Tag: Amazon Prime

Exhuma

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Rating: 3 stars out of 5
Starring: Kim Go-eun, Lee Do-hyun, Choi Min-sik, Jung Yun-ha, Yoo Hae-jin
Where to watch: Amazon Prime Video
To watch or not to watch: It has the right atmosphere and is deep rooted in spirituality and superstition. Interesting, but not enough

Lee Hwa-rim (Kim Go-eun) is a celebrated shaman in Korea. Her tattooed protégé Yun Bong-gil (Lee Do-hyun) have created a name for themselves and amassed wealth for themselves. A real-estate developer Korean-American family is facing a mysterious illness where the men inheriting the bloodline are falling sick and passing away before their time. They could not find a cure in the western medicine for this, so they turn towards more traditional methods. They contact the shaman for her help, who studies the newborn son of the patriarch and concludes the reason to be “Grave’s Call”, or curse by an ancestor from their grave. The shaman duo enlist the help of geomancer Kim Sang-deok (Choi Min-sik) and his mortician friend Yeong-geun (Hae-jin Yoo). The issue seems to be the ominous location of the grave – on the top of a hill near the border between North and South Korea. They decide to relocate the grave to a holier location which is a prime real estate and earn a lot of money in the process. During the exhumation, they come to face evil which is beyond their power to control.

The movie is very atmospheric, at least in the first half, where the hue is yellow, brown and generally dark. The movements are slow, there is little dialogue or emotion and even lesser laughter. There is a selfish interest in helping the American Park family, question about the legitimacy of shamanism, and the class difference shown through the geomancer’s view. Then it all changes in the second half where we come face-to-face with the evil itself. The reason for the evil to be what it is, is either not present or not explained well (depending on the ability to hear between the dialogues). In addition, there is also a underlying cause (literally) for the curse on the family, which was way out the left field, and in a lets-drag-the-movie-to-make-it-an-acceptable-length-way. It totally leaped over the goal of freeing the Park family to avenging Korea. Not good (did the audience dirty). It could have been shorter if it had only stuck to the story and delivered what it promised.

It is by no means a bad movie. It is like a A-grade student suddenly delivering B grade assignment in their best subject. Not bad, but wasted potential. And disappointing. There is more emphasis on Korean history and what it considers evil. An a non-Korean, it might not have that impact on the reception of the story. It gets the cinematography right. Like, bang on. And the atmosphere with the chanting, drumming and screaming as required. It takes audience on a journey into the netherland along with the actors. And the actors, Wow. It was refreshing to see Kim Go-eun in this mature role and look after Goblin. Lee Do-hyun was unrecognizable in this role and get-up. Everyone performed perfectly. It is what made the movie get 3 stars here, because we should rightly leave looming evil entities to Hollywood.

Run Sweetheart Run

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https://www.heavenofhorror.com/

Rating: 3 stars out of 5
Starring: Ella Balinska, Pilou Asbæk
Where to watch: Amazon PrimeVideo
To watch or not to watch: A survival movie with an average amount of thrill along with a pinch of unsuspected supernatural. It is fine

Cherie (Ella Balinska) is a single mother to a daughter, works as a paralegal, studies part time to become a full-fledged lawyer. She has mistakenly double-booked her boss with a client and his anniversary dinner, and takes his place at the client meeting. She is part hopeful for the meeting to turn into something more, as she has been single a long tim, but carries pepper spray nonetheless. She meets Ethan (Pilou Asbæk), who is rich, considerate and says the right things, all of which is very refreshing for Cherie. What starts as a night of part hope, part skepticism, resulting in more hope than skepticism, ends up turning into horror and a chase for her, when Ethan attacks her after returning from dinner. She narrowly escapes his place and runs to cops who arrest her. Ethan posts her bail and gives her a headstart in the hunt he will pursue. Cherie explores all her options to survive and gives a tough fight.

This movie falls in the sub-genre called social horror (think Jordan Peele’s Get Out), only here the social issue is patriarchy. The problem with movies trying to address two things at once is balance, which is often difficult to strike. This problem exists in this movie as well. It starts as any horror movie, but the dialogues are discordant with what’s happening, like the flow of the movie is being forced in a certain direction only by dialogues. The whole chase sequence is pretty cool, and Ethan’s powers are revealed slowly and it is a good surprise, but mixing it with patriarchy was a bit much. Even the protagonist’s actions did not follow a pattern like it happens with a human in general. A lot of this made the thrill questionable. The second act of the movie was the one part which was great, really gory. But it is a very good execution as the actual violence is actually censored, happens off-screen and left to the imagination of the viewers.

The movie is pretty low-budget and it a testament to the director who has made it possible to remove the actual scares from the screen, and still made it possible to be thrilling. It has very small cast and next to no special effects. Other factor which carries the movie forward are the actors, specially Ella Balinska who managed to convey the pain, hurt, fear and strength through the acting alone. Pilou Asbæk is sufficiently hateful and creepy. The music is another positive aspect, complementing the movie in all the right ways. It is pop, lyrics are relevant to the concept and add to the movie where the story subtracts. Watch it for the average thrill, superb acting and vicarious response to patriarchy. It wouldn’t require too much popcorn though.

Nine Perfect Strangers

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https://www.primevideo.com/

Rating: 3 out of 5

Starring: Nicole Kidman, Melissa McCarthy, Michael Shannon, Luke Evans, Tiffany Boone, Manny Jacinto, Regina Hall, Bobby Cannavale

Streaming on: Primevideo

To watch or not to watch: Meh. Watch it because it is available and you have time to kill

Nine people (4 individuals and 2 families) get accepted at a healing centre in Middle of Nowhere, USA. They all have suffered some form of setback or trauma in life and are looking to somehow get over it. The retreat is run by Masha (Nicole Kidman) and she is assisted by 3 other people.They keep everything under control and design the treatment program, customised for each attendee. Every attendee has some dark secret behind their traumas, which they are hididng, and apprehensive of each other in the beginning. Masha claims to have healed/cured/changed people’s lives in the 10 days they spend at the ridiculously expensive retreat. As time goes by, people make friends, share their life stories and generally open up to the others. In the parallel, we have Masha and her team conspiring about the treatment and have secrets of their own, which also forms a plot in parallel with the attendees’ stories.

First of, the name of the series is incorrect. It isn’t 9 perfect strangers all around. There is a couple and a family of three, which reduces the number of “strangers” for them. Secondly, the whole strangers meeting each other has been done with multiple times, ever since Agatha Christie wrote “And then there were none”. Here too, the part of getting to know each other and making friends, which is a large part of the series, is quite expected and hence feels dragged. Except the storyline of Frances (Melissa McCarthy) and Tony (Bobby Cannavale), which is entertaining and sweet and witty. There are instances in the first half of the series in which people question their presence at the retreat, as if it was not voluntary application?! If that is the question posed, the viewer needs either to know the origin of the question (like in Oldboy) or the answer to it (Matrix). That whole plot is left to open, never to be brought up again, discussed or revealed.

The series tries really hard to be full of intrigue or suspense and a sense of underlying plot twist, hinted all along through different memories of the people, but there is none. The deep soundtrack, tracking shots, psychedelic experiences, none of them lead anywhere, only give a sense of building upto something, which is ultimately nothing. In fact, the whole series can be reviewed by calling it “Tries Hard” – the staff tried hard to be full of intrigue while preparing the treatment plan, which is nothing more than felony crime, Nicole Kidman tries hard to be Masha who is inexplicably revered and is all that is ethereal but it fails because watching her speak can be physically painful, the guests try hard to make their lives hard, but in reality the regular medical world already has solutions to most of their troubles.

One thing the show highly favours is the appearances of people – everyone is in awe of Masha because she is this skinny silhouette clad in white, with a Russian accent as far from real as the physical distance between the countries. There is no reason for anyone to like her, or trust her, as it is revealed that she drugs the guests without their knowledge, all in the name of “healing” (really wrong messaging here, by the way, and surprising that not many people are speaking about it). Despite the potential to deliver on life-changing solutions to the very real problems some of the guests do seem to have, it just falls flat on the face, like having a Christmas gift from a favorite person, with beautiful wrapping, but the box is filled with packing peanuts. This analogy is more true, since this comes from the same set of creators and adapted from the same author who wrote Big Little Lies.

Melissa McCarthy deserves an award for her performance in this show, she is finally getting a role where she is able to show her range – no more goofy comic sidekick. She is also the only one who has a more detailed and relatable trauma from which she is a trying to recover. If you need a reason to watch the show, she is it. And nothing else.

Drishyam 2

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https://www.imdb.com/

Rating: 4 out of 5

Starring: Mohanlal, Meena, Ansiba, Esther Anil

Streaming on: Primevideo

To watch or not to watch: Brilliant watch with popcorn

The movie continues after the first installment where the crime (murder of IG’s son) was committed 6 years ago. The family is constantly under the threat and fear of the crime being traced to them. Meanwhile, Georgekutty (Mohanlal) is chasing his dream of making a movie and the script is in the works for some time. He has spent a lot of money in getting it just right. They have new neighbours, a couple with an alcoholic and abusive husband and a simple wife. The Georgekutty family is living their lives, amongst local gossip about the daughter Anju (Ansiba) who also has PTSD and Georgekutty’s recent alcoholism. The police is still looking to solve the crime and they now have new witnesses and clues. The story then “resumes” from that point and becomes again a game of intelligence and sheer will power.

The movie feels like a sweet melancholic orchestra in the beginning and takes it to the best crescendo any performance could. The movie is long-ish at 2 hours 33 minutes of play, and the first hour is director showing us the lay of the land, to generate the same emotions the first movie generated for the family and how that incident has changed their lives. The performances of the actors is yet again, flawless. Mohanlal shines brightly as a man juggling multitude aspects of life. The protagonist of the movie still remains human psyche. It is present in all the aspects of the story – the crime, the public opinion, human conscience, persecution, everything. It is difficult to express in words.

It is one of the best sequels made, not only for the execution of the idea, but for the idea itself. A crime is committed and how the people affected by it are dealing with the aftermath. The idea of multi-faceted persecution is beautifully depicted. It is more a psychological thriller, exploring/exploiting human nature than a crime genre movie – more so than the first installment. This shows how the line between crime and righteousness is grey and we cannot escape the consequences of our actions no matter how clever we try to be. It becomes almost philosophical at this point.

Do watch it, with a huge tub of popcorn for stress eating.

The Report

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https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8236336/

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Starring: Adam Driver, Annette Benning, John Hamm

Streaming on: Amazon Prime

To watch or not to watch: A must watch when looking for something intense

The movie is a true story of a US Senate Investigative Committee’s report on the CIA’s interrogation techniques after the 9/11 attacks. The ungainful torture of the suspected terrorists was called “Enhanced Interrogative Techniques” by the CIA and was outsourced to independent contractors, who did not have the qualification to carry out the task. And yet, they got the free hand for many years. After the government changed, interrogation by torture was supposed to stop, but didn’t, thus leading to the investigation. The Committee was led by an idealistic and tenacious Daniel J Jones and his small staff, working in a basement office for about 5 years. They got 6.3 million documents to read which lead to 6,700 pages’ report and about 500 pages summary. Understandably, there was backlash from CIA and the red tape restricted the access directly into the Agency.

Though the premise of the movie doesn’t make it a compelling watch, but it is. Scott Z Burns managed to make the process of reading the documents and the presentation of the report exciting and intriguing. the role of Daniel J Jones, played by Adam Driver, is an inspiring character in and of himself. The investigation, the screenplay of reading of the documents were interspersed by the footage of the interrogation of the suspected terrorists, all playing the emotions of the viewer masterfully.

The acting skills of Adam Driver have never been in question. Coupled with the ideal outlook of Dan Jones, he is truly commendable. The movie doesn’t pull any punches and is transparent about the entire process, including the apathy of the CIA, the plot to cover up the truth and the resistance from the White House to stop the truth from coming out. It is an honest movie, simply made and yet delivers. A must watch.