5 Kung Fu Panda 4

 I'm such a big fan of the first one, but ...

They made this out of a studio mandate and completely stripped the character from it. The alternative fantasy Chinese world is almost ignored now.

The new voices are miscast, and I like the actors a lot.

It's just so lazy and you can tell they moved so far away from the general heart and mindset of the original.

4 Monkey Man

 

 This movie has such a wild history and it's kind of amazing it even got released. Go look it up. It does show in some of the action scenes, but it's not derailing the movie as a whole.

The first 25 minutes are so are purposefully very frantic and busy, but even then it's too frantic and busy. Like I had a headache watching it, it needed to come down from 150% to maybe 120%. I also wish everyone would step back from the camera a few steps.

 After that, it does slow down and take the time to build it's narrative - and it's surrealism. It's very surreal, it's nice to vibe to in those first 25 minutes when you're rewatching.

If it had been any more surreal, it would lose people, but I can see why people think it treads familiar ground, because it expects the cultural identity to elevate it to something unexpected, at least for American audiences.

The ideology is basically "Working together to achieve your individual goals works better, even when that goal is righteous revenge." The idea of revenge is never shamed, which I loved. A lot of people need revenge against them because a lot of people are corrupted and initiate violence against the underclass.

The music and score is spectacular.

Ok now that I've reviewed it you logically and in a levelheaded way, good lord Dev Patel. Jesus. Fuck. Fanning myself throughout this entire thing.

3 Ernest And Celestine

 

This has been on my watch list for 12 years and I finally got to it, and it's really endearing when it's the two of them in a secluded cabin in the winter time just drawing and acting. It's two artists who were outcasts from their respective worlds finding solace in their arts together.

 

The rest of the story is a little trite, surprisingly so for a French animated film. They're usually not super afraid to not talk down to kids like this does, but I think this was based off of a book.

The animation is so fluid and dynamic, I loved watching events lead into other actions for the "action" pieces. 

2 The Zone of Interest

 I only wish the captions had been a little stronger against the light backgrounds and backdrops. It was a little difficult to see, but I do praise how the sound does a lot of the heavy lifting and the sense of dread that creeps in.

I rented this out of spite to support Glazer after he got smoke for his Oscars speech. He was right and he should say it.