well is the characters and the visuals. The characters, could have easily been boring and two dimensional. Poppy isn't just an obnoxiously happy character, and Branch is not just an overly depressed character. I am not going to say they are complex characters, but they are well thought out and very likable. The visuals are great,  including both design, and animation. The characters have a likable look to them and the world around them looks really cool. The characters are also very well animated and come to life through it. This film is just a joy to look at.

On the downside, most of the songs feel like they are here because they are popular, not because they fit the story. In fact most of them feel quite out of place here. Also the story is often very preditible.

Overall, just a very fun movie.

-Michael J. Ruhland

El Jeremias

Review Written By Michael J. Ruhland



















Michael's Movie Grade:A-

Review: Fantastic movie that is both funny and moving.

As I have mentioned before, one of the many things I love about movies is when, I discover something great that I completely did not except. I just went to this film because I felt like seeing something different from what I have seen in theaters lately, and a Spanish-langue Mexican movie, nobody I know has mentioned felt like just the ticket. I got in just a few minutes before the previews started, and discovered I was the only one in the theater. I began to wonder if I had chosen the right movie to see. That fear was soon quieted. In the first few minutes I found myself laughing and enjoy these characters.

Nearly everything about this movie was great. Martian Castro (his film debut) is a very talented child actor, the whole cast is great in fact, the humor is very funny, the drama is quite touching and the film has a great and very important message, about family, childhood and life in general. There were few predictable moments, when I knew what was going to happen, but with how good the rest of the movie was this was just a nitpick.

This movie was the feature film directorial debut of Anwar Safa. I recommend seeing this film and keeping a track of this director in the future.

-Michael J. Ruhland

Florence Foster Jenkins

Review Written By Michael J. Ruhland



















Michael's Movie Grade:A-

Review: Intelligent, funny and moving. A fantastic film.


This film is really great. It is very funny, often times laugh out loud so. However the drama is equal effective. The combination between the drama and comedy is done amazingly. Neither the drama, nor the comedy, get in the way of each other. In fact the compliment each other very well. The comedy makes the drama better and the drama makes the comedy better.

The entire cast for this film are fantastic in their roles. Despite them being well known actors and actresses, you see them as the characters rather than the people playing them. They feel like they are the people their playing. They are very funny, but they never play it in a way that the characters feel less real. This allows the comedy to be as funny as it is and the dramatic scenes to be as great as they are.

The time period used for this film is represented great. It looks very authentic, and allows the film to have a great look different from most films today.

This is simply a great film.

-Michael J. Ruhland