The Out-Laws (2023)

As a fan of The Vampire Diaries, I’m always interested when Nina Dobrev shows up in a movie. The last one I saw her in was 2021’s Christmas movie, Love Hard. And with Adam Devine and Pierce Brosnan in The Out-Laws, I was definitely interested in checking it out.

Bank manager Owen (Devine) and yoga instructor Parker (Dobrev) are about to get married. Parker’s parents, Billy (Brosnan) and Lilly (Ellen Barkin), have been absent from her life but they have finally emailed her to say they will be attending the wedding. Shortly after they arrive, Owen’s bank is robbed by the Ghost Bandits. Owen is pretty sure Parker’s parents are the Bandits but before he can completely confirm his suspicious, Parker is kidnapped by Billy and Lilly’s former bank robbing partner, Rehan (Poorna Jagannathan). Rehan demands five million dollars or she will kill Parker. Desperate to save his future wife, Owen helps Billy and Lilly rob banks to save her.

The plot of the movie was obvious from the title. As soon as I saw that Owen was a bank manager, I knew Parker’s parents were going to rob him. The only thing I didn’t know was that Parker wasn’t in on it. I expected there to be a twist that she had been setting him up the entire time but, no, she was actually completely innocent. Which was nice. I liked that they didn’t turn Owen’s pure love for her into something that would break his heart. No, this is just a story of a man who loves a woman so much that he would do anything for her. And parents who are kinda crappy.

I did enjoy The Out-Laws a lot. It helps that I don’t mind Adam Devine’s acting. I’m sure he gets on a lot of people’s nerves but I find him charming. And he is a really good comic actor. There isn’t a ton of comedy here but all of it does fall on Devine’s shoulders. And he handles it well. I would definitely say this is one to check out.

Rating: B

The King's Daughter | Movie Review

A movie made in 2014 but not released until 2022. Supposedly, it was delayed to work on the special effects. This means that I absolutely had to watch it. Even if it was only released in movie theaters during a pandemic. But I was confident that there wouldn’t be a lot of people in the audience. And I was right. We were the ONLY people in the audience.

The King’s Daughter is very loosely based on the 1997 book, The Moon and The Sun. King Louis XIV (Pierce Brosnan), the Sun King of France, wants to be immortal. He sends Captain Yves De La Croix (Benjamin Walker) to the high seas to bring back a mermaid. Dr. Labarthe (Pablo Schreiber) believe that if the king consumes the mermaid’s heart, he will be granted immortality. Meanwhile, the king has sent his priest and advisor, Père La Chaise (William Hurt), to retrieve his daughter, Marie-Josèphe (Kaya Scodelario), from the convent where she has lived her entire life under the guise that the king needs a new composer. Marie-Josèphe befriends the captured mermaid and tries to free the creature when she learns of her father’s plan.

Let me start off with : This is not a good movie. The best thing about this movie is Julie Andrew’s narration in the very beginning. Unfortunately, she does not narrate the entire movie. Only about the first half hour. I’m pretty sure her narration is one of the reasons the movie got delayed. Without her telling me what the hell was going on, I would have been completely lost.

I went into this movie knowing it was going to be bad. The question was “how bad?” Before word is even spoken, you can tell you are in for a ride based on how awful the characters look. Pierce Brosnan was given a Party City wig for his role as King Louis XIV. At no point in this movie does he ever look good. He looks like someone else was cast in the role, filmed the whole movie, then someone decided to CGI his face onto that actor’s body.

In addition, all of the costume decisions were strange. The movie is supposed to take place sometime in the 17th-century. Yet all of the women are literally wearing prom dresses from 2014. There isn’t a single dress that is historically accurate. The men’s clothes are only slightly better. Most of the men’s clothes that I saw were tailored in a way to make them look slightly accurate. Like, if you only saw them in silhouette, you might think “Yeah, that looks about right.”

And, of course, there are giant plot holes everywhere. I haven’t read the book itself but the synopsis on Wikipedia doesn’t say anything about the king having a daughter. Marie-Josèphe is supposed to be a lady-in-waiting to the king’s niece. Making this drastic change gives the movie a very weird vibe. In the movie, the king knows he has a daughter and knows where she is but doesn’t care anything about her until…the music at his palace begins to suck? I honestly have no idea why he really brings her to the palace. He claims it’s because he needs a composer and she loves music but that makes no sense. And when she is at the palace, he mostly ignores her except in very specific situations where it looks like he wants to have sex with her? Oh, and one of the movie’s conflicts where he tries to marry her off to a lord in his kingdom because he spent all of his money trying to find the mermaid.

I figured that this was going to be a movie that I wouldn’t be able to recommend. However, if you like terrible movies, this would be perfect. As a matter of fact, if you are going to watch this, please come back here and explain it to me. Why did anyone think that this was a good movie to make? Why did anyone actually agree to work on it? But, if you are a normal person with normal interests, stay far away. Even Julie Andrews couldn’t save this one.

Cinderella (2021)

On September 3, Amazon released a new Cinderella movie on their Prime service. Since it’s release, it has gotten some pretty terrible reviews. But did the movie really deserve all of the hate? Well, I watched the movie just for you…so let’s find out.

The story has the basics of the standard Cinderella story - orphan Ella lives in the basement and serves her stepmother and stepsisters. She catches the eye of the prince, who is in need of a bride. With some help from a magical godmother, she attends a ball, where the prince falls in love with her. At midnight, she runs away, leaving a shoe behind. The prince searches the kingdom for his new love. Happily ever after,

However, this version gives us a slightly feminist slant to the story. There is an underlying plot of how women are basically considered second-class. Ella dreams of owning a dress shop but she is told multiple times that women can’t run a business, Princess Gwen has tons of brilliant ideas for updates to the kingdom but her father constantly tells her to shut up, and even Queen Beatrice is talked down to by her husband when she speaks up on her son’s behalf. There are so many instances of misogyny that it almost becomes the main plot of the film. I don’t know that it is a bad thing. It is a little overbearing though.

The main thing I want to talk about is the music. In this world, people break out into song for little to no reason. And, yes, everyone around them can hear them. Or at least they can most of the time. The problem is the song choice. This movie was written and directed by Kay Cannon, who also wrote all three Pitch Perfect movies, and it shows. She has Prince Robert sing “Somebody To Love,” which fits well in Ella Enchanted, another Cinderella movie. Here, though, Robert looks utterly stupid singing about how hard he works. Yes, I know it is supposed to be sarcastic but it just doesn’t work. Heck, the movie STARTS OUT with the village singing Janet Jackson’s “Rhythm Nation” mixed with “You Gotta Be” by Des’ree. It is not good. And it just doesn’t stop. It seems like there is another song every ten minutes. (Please note that it is a 2-hour long movie.)

Despite all of the terrible reviews, there is a good movie hidden in here. If they made this a straight romantic comedy instead of a jukebox musical, I think this would have been a fantastic film. While Camila Cabello does a decent job with Ella, the prize winners here are the women of the royal family. Minnie Driver as Queen Beatrice is pure gold. Pierce Brosnan’s King Rowan would have died in his first scene thanks to the daggers from her eyeballs. Tallulah Greive’s Princess Gwen doesn’t get a lot of screen time but she kills every scene she is in. The only other character that I enjoyed was Prince Robert’s…Scottish friend? I don’t think they even gave the poor guy a name but he is awesome.

Should you watch it? No…I don’t think you should. While the “movie” parts aren’t that bad, there are so many absolutely awful songs that they make it difficult to enjoy the good parts. Go watch Ella Enchanted (on Amazon Prime) or the 1997 Rogers & Hammerstein Cinderella with Brandy (on Disney Plus). You would be much happier with those choices.

PS: Please stop letting James Corden run rampant all over your movie. I understand wanting to cast him because people know his name. But there is NO reason to keep cutting to him every few minutes. It did NOTHING for the story besides annoy your viewers. He isn’t worth it.