Jean-Paul’s Rating: 4/5 stars

Bottom Line: ‘Lava’ was dull.  ‘Inside Out’ was a beautiful representation of the inner workings of the emotional center of the mind backed by a touching story.

Like every other Pixar movie ever made, ‘Inside Out’ starts with a short cartoon.  This one was called ‘Lava’.  It consists of a fairly catchy song about a male volcano all alone in the middle of the ocean longing for, and of course eventually finding female companionship.  It pissed me off.  Why?  Because the male volcano looks like a volcano.  Slightly anthropomorphic, but very obviously a volcano.  The female volcano?  Hyper-feminized to the point that it’s not even recognizable as a volcano.  Don’t believe me?  See for yourself.

WTF is that?  Hair? A chin?!?!?  A slender neck???  Listen, Pixar, you know how we would be able to tell that a perfectly volcano looking volcano was female?  By you saying in the song that it was female and having it sing with a female voice. Which you did.  Or, you know what?  Why do you have to give either of the volcanos a gender at all?  In your representation of the two volcanos, what you are doing is saying to the world that male is normal and female is abnormal.  I get it, gendered pronouns make English a bit tricky and the whole male/female relationship is still more traditional than others, but seriously, Pixar, epic fail on just about every level in designing the female volcano.  Rant over.

Now on to the feature, ‘Inside Out’ which is an absolute delight.  How I wish I was in on the design meetings as they tried to figure out how to represent brain functions on-screen.  Core memories, random thoughts, emotions, they’re all brilliantly represented.  Yeah, sure, it might not be scientifically accurate, but it still gives a good feel for how certain aspects of the brain function and it makes for some great screen time.

The movie focuses on Joy and Sadness as they go on an epic adventure through 11-year-old Riley’s brain as Riley is experiencing depression from her family’s move to San Francisco.  The D-word is never used (probably because even thinking about an 11-year-old with depression is, well, depressing) but it is obvious that’s what the creators were going for.  Core memories forgotten.  Highlights of life crumbling away.  Even though Joy is the central character, ultimately, this movie is about Sadness.  It’s about Joy’s coming to an understanding that Sadness has a valuable part to play.  It’s also about getting older and emotions getting more complicated.

So, yep, Pixar has done it again.  If you can ignore ‘Lava’.  Which I can’t.  Ugh.  But really, ‘Inside Out’ is a delight.  It’s funny, happy, sad, all the emotions that Pixar has become known for evoking.  It ain’t no ‘Up’, but it is certainly one of their better offerings in a long line of great offerings.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 2/5 stars

Bottom Line: Convoluted plot.  Little explanation for time travel decisions.  Dull action scenes.  Absolutely zero wow factor.

Do you know what would have made this movie better?  Terminator dragons sent from the future to kill Daenerys Targaryen.  Or anything else.  Sorry, Emilia Clarke.

Terminator has jumped the shark.  Or maybe they’ve time travelled the shark back in time to kill what was left of the first two movies.  It’s hard to tell because the time travel aspects of this movie made about as much sense as my previous sentence.  The biggest problem is that everyone and their mother seems to have a time machine.  The “future” has a time machine.  Ok, fair enough, someone has to have a time machine to make any of this make sense.  The “past” has a time machine cobbled together from parts you can find in a junk yard.  The “present” has a time machine which does just about everything except time travel.  It’s a complete mess.

Time travel is time travel.  It rarely makes sense.  It always bothers me, but if there’s something to wrap around it, I’m willing to forgive the inconsistencies.  “Terminator Genisys” has the thinnest veneer of a plot and a bunch of clunky action scenes all tied with a ribbon of nostalgia.  It isn’t even worth regifting.  I tried to enjoy it for longer than I should have, but when terminator #1 jumps from one helicopter and dive bombs another helicopter containing terminator #2 and somehow missed the rotors but still caused the helicopter to crash-land and roll to its destruction stopping right on the helipad that everyone was heading towards, I gave up.  This is what passes for storytelling these days.

You completists are going to go see this movie regardless of what I say, but I’ll say it anyway.  Skip this movie.  Or at least wait until it’s on your movie streaming service of choice.  “Terminator Genisys” is not worth the time or the money to see in the theater.  Luckily, it looks like it’s pretty much bombing.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 3/5 stars

Bottom Line: Enjoyable, mindless, light-hearted, bone crunching, blood splattering fun.  Sure, a lot of it doesn’t make much sense, but so what?

Dinosaurs still rule the box office.  And rightfully so.  Having learned none of the lessons from the Jurassic Park theme park, now we have Jurassic World.  Bigger.  Better.  More dinosaur-y.  What could possibly go wrong?  A lot.

There is lots of stupid in this movie, but it washes over you like a warm Caribbean wave.  You’re too busy looking at all the pretty to notice the jellyfish.  Sure, the super-intelligent genetically modified super-dinosaur just happens to exhibit all of its super-intelligence at precisely the right moment.  Sure, the genetic makeup of said dinosaur is top-secret for vague and pointless reasons.  Sure, an island with a massive tourist attraction would have more than one helicopter and one pilot.  Sure, you probably wouldn’t allow kayakers down a lazy river full of dinosaurs no matter how docile they are.  Sure, the setup for the inevitable sequel is mind numbingly silly yet awesome sounding.  Ignore it.  Feel the waves.  They’re more plentiful than the jellyfish.

Chris Pratt?  Awesome.  I was a little worried after seeing the coming attractions.  They made him seem wooden and outside of his environment.  That did not translate to the movie at all.  Chris Pratt plays Starlord, I mean Andy Dwyer, I mean Owen, an affable dinosaur trainer who is teaching a pack of velociraptors to hunt on his command.  Ok, so Chris Pratt doesn’t really have a lot of range beyond affable.  He plays it so well, though, and you can do a lot with affable.  He is joined by Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard), the stick in the mud who both runs the park and is watching her two nephews who inevitably get sucked into the middle of all the dinosaur mayhem.  Pratt and Howard have some decent chemistry with each other as an opposites-attract couple.

I don’t think “Jurassic World” lives up to its groundbreaking forefather “Jurassic Park”, but it is a fun ride for what it is.  It’s a lot of rehash with a few new ideas thrown it and that all makes it just entertaining enough to make it a movie worth seeing.  With its record-breaking success, expect to see a whole lot more dinosaurs in the future.  The dino-wars are not far in the future.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 3/5 stars

Bottom Line: Return of the disaster movie!  Some great disaster sequences that are totally scientifically accurate!*  Yes, it’s a little corny, but it’s a good kind of corny.

*Scientific accuracy may vary.

“San Andreas” begins with a teenager driving alone down what I can only assume is Highway 1.  She’s searching for things in the back seat, texting on her phone, and all your usual distracted driving faux pas while ominously large vehicles pass her in the other direction.  Then a rock slide comes out of nowhere and hurtles her and her car down the side of a cliff.  Enter Ray (Dwane Johnson) via helicopter to save the day!  Does she get rescued?  You’ll have to see the movie to find out!

With that opening scene, “San Andreas” quickly establishes that this is meant to be more of a tongue-in-cheek type of movie than one to be taken seriously.  It is fun and a little irreverent and pays painstakingly close detail to the minutest scientific detail.*

*Of Bizaaroworld.

So yeah, not terribly scientifically accurate.  But who cares if Hoover Dam is completely destroyed by a slightly higher than moderate earthquake?  You get to see Hoover Dam destroyed!  And who cares if two of the cities with the best earthquake preventative building codes get basically flattened?  You get to see Los Angeles and San Francisco flattened!  And who cares if a tsunami appears out of thin air where no tsunami would ever form?  You get to see a tsunami roll over San Francisco!  All of that and Dwane Johnson forsaking his job and dooming hundreds to die by stealing a rescue helicopter to rescue his ex-wife and then his daughter.  Classic.

Yes, there are better movies out there, but “San Andreas” is fun.  As a bonus, the daughter, Blake (Alexandra Daddario) is a tough cookie and not some damsel in distress.  After an initial rescue by a love interest, it’s mostly her who keeps him alive and not vice versa.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 3/5 stars

Bottom Line:  Another “only you can save us” teen drama.  Pretty well done, but in a crowded field.  An enjoyable movie with not much else to comment on.

“Tomorrowland” starts of in the realm of a kid’s movie.  Fluffy, light, and enjoyable for all ages.  I was worried.  It got better.  It follows the predictable teen movie pattern that is all the rage these days since Harry Potter first appeared on the scene.  Special teen kid.  Destined for greatness.  Doubts self.  Finds confidence.  Saves day.  Sure, we’ve seen it all before, but it’s a damn successful formula.  All it takes is a bit of nuance and some originality thrown in and you have yourself an acceptable movie.  And acceptable “Tomorrowland” is.

Unsurprisingly, the movie got good when George Clooney showed up.  He plays Frank Walker, a man exiled from Tomorrowland who must help Casey Newton (Britt Robertson) get to Tomorrowland so she can save the world.  Clooney is just a hell of an actor and he and Robertson have some decent chemistry together.  I’m not sure how they got Clooney to star in this movie.  Or Hugh Laurie for that matter.  It really doesn’t seem like their thing.  The movie must have looked much better on paper than in execution.

The story is interesting enough.  The bad guy, Nix (Hugh Laurie), is actually a sympathetic villain.  Almost all his motivations, I’m thinking to myself, “Well, that’s totally reasonable.”  This is a formulaic movie so they also must make him do formulaic bad guy stuff, but Nix is really just a guy with good intentions which had unfortunate side effects.

There is a surprising amount of violence in this movie and quite a bit of death, especially for a Disney tagged movie.  Much of it is gratuitous.  It’s all people being evaporated so there’s no blood, but the callousness of it is still surprising.

Is “Tomorrowland” worth seeing?  Meh, maybe?  It was certainly enjoyable and much of the futuristic effects were pretty cool.  If you enjoy all the other “teen saves the world” stuff like “Hunger Games” and “Divergent”, you’ll likely get something out of “Tomorrowland” as well.  If not, you should probably find your entertainment elsewhere.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 4/5 stars

Bottom Line: A taut non-stop action packed extravaganza.  Sharp visuals.  Perfect soundtrack.  Deeply interesting mythos.

You want to see this film.  I want to see this film again.  Not since the original “The Matrix” movie has there been such beautifully choreographed action scenes.  I’ll have to watch the two together when “Fury Road” gets released on DVD to see which reigns supreme.

The world of Mad Max is perfect for the big screen.  It is both shallow and easy to understand while hiding a lot of depth and complexity just ripe for exploring.  “Fury Road” tackles both aspects of the mythos for maximum effect.  It is amazing to me how much is packed into the two hour run-time of this movie.  Normally, two hours would be a really long time to sit through what can only be described as a single chase scene, but so much interesting story matter is thrown in that you don’t feel like you’ve sat in your seat for two hours.  The pacing is near perfect.

What’s also very interesting is how little dialogue there is in the movie.  Tom Hardy, who plays Max, grunts his way through the entire movie more than he speaks and yet he speaks volumes.  It is a shame that he won’t be nominated for Best Supporting Actor because he does such a good job of emoting.  It really is brilliant.  And notice that I say Best SUPPORTING Actor because that’s what he is in this movie.  Max is more a bystander thrown into events beyond his control than the instigator of the story.  The star is without a doubt the war machine driving, ass-kicking Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron).  Furiosa does quite a bit more talking than Max does, but it is again the emoting that shows through the most.

What makes the movie even better is all the women kick all the ass.  The damsels in distress are rescued by a woman and don’t waste any time jumping into the fight as they race their way to freedom.  They are eventually joined by motorcycle riding grannies who also kick so much ass.  It’s sad that it is so rare for Hollywood to produce a movie, let alone an action movie, with a plethora of three-dimensional women that it becomes necessary to note it when it happens.  More of this please, Hollywood.

This was such a fun movie.  It is certainly one that can be enjoyed again and again.  There are also almost certainly aspects of the movie that will be missed on first viewing since there is so much going on.  It is without a doubt a visual extravaganza.  Go experience it.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 4/5 stars

Bottom Line: A very effective minimalist movie with high production value. A character driven look into what it means to be human.  The ending is a bit flawed.

What does it mean to be human?  Where is that line and when does one cross it?  “Ex Machina” provides a compelling narrative that focuses on those questions.  A young programmer, Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson), works at a fictional Google-like company and he wins a lottery which allows him to visit the reclusive brilliant owner of the company, Nathan (Oscar Issac), at his isolated retreat for a week.  It is soon revealed that the real reason Caleb is there is so he can perform a Turing Test on Nathan’s super-secret artificial intelligence, Ava (Alicia Vikander).  A Turing Test is a thought exercise in which a human interacts with an artificial intelligence (AI) to see if the AI exhibits any traits of being non-human.

The movie is broken down into a series of meetings between Caleb and Ava and then a follow-up on the events between Caleb and Nathan.  When you have a movie that consists almost entirely of one-on-one interactions, the dialogue better be good and “Ex Machina” provides a wonderful script.  To back up the wonderful writing, there is a perfectly themed musical score that helps establish the mood and leads to a deeper sense of tension and foreboding.  Movement, language, and music combine into a single on-screen entity.  It is near masterful.

Then comes the ending.  The ending isn’t bad, it’s just kind of unfulfilling.  There are a bunch of loose ends that don’t make much sense.  There is a moment when the end should have occurred, but it kept on going.  I always blame endings like this on test audiences and studio executives.  A good movie got made, but the ending was the price the director paid to get it made in the first place.

Despite the less than fulfilling ending, “Ex Machina” is worth seeing.  You don’t get many compelling, dialogue driven movies these days what with the superheroes and the explosions so it’s good to see the United States is still capable of creating compelling movies that deviate from the norm.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 3/5 stars

Bottom Line: Too many heroes spoils the plot.  Sufficiently comic-y action sequences.  Some good self-effacing humor.

This is the Avengers I was afraid of.  “Age of Ultron” is a “cram everything in so it’s stuffed full of what everyone wants” type of movie that leaves you feeling a bit empty.  It’s not that it wasn’t fun, because it certainly was at times, it’s more that it’s forgettable.  The movie is also not helped by the flimsy narrative which doesn’t give much to build on for the Marvel uninitiated.  I am somewhere in between and I was often left with a questioning look at various parts of the movie.  This often happens with the closing credit easter eggs that foretell the next movies, but to have these moments in the middle of a movie is inexcusable.  For instance, there is a new superhero introduced over half way through the film.  If like me you do not know the mythology, you will be completely lost as to how they fail to give him a name throughout even though he ends up joining the Avengers at the end.

The action in the movie is equal parts fun and sensory overload.  There’s lots of comic-y stuff going on for the overly geeky.  Lots of combo moves that you know damn well have names to them that “in the know” comic book geeks everywhere are cackling gleefully about as they occur on the screen.  The problem is that when you have a group of superpowered superheroes doing battle with a mostly pedestrian villain, the only way to make fights even remotely interesting is to throw the kitchen sink at them.  This leads to a garbled mess of a fight that can only be enjoyed by showing a once in the while slow motion vingette of action.

The one part where “Age of Ultron” shines is in its humor.  This is all Joss Whedon.  He is equal parts superfan and able to recognize the absurdity of the genre and he uses that gift with great results.  There is some great Thor’s hammer humor as well as Hawkeye’s self-effacing recognitions of how underpowered he is.

The biggest problem is Ultron.  His creation is poorly explained, his motivations are childish, the Avengers’ reactions to him make little sense, and he’s just not that interesting of a villain as a result.  I blame this on having too many A-list superheroes in the same movie all of whom need their individual moments of glory.  That’s how you end up with a two and a half hour movie with a shoestring plot.

Yes, the movie was fun.  Yes, you should see it if you’re a fan of superhero movies.  No, you will likely not look back at it with the fondness of the first Avengers movie.  Ultron ain’t no Loki.