Reviews by johanlefourbe

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but, since it was directed by Noah Baumbach, I was quite eager to check it out. In fact, since I really loved ‘Marriage Story’ (It is still my favorite movie released in 2019, no less than that), I’m surprised it took me so long to watch Baumbach’s following directorial effort. I guess the main reason was because it didn’t get much love when it was released and, now, I understand why.  I mean, there was definitely some good stuff though. For starters, the cast was really neat (Adam Driver, Greta Gerwig, Don Cheadle, Jodie Turner-Smith, André 3000) and they all gave some solid performances. I especially enjoyed this sweet couple with Driver and Gerwig and their nuclear family which seemed to get along fairly well. I mean, they were quirky and dysfunctional but not in a toxic way which was quite refreshing. Unfortunately, I did struggle to care about, well, pretty much everything else in this movie. First, there was this ‘Airborne Toxic Event’ which was never really interesting or entertaining, in my opinion. Basically, it did turn the movie into some kind of post-apocalyptic thriller for a while but, after 9 days (of which you didn’t see much), they actually got back home and returned to their lives as if nothing really happened. Even more underwhelming was the whole sub-plot about Greta Gerwig’s character swallowing some mysterious drug. I mean, I didn’t care much about this ‘Airborne Toxic Event’ but, at least, everything did seem to make more or less sense. However, they really lost me with this ‘Dylar’ thing though. Indeed, why on Earth would you have sex with some dude just to get access to some sketchy experimental drug when you have absolutely no idea if this drug will help you at all? Why not get some crack or some heroin then? At least, you would be sure to feel better for a while. Sure, you could argue that, this way, it made Jack and Babette messier and, therefore, more relatable but I just didn’t care much about the story they were involved in. I also liked the idea of this couple struggling with Death in general, it was definitely intriguing but the way they tackled this theme didn’t really work for me, I’m afraid. Anyway, to conclude, in spite of its flaws, I still think it is worth a look though, especially if you are interested in Noah Baumbach’s work. 

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but it was suggested that another Listal member and, in fact, it had been years on my queue. Anyway, since it was suddenly available on Amazon Prime, I thought I might as well finally check it out. Well, as I feared, I really didn’t care at all about the damned thing. First of all, I have to admit that I have actually very little knowledge about Blaxploitation movies. Indeed, I still have to watch ‘Shaft’ but it’s in my queue and I did see ‘Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song’ but, to be honest, it didn’t really impress me, even if I do respect its legacy. On the other hand, I’m really familiar with the Wayans’s family parody business but, except for ‘Scary Movie’, all their other movies were just really weak, at least, as far as I’m concerned. Sure, I have to admit that I’m not actually a fan of spoof movies in general, I have even recently watched again ‘The Naked Gun’, a massive classic in this genre, and I still didn’t like it much. This one was actually the Wayans’s very first parody and, even though it did become a cult-classic, I thought it was so tedious though. Basically, it turned out to be a long series of clichés about black American people but since it was made by some black folks, then, I guess, it was okay if you find it hilarious. Well, I thought it was rather cringe-inducing. At least, Dawnn Lewis, in a very first role, was really lovely and I have to admit that Keenen Ivory Wayans was not bad playing a seemingly tough soldier who actually drank Pepsi and might still be a virgin. Anyway, to conclude, the damned thing was so lame and I don’t think it is really worth a look, except maybe if you are a die-hard fan of the genre. 

I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick, in fact, to be honest, I actually wonder how it did end up in my queue. I think it was because Zooey Deschanel was involved (by the way, she obviously had some plastic surgery done on her mouth and I’m afraid it didn’t really work out for her after all). I have to admit that I’m not familiar with the classic children’s book it was based on but the approach they took was obviously really misguided. Indeed, pretty much like with ‘Peter Rabbit’, they took a beloved quaint children book and gave it a modern twist but the end-result was just so lame. The only thing remaining was this purple crayon capable of creating anything, everything else from the book, even Harold, who was originally a toddler, was suddenly replaced by Zachary Levi, a B actor in his 40’s which sounds as underwhelming as it was. Of course, it should have been fully animated and how cool it would have been if they had remained more faithful to the source material? On the other hand, they might still have been some issue with this format as I’m not sure that you can really deliver a satisfying 90 mins plot about a toddler and his magic crayon. For Carlos Saldanha, following the footsteps of Brad Bird or Andrew Stanton, it was his first live-action feature film and, well, while it seemed that this combination of live-action and animation was a good fit for him, this first effort was hardly convincing, I’m afraid. You might also wonder who was the target audience for this movie. Indeed, the book is for very young kids but this movie is way too intricate and probably too violent for them. However, I can’t imagine children above 12 years old not being bored by this either. Anyway, to conclude, even though it was rather harmless, it was above all really boring and I don’t think it is really worth a look. 

To be honest, I wasn’t sure what to expect from this flick but, since it was Todd Haynes’s directorial debut, I was quite eager to check it out. Well, for his first movie, Haynes didn’t make it easy for himself or for the viewers, that’s for sure. Indeed, instead of one story, he gave us 3 tales intertwined together but I would have a hard time to tell you what was the connection between these 3 stories. To make it even more complex, the different parts had also some complete different directing styles. For example, ‘Hero’ which was dealing with a small boy who shot his father and then might have been flying away afterwards was shot as some kind of satirical mockumentary. ‘Horror’ was shot in black-and-white and was some kind of vintage B horror feature. Finally, ‘Homo’ was even more intricate. Indeed, it might have seemed to be some kind of typical Jean Genet bleak and steamy Queer jail love story but it was apparently not enough as it was also constantly jumping back-and-forth between past and present but both time periods did feel like 2 completely different movies. Eventually, it did remind me of ‘Wonderstruck’ which mixed two storylines in different time periods, one shot in color and the other in black-and-white. However, if ‘Wonderstruck’ was pretty straightforward after all, this movie was a big mess though, at least that’s how I experienced it. Eventually, I read somewhere that the link between the stories could be sex (the little boy in ‘Hero’ didn’t have sex, thank God for that, but he did witness his mother having sex with some random guy) which was interesting but I have to admit that I didn’t catch it at all while watching the damned thing. To be honest, I was scratching my head through the whole duration. Anyway, to conclude, this movie did get some few extra points for its experimental and artistic aspects but, to be honest, I can’t say I really enjoyed it though. 

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but, since I have a weak spot for Melissa Barrera, I still wanted to check it out. I remember it well, even though it was a critical success, it was still a box-office flop when it was released. Well, to be honest, I really had a hard time to care about the damned thing after all and I’m not surprised that the mainstream audience eventually ignored it. I mean, it is not that it was bad, not at all, it’s actually a well made musical with a strong theme, it’s just that I never saw anything really remarkable about it. Maybe it worked better on the stage where it was super successful (I actually really loved ‘Hamilton’ also from Lin-Manuel Miranda which I saw on Disney+). I think the main issue was that they didn’t focus only on one or two characters but instead on a whole group of characters living in Washington Heights. As a result, all their respective subplots were deluded and not really interesting because they all felt generic mostly because they were barely developed. Furthermore, Usnavi’s tale was, in my opinion, rather bewildering. Indeed, the whole point for most immigrants when they leave their homeland is either to escape persecution or find better living conditions. Since his parents left the Dominican Republic, this country didn’t become really rich (It did have one of the fastest-growing economy in the world over the last 20 years though) so going back there was a rather weird move and slightly disrespectful for his parents who went through so much hardship so he could have a better future in the US. To make it even worse, at the last minute, the guy cancelled the whole thing which made everything he went through rather pointless. There was also the fact that I’m not familiar with Washington Heights but was it a good thing that he decided to stay in this neighborhood? But, in this case, why did Vanessa want so bad to live somewhere else in New York then? Anyway, to conclude, I really loved the idea to focus on this vibrant sparkling Latina community but, to be honest, I didn’t really connect with this movie. It is still worth a look though. 

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick, especially since it had been rather poorly received when it was released (it was also a huge box-office flop), but, since there was a decent cast involved, I thought I might as well check it out. Well, eventually, I really had a hard time to care about the damned thing after all. I mean, Lisa Joy is mostly known for being the showrunner on ‘Westworld’ (which I never saw) and, visually, it seemed to be a slick SF feature. Unfortunately, the end-result was a rather tedious neo-film noir mixed up with ‘Inception’ (Lisa Joy is actually married to Jonathan Nolan) and with a dash of ‘Ghost’. So, for her directorial debut, Joy went for something quite ambitious but it clearly backfired here. I mean, right from the start, what kind of half-baked post-apocalyptic world was that? Sure, visually, the various locations were intriguing but, at the end of the day, they didn’t do anything really interesting with this. The whole concept of people revisiting memories was also rather clunky and not as clever or as original as they thought. There was also this major plot-hole that they would gather some very specific details from someone’s memories, even things that they obviously didn’t pick up at all when the event took place, which didn’t make much sense. Memories are fuzzy at best and how could you gather some information that a client didn’t notice at all when the actual memory took place? The connection between Nick and Mae was also poorly established and, as pointed out by Watts time and time again, it didn’t make much sense that the guy would keep investigating her disappearance. At the end of the day, the whole thing was just too convoluted and, above all, barely entertaining at all. Anyway, to conclude, even if I have seen worse, the damned thing was really weak and you should probably avoid it. 

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but I was quite eager to see what Josh Safdie would manage to do on his own without his brother Benny. On top of that, it turned out to be a critical and box-office success so my expectations were getting pretty high. I actually already saw ‘The Smashing Machine’,  Benny Safdie’s own solo directorial effort also released in 2025 and, while it was a solid biopic, it still felt too generic after all. In this case, if you would expect a basic sports biopic about some ping pong prodigy from the 50’s, well, you will be disappointed. It’s so funny because, when I was a kid, I was not obsessing about football (soccer) like other French kids, I was obsessing by basketball and table tennis (I even joined a club for… 6 months). Anyway, table tennis was hardly the main topic after all, even though you do get to see Marty Mauser playing  a few really spectacular games. Instead, you actually get a typical Safdie flick about a charismatic loser who was running all the time from one misguided  plan to another. I really loved this approach with ‘Good Time’, I did appreciate it with ‘Uncut Gems’ and, in this case, I was definitely intrigued but, to be honest, I never thought it was really fascinating though. In these 3 movies, the Safdies gave us some unredeemable fairly unlikeable losers and, yet, you have to care enough about them so that you can engage in their stories which is really tricky to achieve (in my opinion, it only really worked out with ‘Good Time’). However, in this case, there is no denying that Timothée Chalamet was so good though and he delivered another strong and quite spellbinding performance. Will he become the next generation’s Leonardo DiCaprio?  We can only hope for. It was also pretty neat to see Gwyneth Paltrow making a nice come-back but, to be honest, she wasn’t given much to do after all. Anyway, to conclude, even if it didn’t completely blow me away, it was still a decent watch and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre. 

To be honest, since this movie had received some rather abysmal reviews, I had some low expectations but, since there was a solid cast involved, I thought I might as well check it out anyway. If you add the facts that I don’t like musicals in general and that this one was more than 2hrs long, I was clearly not excited about watching the damned thing. And, yet, to my surprise, I thought it was not bad at all after all (apparently, I wasn’t the only one since the public score on Rotten Tomatoes is 88%). Sure, it was rather jarring to have them cut to singing in the middle of a scene but it still worked mostly because Ben Platt sings so beautifully. It was also a good choice to have him singing live during his scenes and not do some playback. It had been also a while since I saw a musical with some songs which were actually catchy. Unfortunately, even though Platt gave a strong performance and even though it’s difficult to imagine anyone else to play this role, he was still 10 years too old to play this character and it was pretty obvious. The rest of the cast was pretty solid (Julianne Moore, Kaitlyn Dever, Amy Adams, Amandla Stenberg) but, in spite of the rather long running time, they were not given much to do after all. Eventually, did the story really work? I’m not so sure. I was also bothered by the fact that Evan had a completely different behavior at the beginning and at the end of the movie which would mean that going through something so traumatic would have helped him to become a more functional young man which I obviously didn’t buy. And, yet, there was something so genuine about Evan Hansen and Connor Murphy (such a pity that the guy disappeared after 10 mins) and what they were going through. At least, it was refreshing to see a musical dealing with something substantial instead of the usual fluff. Anyway, to conclude, it turned out to be much better than I expected and I think it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre. 

Since it was the last movie directed by Robert Rodriguez which I haven’t seen so far, I was quite eager to check it out. What was also intriguing about this movie was that it was an experiment. The idea was to shoot a movie with a very small budget (7000 dollars) which was how Rodriguez did shoot his directorial debut, ‘El mariachi’. At the time, to finance his first movie, he also took part in some medical testing studies so there was definitely an interesting meta layer here. So, on paper, the damned thing definitely had some potential. Unfortunately, this movie went by pretty much unnoticed when it was released but it’s not surprising as the end-result turned out to be seriously lame after all. Of course, it did look pretty cheap and ugly but it wasn’t the main issue. Indeed, above all, even though the whole idea of a thriller taking place during some sketchy medical testing studies did sound pretty cool, they came up with a tedious and convoluted story. To be honest, you might wonder why Rodriguez didn’t simply focus on his own experience dealing with such medical studies as something more grounded would have been so much more interesting and entertaining. For example, why did they involve some cartel chasing the main character to pay some debts? Why not, instead, tell the story of a young filmmaker collecting some money for his first film project exactly like Rodriguez did at the time? To make things worse, all the actors involved (including a couple of Rodriguez kids) were just so weak and, even if they were not helped by the poor material they were provided, they were all rather pathetic. Eventually, even though it was indeed an interesting experiment, it turned out to be a failure and, if you have 7000 dollars to spend, you should probably do something else with your money than deliver such a lame movie with no prospects whatsoever. 

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but, since I have a weak spot for Patricia Arquette and since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out. It turned out to be a rather dark and grim paranormal thriller with some religious undertones. Well, to be honest, I didn’t care much for the damned thing. Indeed, visually, it felt a like a MTV music video-clip which was definitely not a compliment but, even more problematic, the story was borderline idiotic. I mean, you had this priest going to some church in Brazil to investigate a religious statue weeping blood and, from this same church, a rosary went all the way from this little town in Brazil to Pittsburgh, USA, where a girl becomes, I don’t know, ‘possessed’ by this rosary. Of course, the very same priest then went all the way from the Vatican to Pittsburgh to check this. Seriously, all this didn’t make sense whatsoever and, if you have any knowledge about religious theology, you might wonder what being possessed might have to do with the stigmata.  At the end of the day, it was all about the dark apocalyptic vibe, they really loved this stuff at the turn of the millennium and this movie was actually fairly successful at the box office which would be rather unthinkable nowadays. The rhetoric was also a bit strange in the sense that it was Pro-faith but also Anti-Church at the same time. Concerning the cast, Gabriel Byrne was basically born to play such characters and he was actually not bad but it won’t be remembered as one of his most memorable performances. Concerning Patricia Arquette, she had a good run in the 90’s but she was almost 10 years older than her character and, even though she was lovely, she wasn’t really convincing here. On the other hand,  not many actors could manage to do anything with such rather abysmal material. Anyway, to conclude, I thought it was pretty weak and I don’t think it is really worth a look.