Shaft is a movie I went with minimal expectations so on those grounds, I guess it exceeded them, and honestly there were some genially entertaining moments and Samuel L. Jackson, and to a lesser extent Richard Roundtree, were the highlights of the film.
X-Men: Dark Phoenix is by no means terrible but it certainly is a weak ending to a franchise and the main issue with this movie is lacked any real emotion, even though the technical aspects weren’t bad.
Spinning Man, while imperfect, does at least try something new to the sometimes tired crime-thriller genre, taking viewers away from the investigation aspects and looking into the lives, and particularly mind, of a prime suspect and his devolution.
X-Men: Apocalypse was a pretty big disappointment for me following Days of Future Past and while some of the technical parts were well done, the rest had a very stale vibe with similar story elements rehashed from the first X-Men movie way back in 2000.
Aaliyah is yet another trashy “biopic” (loosely) that doesn’t really have much to offer. The performances aren’t anything exceptional (even Alexandra Shipp didn’t have the charisma) but I can’t place that much blame on the actors with a bad script and generic made-for-TV direction.