planktonrules

I am not planning on watching more episodes of "The Sandbaggers", as although it has an overall score of 8.6, which is VERY high, I was not particularly enamored with episode one.

The Norwegians have come to the British secret service asking for a favor...to sneak into the Soviet Union to rescue the members of a team which crashed there. Considering if the British would potentially provoke a diplomatic crisis if the team would be caught, the head of the Sandbaggers refuses to help. Later, however, he's overruled...and in the end it turns out his initial concerns were dead on..they should just let the Norwegians fend for themselves.

I like spy shows, though the energy level of this one is pretty low and the production values are not especially impressive. Overall, I was shocked how slow the show was....and I'm not inclined to see more even though it might get better.

I'm a bit confused by "Red One". While the film was originally designed to be a direct to Amazon Prime film, it somehow escallated to a $250,000,000 movie...with it's star, Dwayne Johnson, receiving $50,000,000! It's a HUGE amount of money...placing it at about #30 on the list of most expensive movies ever made. No wonder Amazon changed their mind and first released it to theaters to try to recoup some of this cost! Wow...$250,000,000!

Johnson plays Callum, Santa's personal bodyguard. However, despite his vigilence, someone manages to kidnap Santa (J. K. Simmons). A top secret organization designed to protect Santa and other supposedly mythical creatures thinks Jack O'Malley (Chris Evans) is responsible or at least knows who is...and they take him prisoner and convince him to help find the guy...with Callum as his wingman.

What follows is a surprisingly adult action film...one with a few not-so-family-friendly bits here and there. It certainly is NOT a film I'd show to small kids...especially with Callum calling folks D*ckheads and a lot of violence. This makes it a film more appropriate for older kids, teens and adults...a mistake in that it limits the appeal of the movie. A Santa movie SHOULD be for all audiences.

Apparently a lot of folks liked the movie judging from the reviews on IMDB. As for me, I much prefer a quieter, more sedate sort of Christmas movie...a classic film instead of a mega-action film. Not terrible...but also not very good either.

Luther and Nora Krank (Tim Allen and Jamie Lee Curtis) are now empty nesters and Luther has an idea...to skip everything Christmassy and instead use the money for a 10-day cruise of the Caribbean. Plus, it'll actually save them money! It's a nice idea...though it's odd how all their friends and associates are REALLY peeved about this. In fact, this is a weakness of the film...the reactions to this idea are really over the top...as if EVERYONE expects the Kranks to be as Christmassy as usual...and acts as if the couple are Satanists or something because they aren't! It even makes the newspaper...which is ludicrous. And, the entire plot relies on this...a HUGE weakness to the film. It just doesn't make sense...and it wasn't particularly funny.

I'm really surprised by this movie. After all, the people in it are all good actors and could be very funny. But the story idea just didn't make any sense and I can see why it has a mediocre score of 5.5 at this time.