Abbey Lee – Movies of the Soul

Vampire Owl: I wonder if they are trying to say that Uncle Dracula is old.

Vampire Bat: Everybody knows that he is very old.

Vampire Owl: But nobody ever dares to mention that.

Vampire Bat: Why should they keep mentioning that when it is well-known?

Vampire Owl: There might be vampire apprentices who wish to know.

Vampire Bat: They are have joined as vampire apprentices because they know.

Vampire Owl: They still don’t know enough, do they?

Vampire Bat: Well, you can’t expect them to know that much until they reach the next level.

Vampire Owl: You know that Uncle Dracula is planning to dismiss those partial vampires before reaching the next level, so that he doesn’t have to give them a bigger salary.

Vampire Bat: It is expected from the oldest miser in the realm. His habit goes back by so many centuries and vampire resurrections.

[Gets a green apple cake and three cups of mint tea].

What is the movie about? :: Guy Cappa (Gael Garcia Bernal) and Prisca Cappa (Vicky Krieps) are going through a situation which makes a divorce on the way. They decide to go on a vacation with their children Maddox Cappa (Thomasin McKenzie and Embeth Davidtz) and Trent Cappa (Alex Wolff and Emun Elliott) for the one last time, and then talk to them about the upcoming separation. Prisca does seem to have a medical condition, but is adamant about the divorce. The family is treated very well at the beach resort which they visit, and the children are really happy to be there, despite having to listen to their parents shouting at each other regularly. The next morning, the manager of the resort invites the family to a beach located further away, where not many people goes. They are taken to the area with a few others, who also join them on the journey. The others are also really happy to be there, as it seems like a really beautiful area, with no rush at all, a world where they could actually do whatever they wanted.

So, what happens with the events here as we just keep looking? :: But the place doesn’t seem to be that serene as they had thought earlier, and earlier told by the van driver (M Night Shyamalan), who is not ready to come to the beach with them, even though the tourists surely need some help. They find a fully naked woman (Alejandra Useche) in the sea, and they soon realize that it is a dead body. Agnes (Kathleen Chalfant), who is oldest member of the group dies, and the children quickly turn into teenagers, making them difficult to recognize even for their parents. Kara (Eliza Scanlen), the smallest among children come up with the biggest surprise. At first, it seems like a problem with the kids, and the old woman seems to be just having those old-age diseases. But it soon seems that everyone there are aging rapidly, like one year in every thirty minutes. They try to get out of there, but ends up having blackouts and waking up where they had started. Almost everyone out there seems to have a medical condition out there. When they have injuries, they quickly heals. The dog out there also dies.

What more would happen in a situation from where there might be no escape? :: Jarin Carmichael (Ken Leung) and Patricia Carmichael (Nikki Amuka-Bird) are from the medical field, but they don’t seem to have any clue about what has been happening. Brendan (Aaron Pierre), a famous rapper is also there, but it seems that he has been there for longer than any of them, and has no clue about what is happening around there. Prisca is revealed to have cancer in her stomach, which also grows very quickly, and it has to be taken out. Charles (Rufus Sewell), a surgeon with schizophrenia is the only person who seems to be qualified enough to save her, but is not in a state which will prove to be helpful to anyone. His wife and Kara’s mother Chrystal (Abbey Lee) has low calcium level and is continuously suffering as she gets older. They think about swimming all the way around the beach, but that seems to be a really difficult task, and a person had already died while swimming.
Climbing the steep hills also seems to be a difficult task, as they are not really the healthy adults required at the stage. Now, is there a way out before all of them will be dying soon enough?

The defence of Old :: M Night Shyamalan always has something different for us, and he seems to choose from such topics or materials which possess such a scope. This seems like a divergent thriller for sure, and has some interesting moments in the form of not just an adventure and struggle for survival, but also as a distant science fiction. As it nicely moves towards what awaits us, we are surely engaged early. The strange incidents at the beach also keeps us guessing, and the characters from different backgrounds nicely adds to the same. Along with the same, the scenery is nothing less than enchanting, and it surely feels like that unexplored beach which we really needs to explore, even if it means that we are all going to get older quickly and die around there. Well, all of those rich celebrities having crores which they need to somewhere might really want to check out this place – after all, they escape nicely from India whenever there is a problem here. In the current situation, being a big film star, cricketer, politician or political businessman is necessary to survive around here, unless you are a government-salaried employee.

Positives and negatives :: The execution cannot be considered as that perfect, as there seems to be some problem with how it has been edited, and regarding how a few things seems to be intentionally left out, but as we see the aging process done so well, there is a lot of smartness involved. Some dialogues also seem to be strange, and a few male characters seem rather unnecessary in comparison to the female characters who come up with something to note throughout the movie’s run. There could have also been something special added around here, as it is a movie set on a strange beach. But none of these seem to matter when we look at the entertainment level of the flick. The best performers here are the children jumping to their teenage – Thomasin McKenzie, Alex Wolff and Eliza Scanlen are the ones we look out for, as they deal with their too quick a jump. Vicky Krieps and Gael Garcia Bernal makes a good couple around here too. Abbey Lee’s work is also notable, as she plays one character who has always been in trouble. In the end, the movie seems to come up with the message that we don’t really have that much time as we think in our lives, and it is always best to do what we need to do as early as possible – instead of gaining regret late.

How it finishes :: M Night Shyamalan seems to be the right kind of director who comes up with the movies which feels so beautifully strange – the last one I remember is The Visit, a movie which remained divergently different in its own way and style. We also remember how well he managed to finish with the two movies of one interesting series, Split and Glass, with some special qualities. This one is based on Sandcastle by Pierre Oscar Levy, which he received as a gift for the Father’s Day a few years ago. Even though most of us do not know that much about the original work, we can be sure that he has managed to recreate the world in his way, as he has done in many other films. Well, if Shyamalan would do a movie on Corona virus pandemic, that would be very special, unlike any other film on the same topic. When we consider the same, we know that this movie surely has something special from his imagination, adding to the original material – as we won’t be reading that one, for now we will just have to think it is so, and enjoy the very interesting adventure here.

Release date: 23rd July 2021
Running time: 108 minutes
Directed by: M Night Shyamalan
Starring: Vicky Krieps, Gael Garcia Bernal, Abbey Lee, Rufus Sewell, Alex Wolff, Thomasin McKenzie, Nikki Amuka-Bird, Ken Leung, Eliza Scanlen, Aaron Pierre, Embeth Davidtz, Emun Elliott, Alejandra Useche, M Night Shyamalan

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@ Cemetery Watch
✠ The Vampire Bat.

Vampire Owl :: Do you know that this director’s last movies were Happy Feet and Happy Feet Two?

Vampire Bat :: Yes, the Vampire Penguin did inform us about the same.

Vampire Owl :: And we are going to watch this one.

Vampire Bat :: Ninety Nine percent at Rotten Tomatoes and nine out of ten at IMDb for an action movie – then why not watching it?

Vampire Owl :: Well, I have my doubts. They rate random violent action movies as awesome. Quentin Tarantino knows that for sure.

Vampire Bat :: Quentin Tarantino has nothing to do with this one. And the trailer was awesome. It called for a quick 3D watch!

Vampire Owl :: It could be also because we love Charlize Theron.

Vampire Bat :: Rosie Huntington-Whiteley is also there, if you want another reason. Remember Transformers: Dark of the Moon.

Vampire Owl :: Let’s go for this then.

Vampire Bat :: It is exactly what I am talking about. I also have to write my two hundredth review with this one.

[Gets the tickets].

What is it about? :: In a distant post-apocalyptic future where the resources are scarce and there is rarely the trace of civilization, Max (Tom Hardy) is captured and is imprisoned to be used as a blood bag for the sick boy Nux (Nicholas Hoult) in a part of the world which is ruled by a tyrant called Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne). Meanwhile, Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron) who was sent by Joe to collect fuel drives away, and the tyrant realizes that she had also taken his five beautiful wives whom he had selected to bear his children without the deformities of the normal people around him. As Nux makes an attempt to make an impression with the captive attached as the blood bag, Max escapes, and joins forces with Furiosa and the wives Angharad (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley), Capable (Riley Keough), Cheedo (Courtney Eaton), Toast (Zoë Kravitz), and Dag (Abbey Lee), as they hope to reach a location called “Green Place”.

The defence of Mad Max: Fury Road :: This one goes directly into the action, and we know what is expected here. We have something like the ultimate action movie which is so quick in its action and thinks not much about bringing up the rules. There are modified vehicles battling in the middle of nowhere – a lot like warships fighting on the sea, and here the four-wheeled monsters fight on the sea of sand. There are sandstorms instead of the storms in the sea, and there is a lot of work in the design of those vehicles, that is for sure. There are gunshots, melee combats, racing and people falling dead all the time. The pace is so good that you don’t wish to take your eyes off the screen. The dialogues also turn interesting soon enough. The background score is also impressive. There is also that display of humanity when it is left with no law and order, as we see the chaos which the lack of civilization brings to the humans. There is madness, and there is fury!

The claws of flaw :: Never does this movie venture too much without the action which seems to be imprinted throughout its run. There is the scope for more and more of story, but the focus remains on the action sequences which keep coming. This leaves the option to say that this is another mindless action movie – but that is still disputed, and depends on how you take it. The ending also doesn’t come up with that big surprise or climax, as the action just continues to lead to the end. There are things left unexplained about the situation, and there is not much smartness displayed by the characters in this movie as the actions are rather reckless. Yes, there is the need for willing suspension of disbelief, but it is easy in this case as the situation is of a post-apocalyptic future.

Performers of the soul :: The performances, especially from the leading cast remains the strength of this movie. The first name that needs attention here is Charlize Theron. This is not the kind of avatar in which you would expect to see her, but this is a role in which she excels. She plays the character who becomes the reason for this movie as well as all the action that we get to witness. She plays an amputee, but is still one of most powerful female action heroines of all time. Tom Hardy also makes it out strong as the titular character, and he surely has the best moments. You might not recognize Nicholas Hoult in the first look, but he steals a few moments nicely. The ladies play the wives well, and another person you need to look out for is the former WWE wrestler Nathan Jones who had teamed with the legendary Undertaker himself, as the strong Rictus.

Soul exploration :: The movie ventures in the post-apocalyptic future when the world has plunged into chaos. It comes up with that situation when almost all the resources have finished, and also when humanity finds chaos again in the absence of civilization. Without order, there will be only people fighting each other, and it is a possible state of the world in the future in the presence of its never-ending wars. As no surprise, the future will still have its weapons, even if the resources are to be so scarce. The final stages mean that someone will try to have them all without thinking about sharing. An experience close to the end of the world won’t make people any better, but will make them worse, trying to make “the survival of the fittest” happen in every case. Then there is the need for redemption as often spoken about by the main lady, and for the same, there is need for courage, sacrifice and revolution.

How it finishes :: Mad Max: Fury Road might not do that well at this part of the world as it is not the usual viewers’ choice action movie with the users’ choice kind of things. This is mostly action, but things remain too grim for the general audience who would surely prefer to see Avengers: Age of Ultron or Fast and Furious 7 instead of this one. But you need to watch this one in the theatre more than any other, as you seek chaos in the sands past the apocalypse – the world is so good that it might even make you satisfied only with the 3D. Mad Max: Fury Road becomes the movie of the week; not so sure about the box-office collections, but it is a certainty with the critics and action lovers. This is actually the fourth film in the director’s Mad Max franchise, and may be we should watch the others too – I haven’t done it yet. This brutality in brilliance gives an order!

And that was the 200th review! 😀

Release date: 15th May 2015
Running time: 120 minutes
Directed by: George Miller
Starring: Charlize Theron, Tom Hardy, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Zoë Kravitz, Nicholas Hoult, Hugh Keays-Byrne, Abbey Lee, Riley Keough, Courtney Eaton, Nathan Jones, Megan Gale, Josh Helman, Melissa Jaffer, John Howard, Richard Carter, Jennifer Hagan, Gillian Jones, Angus Sampson, iOTA, Joy Smithers