Replicas had some poor visual effects which I could forgive if the concept wasn’t badly executed in almost every turn from the writing and direction, and some lackluster performances.
Bumblebee was a pleasant surprise with a genuine heart at its core, the relationship between a robot and a girl, each one finding the other at the right time. It’s what was missing from the last several of the Transformers movies.
The Cloverfield Paradox had an interesting idea at its core, likely whatever remained of the original script God Particle, but the execution, and forcing it to be part of the Cloverfield franchise, just was not well thought out.
Peppermint is by no means perfect but it was the perfect action vehicle for Jennifer Garner who gets back to her kick ass routes dating back to the Alias TV series. Here the fights are brutal and hard-hitting and the performances are good enough to make an entertaining action yarn.
Going in Style is a light-hearted but incredibly fun, and oft funny, movie that excels almost entirely on the cast charms and chemistry with one another as Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman and Alan Arkin work so well off one another, even when the script isn’t all that creative.
Kong: Skull Island isn’t perfect but still fun and entertaining enough with director Vogt-Roberts intermixing monster movie with a Vietnam-era war picture and even the human characters weren’t bad, if not thinly written at times while Kong himself does show a bit of personality and his CGI was pretty good.
A Dog’s Purpose is a schmaltzy and oft manipulative family fantasy drama that features a few decent performances, including Dennis Quaid, but honestly, even as a dog lover, I found the film to be tedious to sit through especially having to constantly listens to Josh Gad’s annoying voice-over.
The Finest Hours is not a great movie but perfectly adequate that tells a compelling story that is utterly amazing. The performances by Chris Pine and Casey Affleck aren’t anything awe-inspiring yet decent enough to carry their respective roles and storylines. While it could’ve been better, this is a movie at least worth a rental.
The Fast & Furious franchise continues to rev along gaining more momentum with each new installment and this sixth one offers more of the same with insane, albeit illogical, action set-pieces but thanks to its core cast, doesn’t really miss a beat even if on the whole is not as precise as Fast Five. Given the post credit sequence, I can’t wait to see what Fast 7 has in store.