jtindahouse

Wow. What an experience this was. The Australian Tourism Board must've loved this movie. This was a hard film to rate. One, because it was confusing and I certainly didn't fully understand it on first watch. Two, because even though it was pretty terrible in a lot of ways, I was still glued to the screen wondering what would happen next.

The acting in the film is pretty dodgy - but that almost felt intentional. It seemed like everyone was told to turn their performance up 5 notches and so everything comes across over the top and unrealistic. I had to keep reminding myself at times that Nicolas Cage is an Oscar winning actor.

When the film started I thought I was going to get a 'Straw Dogs' type film. And it was, but it also wasn't. It was more than that. But not in a good way. It was a little too confusing. I think if whatever it was going for was more clear by the end it could've been more effective. A 5/10 that I'm still not 100% certain on.

RIP Julian McMahon.

I remember in 2008 when 'Four Christmases' came out and it was revealed that Reece Witherspoon and Vince Vaughan hated each other with a passion. I always wondered whether he put the word out to his actor friends not to work with her. Seemingly not, or else all is forgotten.

There's a lot of good and a lot of bad in 'You're Cordially Invited'. There are some legitimate laughs along the way. Will Ferrell is his usual wacky self and Witherspoon brings her usual charisma. I would say there was zero in the way of the romantic chemistry between the two however.

I've never seen a film so determined not to finish before. Every time I thought it was over another little mini sub-story would start up, and this just kept happening time and again. Even the credits wanted you to stay and watch them. The film is about 20 minutes too long and certainly would've been better served finishing earlier.

This film is about what you'd expect. It's R rated, but about as safe as R-rated comedies come. The leads try their best, but their best years are both behind them. The script has the odd good moment, but could've used a lot more situational comedy. It's a pass, by the barest of margins. 6/10.

I absolutely love the concept behind 'The Platform' movies, however I feel like there isn't a lot of room to expand within the concept. So a sequel was always going to be pushing things, I suspected. Turns out I was right, and I was wrong.

The film starts out just fine. It's a bit of retread of the first, but it's so interesting that it can get away with it. I was hooked for the first 75% of this film. There was more than enough life in the concept.

Then it decided it had to do some stuff differently, and it lost me. It went too far off track and I lost interest. It limped to the finish line.

I really think simplicity is the key to making these films work. It's really fascinating stuff when it's kept at that base level, so to speak. 6/10.