Angelina Jolie

Maria

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Maria
  • IMDb: link

Maria explores the final days of renown opera singer Maria Callas (Angelina Jolie) looking back on her life in a self-medicated haze that blurs fantasy and reality in her quest to rediscover the voice she lost years ago. The standouts here are Jolie’s performance, for which she trained 7 months to learn to sing opera (a mix of both Jolie and Callas’ voices are used throughout the film), and the film’s amazing look courtesy of cinematographer Edward Lachman, set decoration by Sandro Piccarozzi, and costumes by Massimo Cantini Parrini.

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Hackers

/ / Home Video
  • Title: Hackers
  • IMDb: link

Newly released on 4K, 1995’s Hackers is a very silly movie about a group of “innocent” high school hackers who despite breaking multiple laws throughout the film are the victims and heroes of the plot when another hacker (Fisher Stevens) decides to frame them for his crimes. The film stars Jonny Lee Miller as a child prodigy banned from using computers until his 18th birthday where he returns to the world of computers and takes up with a group of local hackers which include the hyper-competitive girl (Angelina Jolie) he has a crush on.

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Eternals

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Eternals
  • IMDb: link

Eternals is ambitious as hell. It may be the most ambitious movie Marvel has attempted since weaving together various threads into a single story in The Avengers. Sadly, it’s nowhere near as successful. With an opening crawl, monologues aplenty, and flashbacks, Eternals struggles to introduce and flesh out a dozen characters, their purpose, their backstory, and their place in the MCU.

I’ll give writer/director Chloé Zhao credit for assembling a talented and diverse cast, but with so many characters to keep track of (many of who disappear for large amounts of screentime) more than once I forgot an actor was even in the film.

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Maleficent: Mistress of Evil

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Maleficent: Mistress of Evil
  • IMDb: link

Maleficent: Mistress of Evil movie reviewHonestly, other than the look of Angelina Jolie as the title character, I could remember almost nothing about 2014’s Maleficent walking in to view its sequel. In five years, I’m betting I’ll remember even less about Maleficent: Mistress of Evil.

Jolie and Elle Fanning return as the sorceress Maleficent and the Queen of the Moors, Aurora. The film opens with a proposal by Prince Philip (Harris Dickinson) to wed Aurora and unite his father’s human kingdom with the magical realm that Maleficent turned over to Aurora at the conclusion of the first film. While Philip’s father (Robert Lindsay) is quite taken with the idea, neither Maleficent nor the prince’s mother (Michelle Pfeiffer) think much of the pairing as both hold bigoted views towards the other kingdom and the races that inhabit them.

The crux of Maleficent: Mistress of Evil isn’t really about Maleficent. Nor is it about Aurora and her love story. Instead, the film is focused on the evil machinations of Queen Ingrith (Pfeiffer) as she works to spur on a war that antagonists on both sides are more than willing to fight once she lights the spark.

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Lara Croft: Tomb Raider

/ / Home Video
  • Title: Lara Croft: Tomb Raider
  • IMDb: link

Lara Croft: Tomb Raider DVD reviewWith the character’s return to the big screen on Friday, this week’s throwback Tuesday takes us back to 2001’s big-screen adaptation of the Tomb Raider video game starring Angelina Jolie as English archaeologist Lara Croft. The plot centers around a mysterious artifact found in the Croft mansion, hidden inside an antique clock that begins ticking one fateful night. The artifact turns out to be tied to Lara’s missing father (Jon Voight) and the Illuminati who want to use it to gain control of time. Breaking into her insanely well-guarded home, equally insanely-prepared mercenaries make off with the key and begin a race to find the Triangle of Light which was broken in half centuries ago but with the key can be used to control time itself.

Incredibly goofy, even for a movie based off a video game, the film is largely forgettable other than for its star, ridiculous plot holes (such as granting Lara the chance to destroy half of the clock and essentially end the villains’ plans fairly early on but having her refuse to do so), and overly-elaborate sequences. Iain Glen and Daniel Craig star as the villains while Noah Taylor and Chris Barrie provide Lady Croft minimal technical support and back-up.

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