Weapons – Movie Review

TL;DR – This is one of the most ‘messed’ up films that I have seen, the kind of film where you cross your arms in a vain attempt to put a barrier between you and the screen.  

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I was invited to a press screening of this film.

WarningContains scenes that may cause distress.

2:17 on a clock.

Weapons Review

Sometimes you sit down and realise you were fundamentally unprepared for the film you were about to see. That you were prepared for the horror that was coming, well, you thought you were prepared. You crossed your arms, hoping to shield yourself from what was on screen, but nothing could prepare you for Weapons.

So, to set the scene, in a small leafy town in the countryside of America, you can find Maybrook and its elementary school. It is a quaint place where nothing much ever happens, that is, until one day Justine Gandy (Julia Garner) walked into her third-year class to find it empty of every student bar one, Alex Lilly (Cary Christopher). One month later, the police are no closer to finding what happened to those seventeen children, and the town is tearing itself apart looking for them. There must be a focus on all that rage, guilt, and sorrow, and unfortunately for Justine, she is that focus. So, as the town focuses their rage on her, the question remains: What happened to the kids at 2:17 in the morning on that fateful day?

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Movie Review – Stuck

TL;DR – When it gets to the emotional core of music Stuck has some real emotional weight, but it has issues getting between those moments.       

Score – 2.5 out of 5 stars

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene

Stuck. Image Credit: MJW Films.

Review

There are many things that can make a bad day and I can tell you that being stuck in a train carriage with a bunch of strangers for an indeterminate amount of time would be very high on that list. With this in mind, I was captivated with the idea of setting a musical in that setting and where you could go with the pressures and opportunity of keeping everyone in that one space. What we get in the final film is a story with two halves, however, unfortunately, they don’t quite work together.

So to set the scene, it is a day in New York and disconnected strangers are running around in their day trying to get from one place to another. You have Lloyd (Giancarlo Esposito) a homeless gentleman who is getting ready for the day in the actual train carriage. Alica (Arden Cho) a dancer trying to get home and avoid her stalker Ramon (Omar Chaparro), Caleb (Gerard Canonico) who is running between his many jobs, then Eve (Ashanti) and Sue (Amy Madigan) who are just trying to get home on a difficult day. Fate is a precarious thing at times, and this day as they board the train everything grinds to a halt as a police incident closes the train lines trapping the train in-between stations, and as the carriages are locked there is the realisation that they are trapped and the only thing you can do is sing.

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