Suicide Squad - Movie Review!

Who's In It?

Will Smith, Margot Robbie, Viola Davis, and Jared Leto

What's It About?

Government agent Amanda Waller assembles a team of some of the most dangerous villains for her black ops team, in exchange for their lives and time off prison.

Any Good? 

The first thing that struck me about this film was that it was more Scott Pilgrim style than DC, THANK GOD. Highly stylised with nods to old costumes and story lines - the facts were all here, MUCH better than Marvel - sadly that didn't last.

A lot of the costumes were good, but I've never been as let down by character design as I have been by Cara Delevingne's Enchantress. She looked great at first, dark and weird but that doesn't last, they take away all of the weird, all of the interest & turn her into just Cara Delevingne in a shiny bodysuit. Such wasted potential.  

Get a good look, it doesn't last 5 minutes

As for the other characters, watching The Fresh Prince shooting people in the head was a bit odd - it was just Will Smith with guns on his wrist. As one of the most anticipated characters, Margot Robbie actually wasn't bad as Harley Quinn, I didn't like her costume (digitally shortened short shorts included) but she slipped in between a plain and Boston Harley accent which I was delighted with.

Jared Leto as the Joker has so much potential, but he was butchered by Warner Bros. For unknown reasons they portrayed him as a pimp, in one scene LITERALLY trying to sell Harley - real Joker like there, WB. He wasn't in any scenes with anyone but Harley, which was massively disappointing. 

Even when they had BATMAN WITH HARLEY WHILE HE MAGICALLY DISAPPEARS?! WTH?! Any time he does anything even remotely Joker-like the screen cuts away,the frustration levels are real. I just hope solo Batfleck-flick affords him more time.

An actual gold pimpcane..

One thing for sure is that this film was BUTCHERED by Warner Bros. and I feel terrible for David Ayer. The beginning of the film was really good and stood head and shoulders over most comic films in general, but then it had to be made PG-13. The script has no gravitas because it's 'nice and wholesome'. The fighting was dumbed down - they were fighting rock monsters and still had to be watered down.

If you have kids who REALLY want to see this I'd say bring them, otherwise wait for the (hopefully) R-Rated director's cut which I'm genuinely excited to see. Overall, Suicide Squad is a film with huge potential that was subject to American editing standards - hopefully they'll pay attention to the results and stop forcing things for children.

Rating: 

Dallas Buyers Club - Teenage Movie Review

Who's in it? 

Matthew McConaughey, Jennifer Garner and Jared Leto


What's it about?

Homophobic Texan manly mayyyyn Ron Woodroof finds out he has HIV after an accident with electrical wiring while working. When the hospital refuses to sell him non-FDA approved AIDS medicine that is in trial stage, he becomes a AIDS-Meds mule and recruits transgender Jared Leto to reach into the badly affected gay community to sell this medication.

Any Good?

The thing with this movie is, there's no clear villain (other than BIG SCARY EVIL PHARMA and the Government of course), and it really throws any preconceptions of right or wrong out the window. Woodroof may be a drug mule and is selling memberships to his med club to desperate people seems to be the bad, but he's helping the otherwise helpless massive AIDs stricken community in 80's Texas. Doctor Sevard is giving patients a toxic drug that is killing them quicker than AIDs, but he only seems to want to gather reputable data to find a cure. This film is as morally grey as they come. 

Googled 'morally grey', this was the result..

The acting in this movie was some of the most stellar I've seen. Matthew McConaughey has suddenly gone from a joke to one of the best actors in Hollywood in a year and he really shows his chops in this. He could be favourite to win against Leo for the fully believable performance, this is the Oscars after all. Jared Leto was PHENOMINAL as the transgender partner-in-crime, Rayon to Woodroof. Seriously, this is the best portrayal I've seen since Bryan Cranston in Breaking Bad. It was Lead Actor winning stuff, beating all contestants this year by a mile and is sure to win Best Supporting Actor, without a doubt. Jennifer Garner hasn't changed in my eyes since Daredevil, she kept her streak of meh acting all the way through the film, really being the weak link of the cast.

Dallas Buyers Club has me terrified of mopping up at the Oscars and leaving nothing to Leo and Co. but they deserve it. McConaughey could very well win Best Lead and if Leto doesn't win Best Supporting I'll flip every table in a mile radius. I predict this film to dominate on Oscar night and I don't know if I'm against that. It's worth repeated cinema trips to see this just for Leto's Rayon alone, I nearly cried, ehm, fell in love, with Rayon, and I can assure you, you will too.

 Rating: 

The (sigh..) Eldest Gorgebag