4k-UHD/Movie Review: Charlie's Angels (2019)

 

The 2019 version of Charlie's Angels is an action/adventure movie directed by Elizabeth Banks and starring Kristen Stewart, Ella Balinkska, Naomi Scott, Patrick Stewart, Noah Centineo, and Djimon Honsou. The film is a reboot of a reboot, which was very likely a large part of why it did not do better at the box office. That, and the lack of significant star power. Of course, the 2000 and 2003 movies had Drew Barrymore, Lucy Liu, and Cameron Diaz, all of whom were very well-known. This one has Kristen Stewart, who is probably the biggest star, aside from Patrick Stewart and Elizabeth Banks (who has a prominent role in the movie as well as directing the film). Stewart (in arguably her best role to date) plays one of the Angels along with Naomi Scott and Ella Balinska. They all did a fine job as the "Angels" but did not have the star power to drive many people to see the movie. Some well-known actors and actresses are in supporting and cameo roles, including Patrick Stewart, Ronda Rousey, and more, but their roles were relatively small. The film does partially tie into the TV show and the prior movies.

My biggest complaint about the movie is that it lifts too much from the prior movies, including a villain from the agency, an updated version of The Thin Man character (played by Crispin Glover in the prior film), a mogul bad guy, etc. The "empowered woman"/"girl power" theme of the movie was fine, even if a bit ham-fisted at times. As you can see from some of the comments on Amazon, it turned many people off, but it is not something that bothered me all that much.

The 4k set is a two-disc set containing a UHD disc and a regular Blu-Ray disc. The movie looks and sounds great in the UHD format. The UHD disc has previews that play before the menu loads, then the movie itself. The rest of the extras are on the regular Blu-ray disc. They include deleted scenes, a gag reel, several short (5-7 min, give or take) making-of and behind-the-scenes featurettes, a feature on Elizabeth Banks in her roles as actor and director, and the music video for the movie's theme song. Overall, it is a decent movie, but not great. It is not as good as the original 2000 movie but on par with the 2003 sequel, full throttle. It will definitely not appeal to everyone, but for a two-hour action movie, it is worth checking out as long as you accept that it is not award-winning material.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Personal Shopper

 

Personal Shopper is a smaller-budget independent film from 2016 starring Kristen Stewart, whose best movies seem to be the smaller movies that she does between the large Hollywood blockbusters. In this one, she stars as Maureen, an American living in Paris who works as a personal shopper for a French supermodel. Maureen is also a medium who is waiting for a message from the afterlife from her deceased twin brother. She also has the same genetic heart condition that killed her brother and gets sicker over the course of the movie. The movie is in part a supernatural psychological thriller and in part a crime story. The two storylines interweave with each other throughout the course of the movie and work better at different points than others. And, the movie features one of the few topless scenes that Stewart has done in her career. 

The A/V quality of the blu-ray is very good. The movie is not laden with special effects, but the location shots around Europe look very good, especially if you are watching on a large screen. The extras include the movie trailer, an almost 20-minute interview with the director, Oliver Assayas, and a 46-minute question and answer session from the Cannes Film Festival. 

Overall, the movie is good, but not great. Stewart definitely plays a different type of character than she has played in her more well-known roles in big-budget movies. Given that she seems to play more understated characters better than she does more charismatic characters, this role definitely suits her. I would not classify it as a must-watch, but if you are a fan of Stewart or indie movies in general, it is a good one to check out. 

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Snow White & the Huntsman

 

Chances are, most people are aware of the Snow White story from the Disney cartoon. This is a much different take on the story. The movie stars Charlize Theron as Queen Ravenna, the evil queen who can drain the life from people to stay young and beautiful. Kristen Stewart is Snow White, the "fairest of them all" who, if Ravenna can kill her, will allow Ravenna to stay young and beautiful forever. Ravenna gets the Huntsman (played by Chris Hemsworth) to track Snow White down after she escapes the castle Ravenna has had her imprisoned in since she was a child. He ends up helping her and along with the seven dwarves (who are not a large focus of the story), help Snow White fight Ravenna.

The movie looks and sounds great in HD. There are a ton of great visuals, and the movie makes great use of CGI to, among other things, transform actors like Toby Jones, Nick Frost, and Bob Hoskins, into dwarves. The movie is well written and acted, with Theron basically stealing the show. Stewart gave a good performance as well. Probably not as good as in some of her lower-budget and indie roles, but better than she did in Twilight (although the source material she had to work with there was not exactly stellar).

For those who get the Blu-Ray, the extras include a commentary track on the movie by the director, the visual effects supervisor, and one of the editors of the movie. Then there are several making-of and behind-the-scenes featurettes that range from just over a minute in length to just over twenty minutes. Around an hour's worth of material, give or take.

Overall, the movie is very good. Theron is definitely the highlight of the film, but all the actors gave good performances, and it told a good, original, version of the story. It definitely had set up for more stories to be told in that universe, but because of the controversy that came out after the movie was released with Stewart and the married director being caught making out, the movie only got Huntsman focused spinoff that largely ignored Snow White's existence. Even so, it is still a good movie that had a good blend of action and drama and is definitely worth watching.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Adventureland

 

Adventureland has a pretty simple plot. A recent college grad named James, played by Jessee Eisenberg, plans to go on a trip to Europe before moving to New York for graduate school. He finds out that his parents are broke and have no way to financially assist him, so he ends up taking a job at a local theme park called Adventureland. There he meets Em, played by Kristen Stewart, whom he falls for, but she happens to be in a relationship with a married man named Mike Connell, played by Ryan Reynolds. Then, the rom-com love triangle story proceeds from there.

While the movie does fall into the category of a romantic comedy, it is not a cookie-cutter story by any means. The relationships are more complicated than falling for each other, splitting up, and getting back together. The backdrop of working in a crappy job that everyone hates makes the story pretty relatable. The story is well-written and very well acted. Stewart, who was also doing the Twilight series at the same time this was made really showed that she had acting chops far beyond what she was able to display in Twilight. And Eisenberg did a good job playing a guy who was a combination of a sensitive "loser" and an arrogant ass. The movie was set in 1987, so the movie has a pretty good 80s "alternative" soundtrack.

For those who get the Blu-Ray, the movie looks good in HD. Even without any big CGI sequences, the cinematography looks very good in HD. The extras include feature commentary that includes the director and Eisenberg. There are a couple of minutes worth of deleted scenes, a seventeen-minute making-of documentary, six minutes worth of fake promos for the amusement park, and a couple of features centered around the supporting characters. A decent amount for people who like watching the bonus material.

Overall, the movie is very good. It is well written and acted. Not only do Eisenberg and Stewart do a great job in the lead roles, but it also has a strong supporting cast including Kristen Wig, Bill Hader, Marin Starr, and Wendie Malick. As I said above, it is not a cookie-cutter romantic comedy and we really are kind of left to guess at the fate of James and Em's relationship at the end of the movie. It is a good movie that is definitely worth checking out.