Justin Bartha – Movies of the Soul

Vampire Owl: I remember having met a sweet witch.

Vampire Bat: I do not remember any witch being sweet at all.

Vampire Owl: He had some of the sweetest magic potions.

Vampire Bat: You shouldn’t buy potions without approval of Vampire Senate.

Vampire Owl: I have paid all the taxes along with the price.

Vampire Bat: You will still have to pay the import duty.

Vampire Owl: But we belong to the same realm.

Vampire Bat: Yes, but not the same territory.

Vampire Owl: Now, we are having taxes like humans?

Vampire Bat: It is still very much less in comparison to some of the nations in the world of evil humans.

[Gets a raspberry cake and three cups of orange tea].

What is the movie about? :: Ray Cooper (Jason Momoa) jumps off the top of a building while being chased by the police, and it is followed by a flashback. His wife Amanda Cooper (Adria Arjona) gets really ill with a rare form of cancer. The survival expert, Ray hopes that he can do all that is possible to save her. But it is soon revealed that the life-saving drug called Infirmam was taken off the market due to Bio Prime CEO Simon Keeley (Justin Bartha) paying the manufacturers to delay the production. This also means that there was going to be an indefinite delay, and Amanda doesn’t have that much time. He watches congress woman Diana Morgan (Amy Brenneman) going through a live devate with Simon, and there he seems to be talking about much their company is dedicated to saving lives at less cost, and on how much they have sacrificed in the form of money and time. He makes a call to the live debate, and as Simon doesn’t seem to care that much about bringing the drug back to the market, Ray threatens to kill him if his wife dies because of this negligence.

So, what happens with the events here as we just keep looking? :: Soon enough, Amanda dies, and Ray is left with his daughter Rachel Cooper (Isabela Merced) to go on with the pain and grief. A few months later, Ray gets a call from a journalist Martin Bennett (Nelson Franklin) who claims that he possesses evidence related to the unethical practices and criminal activities on the side of Bio Prime. They meet on a moving train, but a hitman Amo Santos (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) attacks them, killing the journalist and stabbing Ray. Rachel who had followed them also gets knocked out in the process. Even though further investigations reveal nothing about what had happened with Bio Prime or in the train, and with no information about the hitman who attacked them, Ray still continues to track Simon and his company. He manages to sneak into a charity programme and interrogate Simon, only to be attached by the bodyguards whom he manages to kill along with his gaurds. The only other responsible name that he gets is that of the chairman of the same company, Vinod Shah (Raza Jaffrey). FBI Agent Sarah Meeker (Lex Scott Davis) is in charge of the case.

And how far can this go as we keep moving forward? :: Ray and Rachel go on a long ride through less taken roads, trying to get away before the police officers or the assassins get to them. Rachel tries calling Sarah, hoping that she will look into Bio Prime before her father comes up with something terrible again. Sarah is able to get the trust of Rachel like a mother figure. Meanwhile, they are attacked by mercenaries who seems to have found them much to their surprise. Ray fights them and after a small fight, ends up killing them too. At the same time, the same hitman who had attacked them on the train is after them too. Their only option here seems to be to find Vinod and hope that it ends with them. But Santos has other ideas about it, and Vinod knowing anything more than what Simon knew seems not possible at all. How far does all these secrets go? Who might be the last link behind all of these? Will the father and daughter duo survive against what they seem to be completely incapable of handling? Is there a thing like hope for them?

The defence of Sweet Girl :: Jason Momoa is here doing what he does the best, without the superpowers of Aquaman and outside the team of Justice League. Isabela Merced has a point as the daughter figure. She plays a character who is more matured than anyone else of her age, and has her own ideology. This is also one strong character that she can happy that she played. The twist also works like a dream for her, and she rises above everyone else with ease here. She does remind one of Chloe Grace Moretz, like someone who could rise above the senior stars when provided with an opportunity. Then there is Manuel Garcia-Rulfo as the hitman and Amy Brenneman as the congress woman who are all doing what they do the best. The action sequences are all good, and both the father and daughter do their job well. The twist basically comes a shock, even though there were some red herrings here and there – that should work for most people. The movie, just like it begins well, ends without overdoing it, but being mostly satisfactory.

The claws of flaw :: The movie could have been quicker here, as there is a lot action to be done. The twist in question here doesn’t seem to be that effective for everyone, as the willing suspension of disbelief might have its problems with how the action sequences have been going on here. It does take a little too much time to get to the twist, which should have been revealed earlier for the audience to adjust to the whole new situation it had created. The loopholes are surely there, especially in the second half of the movie. The movie does seem to be confused about how to respect the genre, and the world it had built earlier. The feeling of half-bakedness does bring some trouble. There was the chance to come up with better dialogues and better emotional moments too – the emotions are there, but with the twist, some emotions feel as if they didn’t exist at all. With that particular twist, it also feels that some of the length of this movie was for no reason, as a number of things didn’t happen as it was shown.

How it finishes :: Sweet Girl is more of less the movie that can go in the path of Hitman, Transporter, John Wick, Mechanic, Accountant, Equalizer, Kate and others while having its main lead going through the impossible to reach the other end. It would require a sequel for that, as it had that twist which changed things a little too much. There will be opinions against this one for sure, as the twist would take away something which the fans would have wanted in the climax, but the film did require something divergent to set a path different from the usual movies dealing with this kind of thing – you can’t just complain for taking the risk and bringing more to ponder about. With lots of action around, a few things can be forgotten, and others can be appreciated – what is to loved and hated might still be different for different types of people. I would be asking people to watch this one without looking at the spoilers and come with your opinion. We are never really less in need of action thriller with a huge mission in hand, right?

Release date: 20th August 2021 (Netflix)
Running time: 110 minutes
Directed by: Brian Andrew Mendoza
Starring: Jason Momoa, Isabela Merced, Adria Arjona, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Amy Brenneman, Raza Jaffrey, Justin Bartha, Lex Scott Davis, Michael Raymond-James

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@ Cemetery Watch
✠ The Vampire Bat.

There was the age of the wolf-pack, with its own lone wolf with a beard. They have extended that age so much that the first movie had to suffer the consequences of getting the bad name of not inspiring worthy enough sequels. No, the sequels are not that horrible, but they are just faded visions of what the original was, and considering what Dude, Where’s My Car? happened to be, and the memory loss being shown in an even better way before the series, these two sequels struggle to keep up with them. Well, stupidity might save one or two movies, and the same theme which doesn’t have that much chance of repetition can’t be that much of a saviour, but as long as this part is concerned, it has just managed to make it interesting enough. It surely trails in comparison to the other Hollywood movies in the theatres right now, but it has surely made it into the good movies list, and the moments when it was going to go down can be forgiven. It has fought hard, and it has made sure that it won’t lose. As most of the shows are now already nearly booked and full around here, I guess it will have a good run here.

Welcome the wolf-pack again, for this should be their final battle in the big screen together in a Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 2, “it ends” style unless they decide to expand the triology many years later or create a spin-off or a reboot; Bradley Cooper as Phil Wenneck (the unproclaimed, but still the seeming leader of the lost wolf gang), Ed Helms as Dr. Stuart Price (the dentist-doctor with a gorgeous Thai connection) a.k.a Stu, Zach Galifianakis as Alan Garner (former member of a lone wolf-pack) and Justin Bartha as Doug Billings (the man lost and found in Las Vegas and to be lost again). Well, they surely must have had a death wish, not only in the movie, but also outside, as they were on a battle against Fast & Furious 6 which had already accumulated enough people to watch the movie with its first trailer itself. There were people who forgot everything else just for that one racing-action-adventure movie, and unfortunately, this movie doesn’t create that high an impression, and it also fails to invoke curiosity, thanks to the second installment of the series which preceded this. But the gang is still up for a fight, and they will surely win territories especially because the Vin Diesel starrer was released one week earlier at this part of the world.

After being arrested in Bangkok, Leslie Chow (Ken Jeong) escapes from prison through a tunnel he made in the The Shawshank Redemption style using a prison riot as cover. Meanwhile, Alan Garner (Zach Galifianakis) has gotten mentally worse and tries buying a giraffe as a friend but it gets beheaded under a bridge causing a Final Destination 2 situation on the highway minus the horrible deaths. His father is shocked and angry at him and dies of a heart attack. After the funeral, Alan’s old friends Phil Wenneck (Bradley Cooper), Doug Billings (Justin Bartha) and Stuart Price (Ed Helms) make a return to find out that he is kind of out of control and decides to get him to rehabilitation centre. But they are captured by Marshall (John Goodman) and asks them to return the gold Chow had stolen from them, along with the robber himself, as Alan was the only one in contact with him through letters to and from the Thai prison. He also keeps Doug as a prisoner so that they won’t stray away from their path. Now they have three days to find the person or their friend dies, an equation which is simple enough.

Alan has an e-mail from Chow talking about them meeting in the city of Tijuana in Mexico. Stu and Phil attempt to drug Chow and capture him, but when he finds it out, they reveal to him about the deal with Marshall and the need to save Doug. Chow agrees to take the gold back to the man, but it is stored in the walls of the basement of a Mexican villa that he used to own before he was captured by the police. Stu, Alan and Phil goes on the robbery mission with Chow and successfully find and take out the gold from inside the walls. But Chow cheats them, as he locks them down in the basement, alerts the security, and escapes with Phil’s own vehicle. They are arrested, but are surprised when they are taken back to the house from where the stole the money. There they meet Marshall again who tells them that Chow had lied to them amd the villa never belonged to him, and the gold which they were stealing belonged to Marshall. But he gives them another chance, as they already found Chow and they might be the only ones who might know where to look for him. So the wolf-pack is out there again, this time with less clues.

One thing that might be clearer than most of the things out there must be the fact that there is no real hangover in this one and therefore the title is of lesser significance and this one belonging to the series is more of a less suitable thing. But still, arguing that this movie is the result of two hangovers that happened earlier, and mostly the first one, this is that part of the series which is an extension. It has both the first and the second parts in it, and it tries to build on those two, and without them, this movie is absolute nothingness. The movie successfully deviates from the original formula, but that has done not much good, except for bringing a little dark shade associated with what was otherwise good fun. This dark side is rather an eclipse and with it should this movie series end, as it is known. But they have given themselves a scope for another movie with that end, and it is not a good sign. It should have ended with the scene before the closing credits, but it chose to bring a hangover element to this movie after it had successfully finished. That was one of the worst things ever, as a happy ending which is really an end, would have done this series a lot of good. Now someone might think about building on it and make it miserable without knowing that all good things must end well.

There is lot of fun, but it should still be considered as a lazy effort, with nothing special to offer, and what it has done is that it has alienated the common viewers who loved it even further more. The essence of losing one person has been kept in there though, as one person is destined to be lost in every movie of the series, and this time, it is again Doug which gets his “I am lost, please find me” score to two out of three, which is very good as he has much less to do even as an important member of the wolf-pack. There is too much of Chow instead, which is surely funny, but at times it does get irritating. The most laughter-deriving character is still that of Alan, and there is nothing changing that this time too. For the Malayalam movie watchers, there is a little bit of Jagadish from In Harihar Nagar in Alan this time, and it can be identified by the way in which he cries with no reason. 2 Harihar Nagar and In Ghost House Inn had made better sequels in Malayalam, but this one doesn’t do that much good to the original. The lack of innovation haunts this movie in its soul and the jokes might not be enough for all.

Behold the negative reviews though, for how much can something go on with a group of alcoholic drug addicts who mess up things because of their own fault only. The repetition always have its limitations, and the lack of repetition leads to a diversion from what made this series a grand success; such is the confusion and thus the complication. There is a limit to what drugs and alcohol can achieve, even in the movies. With the signs, “Alcohol is injurious to Health”, “Smoking is Injurious to Health” and “Drugs Kill”, the movie might have been against the use of the drugs which started all the trouble in the first place, but in many ways, it also glorifies the same, just as the Malayalam movie Spirit glorifies alcohol consumption throughout the first half. The comparison is surely far-fetched, but when you deconstruct them, there is a seventy five percent chance that you come up with the same conclusion once in a while. As this is an R-rated comedy, one has to wonder how much the censor board has cut just to make it adjustable to this world. One has to wait for the DVD to know exactly how much of the movie has gone to the grave, never seen by the people of this part of the world. Still, this time it looks less cut and that is a surprise!

Release date: 31st May 2013 (India), 23rd May 2013 (USA)
Running time: 100 minutes
Directed by: Todd Phillips
Starring: Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, Zach Galifianakis, Ken Jeong, Heather Graham, Jeffrey Tambor, Justin Bartha, John Goodman, Jamie Chung, Lela Loren