u/Duncan_Dixon_Coffey

George Lucas-era Star Wars films had a level of ambition that was typically hit-or-miss. Love or hate Lucas’ efforts, each entry had some interesting ideas that perhaps weren’t as successfully explored as intended. The closest thing we’ve gotten to Lucas’ zeal during the Disney era was The Last Jedi, and it’s been backward ever since. So to arrive at the point where we’re getting a Mandalorian and Grogu turducken of a TV/movie hybrid is especially sad because regression remains the name of the game rather than ambition.

Picking up from the end of season three of The Mandalorian, this movie sequel follows the titular character, aka Mando (Pedro Pascal), and Grogu getting tasked with a fetch quest involving Rotta the Hutt (Jeremy Allen White). The plot is serviceable, if a tad unexciting, but the pacing is strangely inert and un-Star Wars-like. Almost like a TV show.

Part of this is the lacklustre script, which was clearly several planned Mandalorian season four TV scripts smushed together by screenwriters Jon Favreau, Dave Filoni, and Noah Kloor. There’s an excessive amount of establishing shots, story beats that feel overly plotted out, and dialogue that’s occasionally repeated almost verbatim. You can even track the moments where a hypothetical episode ends, and the next installment begins. I suppose this recursive feeling is inevitable when you’re making a movie that’s based on a Star Wars TV show, which itself was based on the original Star Wars movies.

Most glaringly, there are almost no character arcs or a story to sink our teeth into. We learn nothing new about any of the established characters, nor are there any meaty ideas or social commentary which we know Star Wars can do incredibly well. All we get is Mando and Grogu fighting or walking their way from one event to the next with nary a thought or opinion of what’s going on.

Another unfortunate consequence of this Frankenstein’s monster of a script is how The Mandalorian and Grogu operates at the same monotonous wavelength from start to finish. While previous Star Wars movies had their share of pulse-raising action moments mixed with quieter character-focused moments, this movie will barely make your heart rate flicker. Even though there are plenty of well-choreographed fight scenes and action sequences, none particularly stand out visually or creatively.

Despite Favreau having the cinematic medium at his disposal, his direction is particularly unimaginative, especially when it comes to The Mandalorian and Grogu’s aesthetic. It’s mostly grungy browns, straightforward camera shots, obvious CGI, and the occasional oner to show off just a little bit. Almost all of the creatures and planets leave little to no impression because we hardly get a clear look at anything. The closest thing we get to interesting is the giant Dragonsnake, and that’s only because its white skin contrasts with the Dagobah-esque colour palette.

But the biggest disappointment is how the movie continues to carry forward the TV show’s fatal flaw: making the universe feel small despite all the leeway in the galaxy to do whatever the writers want.

We could’ve gone to new galaxies, met new alien species, or just be rid of whatever Empire-shaped shackles that are keeping the movies bound to their past. Yet The Mandalorian and Grogu shows that the movies continue to be guided by their heyday when it’s best to simply let the past die.

Please read the rest of my review here as the rest is too unwieldy to copy + paste: https://panoramafilmthoughts.substack.com/p/star-wars-the-mandalorian-and-grogu

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Mortal Kombat II kicks off with a lengthy flashback that dives into the origin story of Kitana (Adeline Rudolph; Sophia Xu as young Kitana). For all the colourful sets used, it’s not exactly exciting as the blocking and tone feel more akin to a daytime soap opera than a big-budget blockbuster. There is a decent fight scene involving the main antagonist, Shao Kahn (Martyn Ford), that ends with a bloody fatality finish that’s sure to satisfy fans of the video games.

But as soon as the ‘Mortal Kombat’ title card comes up, there’s no ‘2’ or ‘II’ to be found. It’s immediately clear that this movie wants us to forget all that happened in the 2021 reboot. In fact, Mortal Kombat II is downright embarrassed to be following up on its unexpectedly successful predecessor because this is an IP movie that’s overly pandering to fans of the franchise.

In a very interesting turn of events, producer Todd Garner appears to have known what was coming well ahead of time because he came out swinging against the initial wave of mixed reviews for Mortal Kombat II, tweeting checks notes:

‘It’s clear [reviewers] have never played the game and have no idea what the fans want or ANY of the rules/canon of Mortal Kombat. One reviewer was mad that a guy ‘had a laser eye!’ Why the f**k do we still allow people that don’t have any love for the genre review these movies! Baffling.’

To be fair to him, he has since deleted that tweet and apologised for his overeager defensiveness over the movie, admitting that ‘no one is above criticism’. Look, I understand wanting to defend something that many people worked really hard on. But stifling constructive criticism isn’t good for anyone, and so I speak honestly as someone who has played the games and also loves movies: I sincerely hope that Mortal Kombat II was truly, as they like to say, ‘made for the fans’ because that is the only subset of moviegoers who would appreciate what was going on in this barely-there movie.

The sequel picks up where the first movie left off and rapidly introduces every important character, the groundwork for the movie’s titular realm-controlling fighting tournament, and any remaining lore we need to know using new audience surrogate character and video game fan favourite Johnny Cage (Karl Urban).

There’s plenty of ‘stuff’ that happens in Mortal Kombat II, but it all serves as narrative patchwork to string together the movie’s many action and fight scenes. Eschewing even the slightest bit of proper characterisation, every single character, new and returning, operates in two modes: delivering exposition in an overly serious tone or dropping several pop culture references in rapid succession that elicit mild chuckles.

The result is a script that has no idea what it wants to be. Is it trying to be overly serious or as campy as the video games (or the 1995 movie adaptation)? In trying to juggle both, it succeeds at neither. The serious stuff feels like soap opera cosplay, while the campy material comes off as try-hard edgelord-y, almost like the screenwriter is guessing how a gamer would talk in real life.

The lacklustre writing bleeds into the performances as some are serviceable, while others are downright bad. The group scenes are often the worst, as it feels like all the actors are in a different movie to each other. At one point, I was wishing for Kung Lao (Max Huang) to use his razor-brimmed hat on me so I could be spared the worst of the line readings. No fault of the actors, though, who are clearly doing the best they can. Only the always-entertaining Karl Urban manages to balance the camp with fleeting moments of random seriousness, and Josh Lawson is once again having the time of his life as the overly-Aussie Kano.

Please read the rest of my review here as the rest is too unwieldy to copy + paste: https://panoramafilmthoughts.substack.com/p/mortal-kombat-ii

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There’s an emotional honesty in every John Carney movie that feels like it happened to him or someone he knows, warts and all. I don’t know if he ever bonded with a Czech woman while busking in Dublin one day (like in Once) or started a band in high school to impress a girl (like in Sing Street), but it feels real. Power Ballad is in that same register, as it’s about a middle-aged rocker who could’ve been big but is instead left to play cover songs at weddings. Again, I don’t know if Carney was ever in a wedding cover band, but I can certainly believe it if he said he was.

Rick Power (Paul Rudd) has been fronting his wedding cover band, The Bride and the Grooves, for about 15 years now, still dreaming of that elusive big break. The opening sequences are all of the band performing at weddings, but Carney shoots them like large arena gigs, complete with crowd shots, sweeping angles, and energetic rockstar moments. It’s all very exciting, especially when Rick takes any opportunity to perform one of his original power ballads (fittingly).

Despite performing as he would to a sold-out crowd at Madison Square Garden, Rick’s joy is short-lived as he’s brought back to brutal reality when the camera circles back to the remnants of a rapidly dissipating wedding crowd. As Rick’s drummer tells him: ‘You’re not a rockstar, you’re a human jukebox.’

Carney may seek refuge within the music world, but he never shies away from the harsh realities of life within it. Power Ballad captures the visceral joyfulness of being in a band, followed by the comedown of having to go back to a tiny house in Dublin until the next wedding gig comes around. At least he has his loving wife (Marcella Punkett) and 14-year-old daughter, Aja (Beth Fallon), to keep him grounded. It’s not a luxurious life, but it’s real and sincere, traits that musicians try oh so hard to attain (or at least pay lip service to).

The movie reaches its highest notes when the expected John Carney meet-cute is subverted with the introduction of boy-band member turned wannabe solo star Danny Wilson (Nick Jonas) at a wedding. Being a close friend of the groom, Danny is asked to perform a song, much to Rick’s chagrin. But as the pair trade vocals on a blistering cover of Stevie Wonder’s I Wish, we witness them go through the full arc of initially mistrusting each other to gradual respect over three masterful minutes of ‘show, don’t tell’. There’s clearly some spark between these two, and it helps that they’re the only two Americans at the event.

Rick and Danny bump into each other again after the wedding and do what musicians do: jam, smoke weed, jam, drink, and jam some more. Watching the pair bond over each other’s songs is just magical, and it encapsulates why these ‘making-of’ scenes are often the high points in music-centric movies like Michael and Bohemian Rhapsody. These two people may come from opposite sides of the success spectrum, but Power Ballad levels the playing field by letting music be the driving force of their bond.

It doesn’t matter whether you’re a struggling wedding singer or trying to break out of the shadow of your boy band, you just want to be heard - and have your music be heard - by someone who gets you. So when Rick discovers that Danny stole one of his songs and turned it into the worldwide smash hit he’s dreamed of, that cherished moment immediately becomes tainted and we (and Rick) are left pondering whether their evening of bonding was all a lie and how many musicians got screwed over in a similar fashion.

Unsurprisingly, Rick starts coming apart at the seams and every aspect of his life begins to suffer. It was his big break, dammit, and it was stolen from him by some wannabe pop star. It’s nothing we haven’t seen before, but Carney knows it. Rather than shy away, he leans all the way into the story’s tenderness of the story and music’s sappiness until everything feels perfectly okay. There’s nothing to be embarrassed about here.

Please read the rest of my review here as the rest is too unwieldy to copy + paste: https://panoramafilmthoughts.substack.com/p/power-ballad

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There’s a sheen of aspiration and hope woven throughout The Devil Wears Prada. Some of it was tainted by objectively awful people, sure, but seeing the influence wielded by someone like Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep) in the unforgiving world of fashion and magazines circa 2006 was thrilling. There’s always something appealing about watching someone be good at their job, even if that someone is awful.

It makes perfect sense that The Devil Wears Prada 2 is all about the inevitable downward slope that even supposed powerhouses like Runway magazine and Miranda can’t avoid. Amidst a cloud of trepidation over whether any semblance of theme and story would be smothered by fawning fan service, this is a movie that has something interesting to say about the existential crisis faced by Runway, magazines, and the media landscape in general circa 2026, even if the subtext is about as obvious as a pair of Jimmy Choos clacking on tiled floors.

In the 20 years since Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway) threw her phone into that Parisian fountain and walked away from Runway magazine, she’s established herself as a well-respected journalist who has published some award-winning work, including a four-part piece about the intricacies of the Federal Reserve. But alas, the people aren’t exactly clamouring for thousands of words about banking and even Andy (and her respected colleagues) can’t escape the worries faced by every contemporary journalist and media outlet: layoffs, publication shutdowns, and cynical corporate buyouts with only the bottom line as the main focus.

Having been through all those worries in some form, the reintroduction of Andy through this lens really hit home. The viral video of her rant about why journalism matters is a stretch (a video like that wouldn’t get anywhere near the attention this movie depicts), but seeing Andy and her former colleagues at a bar commiserating about leaving journalism to write marketing copy is painfully honest. I’ve had that exact same conversation with colleagues, so the emotional truths conveyed by everyone here are spot on.

Over in the world of Runway, things aren’t getting better. Print is out, digital is in, which means Runway magazine exists primarily in name only and is clinging to its former relevance. So it’s no surprise at all that The Devil Wears Prada 2’s next big trick is to have Andy be recruited back into the Runway fold as its new Features Editor to help stabilise the slowly leaking ship. Is the plotting to get Andy, Miranda, Nigel (Stanley Tucci), and Emily (Emily Blunt) in the same room together clumsy? Very much so. Does it ultimately matter how we got there as long as we got there? Not at all.

This much-anticipated reunion is a mixed bag at first, both in vibe and execution. While Andy and Nigel are forever a delight, having her kowtow immediately to Miranda upon their big (re)meeting feels like a temporary reversion of any meaningful character development. It’s like the movie knows this is what we wanted and is desperately trying to give it to us, resulting in a caricature of what we loved in the first place. Emily and Nigel remain delightfully iconic though, and their quips remain as sharp as ever. Go off, queens.

Thankfully, things quickly reorient themselves as Andy’s hard-earned confidence puts her in a position where her voice can be more widely heard rather than shushed, while Miranda’s fading influence is pushed to the forefront. The Devil Wears Prada 2 is at its best when it blends character with surprisingly poignant commentary about the struggles faced by media outlets everywhere, even top-tier publications like Runway.

The editorial quality is slipping as editors are forced to eschew hard-hitting journalism in favour of tabloid fodder to appease the SEO/AI gods; Andy is working like mad to get important stories published but these have little impact on traffic; and Runway (and by extension, Miranda) is at the whims of its advertisers, who have the power to demand advertorial content whenever they please. Miranda even hangs up her own coats now, a far cry from her HR-worthy coat-throwing antics of the first film. How the mighty have fallen indeed.

Please read the rest of my review here as the rest is too unwieldy to copy + paste: https://panoramafilmthoughts.substack.com/p/the-devil-wears-prada-2

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There’s arguably no singular cultural icon quite like Michael Jackson. He was the undisputed centre of the pop culture galaxy and everyone clung onto everything he did, whether it be his countless iconic songs or all the controversial legal issues that dogged him. This also means that the late singer inadvertently becomes a deep well of human psychology from which a wealth of stories could potentially be drawn.

From generational trauma and redefining masculinity to being a Black American who broke down racial barriers through music and the dangers of being the most famous person in the world, Jackson is perhaps the north star for all of these ideas (and much more) over the past several decades.

That’s why Antoine Fuqua’s Michael is a terrible cinematic depiction of the singer and his cultural impact because the movie teases all of the aforementioned heady ideas, only to chicken out every single time to remind us just how awesome Michael Jackson was.

To say that this movie commits all the classic biopic sins outlined in Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story is giving it far too much credit because there’s no proper story structure for it to work as a movie. Starting with the formation of the Jackson 5 and spanning until Jackson’s Bad tour in 1988, Michael ticks off major milestones in the singer’s life like someone going through his Wikipedia page, all while ignoring the psychological and dramatic substance behind said milestones. Whenever the movie gets close to something meaty, it quickly cuts to a recreation of a live performance or recording of a famous song as a distraction before moving to the singer’s next big life moment.

Even calling Michael ‘by-the-numbers’ is an insult to numbers because at least there’s a logic to ones and zeros. There’s absolutely no logic to be found in this glossy, 127-minute music video that functions as image rehabilitation trying to get ahead of any potential negative story at best, and a mockery of the artist, audience, and alleged victims at worst. When Berry Gordy (Larenz Tate) says, ‘In this business, you can make up just about anything,’ it comes off more as a warning than you initially realise.

The movie’s slavish depiction of events leaves no room for any thematic throughline or deeper exploration of any character who had a major impact on the singer’s life. It’s well documented that Jackson had an abusive childhood stemming from his father, Joseph Jackson (Colman Domingo), and Michael does hint at this. But the movie quickly handwaves all this away with nary an explanation, and making Michael the focal point without analysing the psychology of those around him with any nuance feels almost negligent. We don’t get any indication why Joseph is the horrible father he is, or any clue that his mother, whom we know he was very close to, is more than a lady who likes watching 1930s comedy movies with her son.

But the fundamental, fatal flaw of Michael is that the movie not only operates as a shameless hagiography of the singer, but also portrays him as someone with absolutely no personality behind his voice apart from what everyone proclaims him to be.

That’s no shade on Jaafar Jackson, whose recreation of his late uncle’s mannerisms, singing, and dancing is perhaps one of the best physical impressions of a real person in recent years. But it is ultimately a performance that recreates what we, the audience, know of Michael Jackson as a pop culture figure rather than a person.

There’s no indication of who he is as a person or what his personality is (other than he’s sad or lonely), nor does the movie even try to lift the lid or reveal something new about the singer. What it does do is show how Michael solved gang violence in Los Angeles by casting the Bloods and Crips in his Beat It music video, and how racial equality on MTV was solved by persuading the network to play his videos. I wish I were joking, but these scenes are in the movie.

Make no mistake, it’s amazing to watch Jaafar recreating Michael Jackson to the level that he does, but it’s ultimately a cynical nostalgia play aimed at telling us just how great the late singer was at performing live. As good as it is to see a recreation of Jackson’s legendary Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever performance, I can easily just watch the original on YouTube and feel more emotion than what the movie is putting out.

Please read the rest of my review here as the rest is too unwieldy to copy + paste: https://panoramafilmthoughts.substack.com/p/michael

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