NoWo's Reviews
Bollywood X-Men!
about as good as a Corman movie, but with more singing and dancing.
The script is drunken copy and paste, special effects are Tsui Hark, Chinese Ghost Story level but without the charm, and the acting without nuance.
Chopra is extremely attractive, Roshan is India's hunk (could easily pass off as Italian or Spanish, though), they both can dance, but it does not make a movie.
Made a killing at the domestic box office, though.
1 woke point 'cause the morality expressed in here doesn't sit well with me. Might be a culture thing. Well, morality _is_ cultural. Arguably.
Created: 11-06-2025
Not any better
This one was sold to me with "Aamir Khan is the Indian John Malkovich" and "You need to see the full trilogy to really appreciate it".
Well, not convinced. Although this movie is among the highest grossing ever. Indian domestic.
Kahn and filming on location in northern America must have ballooned the budget, though.
The script is heavy handed, but yeah, I'll probably, at some point, take some time to try Khan more serious movies.
The cinematography is surprisingly decent, actually; the director got better with practice.
The discount Moore's era Bond special effects and vehicles are, well, Moore had the charm to sell them. It's a rare gift. The twin (practical) effects are not too bad.
Oh, it's almost 3 hours. It feels slow and repetitive too. A 2-hour cut would have earned an extra point.
Created: 11-06-2025
More of the same
First opus made heaps of money, so a sequel was inevitable.
Cookie-cutter script, one dimensional characters.
The two leads have a WTF attitude that make their characters funnier, at least.
Rai is ludicrously gorgeous, and Roshan is stupidly handsome. They both can dance. But they sure can't play ball.
It's a long movie. Not only the runtime. Acceptable when second screening, but would not recommend.
Created: 11-06-2025
Rapidly paced and mildly angered
Watched this on the (repeated) recommendations of a friend; predictably, half Indian himself.
I would say Temu Fast & Furious knock-off, but I haven't seen any F&F movie, and it's more of an odd couple buddy movie I guess.
As with many of my forays into Indian movies, it's mostly average form and little substance.
The people in there are better dancers than actors. The 2+ hours runtime includes probably half an hour's worth of dancing and singing. They're all quite fetching too, as expected from Indian movies.
The cinematography is comparable to late 90s direct-to-DVD. Better than 80s direct-to-VHS, I guess. Except for the musical pieces. They're much better quality than the rest of the movie.
The plot is very forgettable (I already have), standard fare. Not to put a too fine point on it, but I second-screened this (all three, really, I'm a masochist) while doing repetitive, non-demanding work, and I don't think I missed any twist.
I don't even speak the language this was shot in ...
This being Bollywood, no explicit violence or nudity while coming as close as censorship will allow, but also a strangely lenient moral relativism despite being ostentatiously manichaean in its presentation.
As for representation, this movie is full of Indians. Joke aside, every character is very light-skinned, so, yeah, colourism is still going strong over there. Well, was, 20 years ago.
Created: 11-06-2025
TL;DR: gets worse with Time (Lords), watch the older stuff
I'm rating the newest batch, assuming most readers to be young'uns.
Also because I finally got around to see what the protest was about.
New-Who is atrocious. It's uninspired, slop propaganda writing at its worst. Or best. Pinnacle. The agenda was clear when the Doctor got to be a woman, then a black foppish man. Both are flat, amateur actors, and their companions are no better.
Honestly, I watched less than 2 hours worth of these new series. More like desecration rituals. All the leftist talking points.
The revival series do have some merit. Eccleston is a solid actor, works brilliantly with Piper, and benefits from excellent scripts.
Tennant does a good job of bringing together traits from the previous Doctors, and has a few smashing episodes (Weeping Angels, anyone?). His comeback was a sell-out, though.
I didn't really follow Smith's and Capaldi's tenures; good actors, but the show was going to shite, and I just didn't bother, so, maybe some good in there.
The classic series are definitely 10s out of 10 in my book (nostalgia alert). Pertwee's Doctor is fully inhuman, going from disarmingly child-like to monstrously calculating in a jiffy, and Baker's is the incarnation of madness-with-a-method. And a scarf.
The show did flounder in the 80s, but we had high expectations at the time; it probably was still pretty decent.
I guess an apt comparison in the US would be original Star Trek vs Lower Star Trek. TOS had some many things to make fun about, and yet, well, the dog's bollocks.
Created: 11-06-2025
The dizziest cow
The premise of this one is trivial: the hairdressing X-games in rural England.
Rickman, Richardson, Griffiths, Clarke and Nighy are just having a smashing good time. And it's contagious. They're brilliant. They also show range. Griffiths, in particular, once again goes above and beyond.
Hartnett and Cook, not so much. I guess their characters are meant for teenage Romeo & Juliet appeal, but they sound so much out of place. What with the accent, lad? Frankly, jarring.
Mrs Shircore gets a prominent place in the credits: she did make-up and hair design for the movie. With a dozen-strong team. They're basically the VFX team for this. I also think they do drugs.
As for woke, well, we do have a lesbian couple. Which is not pushed as anything special. They're good characters, pushed by good actresses. That's enough for me.
Possible male homosexuality, as well.
Then again, they're hairdressers. Clichés exist for a reason.
This is not ZAZ comedy; this is the very English, very serious treatment of a very stupid concept.
I find it very endearing.
Created: 10-23-2025
The makings of the modern boss bitch
Full disclosure: 2nd screen viewing while doing some light work.
This movie follows the misadventures of a mother-daughter team of marriage con-women, in a long-form vaudeville format.
Could be good, but 1/ Weaver has neither the presence nor the charm to pull this off, and young Miss Hewitt does have the slutty sex appeal if not the acting chops but 2/ their characters are utterly unlikeable. They're not Newman/Redford, nor Caine/Martin, Clooney/Pitt, and so on.
They're boss bitches prototypes, devoid of morality, compassion, and with all the aggressivity of a weak man. Early-adopters feminist 'baddies'. Or simply, remorselessly evil.
With the explicit assentiment of society at large, making this a realistic movie after all.
Another woke point for trying to normalize female-on-male violence and exploitation.
Pedantic detail: no idea if they had focus issues or the lenses they used were too soft, but there's some serious blur going on at the edges. And not the artistic kind.
The script is paper-thin and predictable, which is forgivable in the genre, considering it's meant to proceed quite briskly. Here, it does not, the movie clocking in at nearly 2 hours. It has time to go cringe. Both female meet their cookie-cutter male foil, expected plot twists ensue, but not hilarity.
OK, the Beatles by a balalaika band was fun. The Inara George piece was eerily reminiscent of Dear Prudence, though.
Speaking of, Hackman and Lee seem to be having fun with their roles. That's two happy customers.
Might not be many more.
Should have listened to some music.
Created: 10-22-2025
Where no comedy has gone before
Pretty well-known Star Trek parody, nothing to add there.
Rickman, Allen and Shalhoub are all criminally under-rated actors, and rock-solid in this. The rest of the cast is very competent, but in far less demanding roles,
What sets this movie aside, in my opinion, of the slew of parodies of the times (back when we still had comedies), is that it makes fun of the source material without making light of it.
Roddenberry, self-awoved socialist scoundrel that he was, knew that the whole point of heroic stories is to breed more heroism, and that mankind's destiny is to look up and rise.
Galaxy Quest follows the standard hero's journey for they who pretend, but is also a clever meta-commentary on fiction, fandom, and those who choose to believe.
Plus a good movie.
Created: 10-22-2025
Unexpectedly charming
Still not a good movie by any means; more like the curse of having a teen-aged daughter.
The movie does not dwell into "deep lore" or the pathos of the genre, but keeps it light-hearted and comedic. Although it's amusing more than funny.
It's a chick flick, so, not the audience.
The main cast is hit-and-miss.
Silverstone is good, but ironically looks rough for mid-forties. Hollywood ages women.
Ritter is bubbly, and Weaver had been on a downward for some time already by this movie. Her attempts at comedy have always been tepid anyway. Galaxy Quest was Rickman and Allen.
Supporting actors do shine through, though. Mostly by not taking this seriously. Always a pleasure to see Shawn and McDowell (hey, at least they make rent), and Kirk, well, got to love what he did.
Some very discreet representation in the background, but nothing to cry about. Some parts did put a smile on my face.
Could be worse.
Created: 10-22-2025
They even botched being a family.
Thunderbirds, retro-futuristic aesthetics are on point. Though it looks atrociously non-functional, especially the robot. And the fashion. We never should have stopped dressing like this, especially the women.
I'm pretty sure it's full of Easter eggs for the true fans. Which I am not, but many details look a bit forced, like they could be there for the true believers. The rocket is named Excelsior; I got this one. I think.
The Thing's head is weird, so is his voice; Human Torch is emasculated, so is Pascal; he's living proof of the existence of a third sex at this point. Clearly not male, but not female either. And then there's the all-too Visible Mary Sue. And the ever-present black female authority figures.
As with other recent movies, this one bears a lot of small, discreet scars; weird hiccups or suspicious danglings at the end of a scene. Feels like the brunt of the woke ended up on the cutting room floor.
And then there's Shalla-bal. Always thought it was a place, thanks to Satriani. But I knew it had to do with the surfing alien. Why a female surfer, and why butt-ugly (tits-ugly too)? Because current year.
Seriously, VFX have dropped off a cliff in the last 10 years. Same for many tech fields, really.
The emphasis is mostly on visuals there: Thing and Torch are wearing their watches left-handed, which is good for the symetry of the composition in one scene, but they act clearly right-handed. Form over substance details, everywhere. See the surfing scenes.
Pet peeve: they clearly show the baby being upside up at the end of pregnancy, and nobody cares. And there's far worse regarding the handling of the baby. Crap, Torch clearly is the most thoughtful among the four. And Richards is a moron's idea of a pathologically intelligent man.
There is some good in that movie, in unexpected ways. But they botched the expected, easy ways to shine. They made a sort-of-maybe-nice-if-you-don't-think-too-much movie where great was within easy reach.
The overall script is shallow, and (I think) they purged what woke they could in the last minutes, because (surprise) it's not bankable, leaving a pretty, polished but empty and direction-less shell.
Meh. The curse of the Fantastic Four.
Created: 10-21-2025
