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» Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE   » Community   » Film Handlers' Movie Reviews   » Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019)

   
Author Topic: Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019)
Sam Graham
AKA: "The Evil Sam Graham". Wackiness ensues.

Posts: 1431
From: Waukee, IA
Registered: Dec 2004


 - posted 07-03-2019 10:52 PM      Profile for Sam Graham   Author's Homepage   Email Sam Graham   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
CINEMA: B&B Ankeny 12 & B-Roll Bowling, Ankeny, IA
AUDITORIUM: 2, SEAT: D11
PRESENTATION: B&B GRAND auditorium Recline-o-Vision with butt warmers and DTS:X and projection from freaking laser beams
PRESENTATION PROBLEMS: I am not watching this all that far from home, so I'm probably doing it wrong
RATING: Three stars (out of four)

THE PLOT: Avengers:Postgame. Wackiness ensues.

This is easily the best of the post Tobey Maguire Spider-Man movies, which has had like three different iterations if you count the animated "Into the Spiderverse" nonsense.

Parker and his classmates are on a summer school trip to Europe to see cool shit and maybe get laid. Trouble erupts and Nick Fury enlists Spidey to help. A plot twist Helen Keller could have seen coming ensues, and then stuff needs a fixin'. But it works because it's light and fun, which is sorely needed after the Avengers opus.

Sony did the last movie, "Homecoming", in cooperation with Marvel and Disney to get Spider-Man into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This movie feels more like something Marvel/Disney did themselves, then handed over to Sony for distribution. It's that much better.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001


 - posted 07-24-2019 02:21 PM      Profile for Bobby Henderson   Email Bobby Henderson   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Cinema: AMC Patriot 13, Lawton, OK
Screen: #4
Format: Mystery Meat Digital (couldn't see inside the "boothless" protrusion at the top of the seating area).
Presentation Problems: Strange house lights issues, crying baby.
Movie Rating: 2 drones out of 4

For all the movie's high, certified fresh score at Rotten Tomatoes, this one just didn't live up to my expectations.

The big plot twist that happens was not surprising at all. What's bad is the big reveal took the movie from an other-worldly place that seemed fun down a level that was just surprisingly pedestrian and odd in tone. And when it went there the story just kind of fell apart for me. Too many nit picky things suddenly got called into question. For 10 years Marvel movies have severely strained the limits of suspension of disbelief when it comes to things like human-made technological gadgetry. Viewers can go along with a lot of things in a movie, but there is a blurry, brackish barrier the gee-whiz stuff needs to avoid. If credibility is pushed too far the story can get sucked into the bullshit zone.

We get the same problem considering the invincibility of certain characters, like Spiderman in this movie. I can go along with a superhero dodging a few bullets from one bad guy, or "Neo" in a digital construct of reality stopping hundreds of bullets in mid air. My mind can't help but wander off when I see a hero dodging thousands of rounds of ammo simultaneously fired from many computerized baddies who are chasing him. My thoughts drifted to real life military drones and how surgically lethal they can be, even when they're just remotely piloted by a fallible human on the other side of the world. I wouldn't think about those things while watching the show if the movie's producers didn't push their luck so much.

The only thing that saves the movie at all are the light, comedic moments throughout. The cast is pretty good.

I think the house lights were malfunctioning. When they lowered for the feature they flickered badly, with a bright strobe kind of effect before they turned off. When the house lights came back up during the credits there was no fade effect; it went from zero to 100%. That made it tough to sit through the credits to see the couple teasers.

One would figure distractions would be at a minimum for an early Tuesday evening screening. Nope. Some lady brought a toddler with her that was probably too young to watch a movie like this. The kid kept getting scared and upset during various action sequences.

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Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99


 - posted 07-24-2019 04:17 PM      Profile for Mike Blakesley   Author's Homepage   Email Mike Blakesley   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
The one new-ish thing that is driving me crazy about the Marvel movies is how they can just press one button, blink an eye or I don't know, click their heels together? and their whole super-suit or whatever just unfolds from nowhere with a bunch of clickety-click sounds. Then when they're done being super, clickety-zip-flap-click and the whole thing folds up and disappears and you can see their real face again.

The Transformers were the first series to deploy this nonsense, where a vehicle the size of a Volkswagen Beetle can unfold into the machine the size of the Empire State Building.

I long for simpler times, like the time when Superman was unsure where to change into his costume because he spotted one of the then-new "boothless" phone booths.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001


 - posted 07-24-2019 09:00 PM      Profile for Bobby Henderson   Email Bobby Henderson   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Yeah, the super suit sight gag where it builds onto the hero's body from out of nowhere is definitely a bullshit zone thing. One scene early in this movie has Peter Parker's Spidey mask morphing on and off his head as if it's possessed with magic from Hogwarts. If the movie is supposed to take place in somewhat present day times with somewhat present day technology then there's just only so much a bunch of nano-bots can do.

Then there's a technological issue of "illusion-tech" involving projectors that seems to ignore basic laws of optics and physics. Something that emits light is not going to create shadow and modeling if there's a bunch of bright daylight washing out that shadow in the same target area. Drive-in movie theaters could operate during the day otherwise. Oh well, there's tons of other "holographic" type stuff that has been in most of the other Marvel movies.

It's a heck of a lot easier to write implausible stuff if the character breaking the laws of physics is someone with super powers that naturally go way beyond the abilities of a regular person. I remember complaining about the first Iron Man movie, specifically the scene where Tony Stark escapes the terrorist camp in his crude prototype suit. He crashes into a sand dune at high speed like a freaking meteor. In real life it wouldn't matter how much padding someone put into the flying tin man contraption. The person inside would be gruesomely crunched and splattered. Previous to Marvel movies the only character I can think of to take a beating like that and not die is Wile E. Coyote.

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