The 2024 Wrap Up – Part Two

Posted on December 28, 2024December 28, 2024 by fenrisfil

Welcome to part two of my annual wrap up looking at 2024. In this half I will give you the second half of my top ten movies of the year and look at how things have played out in the box office. I’ll also be encouraging you to give a second look at four movies that you may have marked down as “Not worth bothering with”.

Top Ten (Part Two)

First up, a couple more honourable mentions. A movie that really surprised me in 2024 was “In The Land Of Saints And Sinners“. There’s no getting around it, Liam Neeson has been making a lot of truly terrible movies of late. This one however was great and Neeson was back on top form. Another impressive comeback was Kevin Costner’s passion project “Horizon: An American Saga“. A long complex tale that would have been better served as a TV series, but was still quality cinema. Costner often self funds his projects and usually loses money with them, but no one can deny his dedication and passion.

Before I get on to my top five movies I want to shout out two 2024 movies I won’t get to see until 2025. Namely: Sonic 3 and Nosferatu. The first two Sonic movies were far better than I think anyone expected and I have no reason to think they will drop the ball now. Meanwhile Francis Eggers new horror movie hits theatres in the US on Christmas day. In the UK we get it Jan 1st 2025. So while Sonic my miss out on the list for both years, I suspect I may be justifying Nosferatu’s inclusion on my 2025 list instead. We will see. Early reviews have been glowing.

#5 Boy Kills World

Review (From a roundup) HERE. This is my fun cult movie of the year. A mixture of excessively violent action and comedy, done with the freedom of an independent movie aiming to be a cult classic. This is a revenge film about a deaf, mute played by Bill Skarsgård but with H. Jon Benjamin (Archer, Bob’s Burgers) as the voice in his head. Sadly the movie was marketed so poorly a lot of people are probably hearing about it for the first time in this article. It made only $3m against its $20m budget. However, cult movies like this tend to make up for their box office in the long term through streaming and physical media sales. So there is hope for it yet. If you like action comedies check this one out! This just about made a 7/10.

#4 Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F

Legacy sequels usually are a disappointment. Even when they are decent, they tend to fall far short of the original films. Every now and then though we get one just about up to scratch. Perhaps not as good as the classics, but one that does feel part of the same conversation. Axel F was one of these. A very pleasant surprise, especially after the very disappointing legacy sequel to “Coming to America”. Eddie Murphy was back on form. The rest of the gang was back on form and the movie carried a lot of the same vibes while also not ignoring the massive time gap. This was a very solid 7/10.

#3 Late Night With The Devil

Review (From a roundup) HERE. While perhaps not as original as many may think, it was original enough to stand out in the sea of modern horrors. The 70’s TV style felt authentic and they had fun playing the plot out through that medium. The movie reminded me a lot of “WNUF Halloween Special”, but slicker (Hence not finding it totally original). David Dastmalchian, a highly underrated actor, did a fantastic job in the lead and young Ingrid Torelli impressed as the possessed child. While I wasn’t surprised the movie was good, I was that it ended up my top horror of the year. Well done Shudder! Strong 7/10 for this.

#2 The Wild Robot

Review (From a roundup) HERE. This was a shocker that really shouldn’t have been. When you realize this is from Dreamworks and Chris Sanders, the minds behind the original “How to Train Your Dragon” you realize expectations should have been high. Yet this flew under a lot of peoples radars for some reason. Perhaps because Lupita Nyong’o isn’t that big a star (Despite her talent). Perhaps because Pedro Pascal seems to be in everything and due to that also has no draw. But the truth is both of them did a superb job. But it’s the animation, the story and perhaps above all the humour that makes this an absolute classic. 7.5/10

#1 Deadpool & Wolverine

Full review HERE. Speaking of humour, by far the funniest film of the year was Deadpool & Wolverine”. So despite the paper thin plot and obvious milking of nostalgia, this still ends up my movie of the year. The cast of heroes is excellent, including the surprise (And not so surprising) cameos. Aside from Emma Corrin, the villains were less impressive, but they did what they needed to. Right from the very start, the movie is outrageous, hilarious and action packed. It even manages to tell strong character stories, compensating largely for the weak plot. Those stories extend beyond the main two characters and makes each cameo feels worthwhile (Although one of them mostly for comedy…Don’t skip the post credit scene, that’s all I’m saying). This was an 8/10, even with the flaws.

Second Chance Saloon

These days negativity about entertainment spreads like wildfire. There’s no getting around it, the studios have a PR problem and a terrible relationship with their fans. Part of that is because they have been strangely antagonistic and part is just their uninspired output. Most new movies or TV shows are filled with all the same modern cliches. Any criticism of the product is reacted to with insults and labels. So it’s understandable people are increasingly walking away from new shows, movies, franchises or even entire genres. Of course that means on occasion they don’t give a chance to something perhaps they may enjoy. So in this section I am going to recommend a few movies for a second chance.

Let’s get to the easier sells first. I want to mention a couple of fun movies that while not bothering my top ten, were entertaining and didn’t contain anything that anyone should find offensive. “Red One” quickly flopped at the box office, showing that neither The Rock nor Chris Evans are box office gold. Yet, this was a fun, well meaning action Christmas movie. The second to mention is Gladiator 2. This is a direct sequel to the original and an entertaining movie that attempts to offer a subversion of the plot from the first. Sadly some reviewers have thrown out the usual complaints: Bad CGI, ‘Member berries, rehash of the first film. None of those are anywhere near as bad as presented. The plot especially is mostly similar because it is a gladiator movie. Not too much variety in the genre.

Not For Everyone

So now we get on to the divisive movies. First up is Joker: Folie à Deux, this is a movie that got a savage backlash mostly from people that hadn’t seen the movie, but had heard things they didn’t like about it. It’s a subversive movie and a gritty, depressing neo-noir. It’s not a bad movie objectively speaking. Indeed, it is very well made. What it isn’t much of though, is fun. If you go in expecting a comic book movie, you will hate it. Especially true if you think this is the “Real” Joker. But if you like gritty, depressing neo-noir’s or can enjoy a movie for being well made, give it a chance. Personally, I’m not a fan of the musical stuff, but it wasn’t a deal breaker.

Second movie I want to mention is Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis. As you will learn in my review, it’s not a movie you can approach in a straight up way. You pretty much have to ignore the movies plot, take the subtext lightly and look deep at the subtext to the subtext or the metaphor under the metaphor. If you watch the movie thinking of it as being about Coppola himself and film making in general, it becomes a lot more interesting. It’s not for everyone though. Both these films are for true cinephiles. People at film school will probably appreciate them, but if you want to chill with a beer and some popcorn… Yeah, maybe don’t watch these. But then that’s where Red One and Gladiator II come in. So whatever kind of viewer you are, two of these films should be worth giving a chance to.

Box Office Breakdown

So finally we are on to the objective part of this round up. What movies actually made money. This year the top ten global box office contains ten franchise movies. Yep, not a single one of these is an original movie. This is pretty normal for these days and part of the reason why movies are starting to struggle. There isn’t enough effort put in by the studios to build new franchises. Not that there aren’t original movies, but they are usually lower budget, less pushed by the studios and often direct to streaming. Anyway here is the top ten in the global box office for the year 2024.

Inside Out 2 – $1.7b (“Break Even” Aprox $600m) $1.1b Profit (Aprox)
Deadpool & Wolverine – $1.3b (“Break Even” Aprox $600m) $700m Profit (Aprox)
Despicable Me 4 – $969m (“Break Even” Aprox $400m) $569m Profit (Aprox)
Moana 2 – $804b (“Break Even” Aprox $600m) $204m Profit (Aprox)
Dune: Part Two – $708m (“Break Even” Aprox $600m) $108m Profit (Aprox)
Wicked – $593m (“Break Even” Aprox $900m) $300m loss (Aprox)
Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire – $569m (“Break Even” Aprox $450m) $119m Profit (Aprox)
Kung Fu Panda 4 – $548m (“Break Even” Aprox $300m) $248m Profit (Aprox)
Venom: The Last Dance – $470m (“Break Even” Aprox $330m) $140m Profit (Aprox)
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice – $450m (“Break Even” Aprox $300m) $150m Profit (Aprox)

Analysis

Only the first two of this list broke a billion, same as last year. Indeed post covid that is the average. Pre covid it was around 5 per year. With high inflation and ticket prices increasing even beyond that, we should be seeing more not less. In 2014, “Interstellar”, an original movie and the 10th highest earning that year made $653m. If you adjust for inflation that would be around $871m. That would place it 4th on this years list. Of the $200m+ production budget club, only the top three of this year could be called a success. The other wins are for those films that controlled their budgets. Kung Fu Panda 4 being most notable. “Wicked”, despite it’s success is still a financial failure (Offset a little by it’s strong US box office).

The top ten this year is fairly predictable. These are all fairly safe bets outside of perhaps the Dune sequel and of course, all franchise movies. Dune II was only in the air because the first movie came out during covid and as a result didn’t give us a clear indicator of popularity. However, the cinema is largely starved of proper science fiction blockbusters these days and clearly there is still a market. We will almost certainly see more entries from nine of these in the years to come. Venom. however. is done now along with Sony’s Spider-Man-less Spider-Man films. Outside of the Venom movies that universe has been a total failure and it’s unlikely Venom 3 will have made up for the losses of “Madam Web” and “Kraven”, both apparently in the running for worst superhero movie of all time.

Final Notes

By contrast to the box office, my top ten of the year only included four franchise movies. One of which, “The Fall Guy” was a reboot of an 80’s franchise and so could hardly be said to be a cynical cash in. Most people forgot that 80’s series existed. That’s not the case with Beverly Hills Cop, that was very much a cash in on Nostalgia, but it was done very well and deserves it’s place on the list. That’s the thing, there’s nothing wrong with legacy sequels or franchises, but they shouldn’t totally dominate the blockbuster side of the movies. One of the reasons the modern era is so reliant on the IP’s is because almost no one watches movies for the actors anymore. The age of the movie star is long gone. But with it, the freedom to take chances with the actual movies.

In the social media age, I’m not sure you can have movie stars. So that means studios need to be willing to take more risks with the films themselves so they can create the franchises of the future. It’s not all bad news though. There are good films out there, they just may require a little bit of digging around to find. How many of my top ten did you even hear about this year? What you may not realize is there are a lot more movies being made today than in the 1980’s and we live in the age of instant access. We have more freedom to find the content we like, but with freedom comes responsibility. It’s on us to find that content, we can’t wait for it to come to us. For cinephiles that’s not a problem, but for the general audience? That may be why the box office is still struggling.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2021 Year in Review – Part 3 : The Top Ten

Posted on December 31, 2021January 1, 2022 by fenrisfil

So as 2021 draws to a close I want to leave the year on a positive note by listing off my ten favourite films of the year. These are all personal favourites and as such this is an entirely subjective list. So let’s kick it off from ten to one:

10. Willy’s Wonderland

So let’s start with my favourite cult movie of the year. This is a fun, low budget horror staring Nicholas Cage in a roll that you would probably never think he would be right for… but the thing with Nick Cage is those often turn out to be his best roles. This is no exception as he brings a sort of overly calm autism to the silent, deadly protagonist. Not a word passes his lips for the entire movie as he turns the tables on his wood be executors, the possessed animatronic monstrosities at “Willy’s Wonderland”, a family entertainment centre. That base concept is not in itself original, basically being a “Five Nights at Freddy’s” movie and also similar to the “Banana Splits” movie that came out 2019 that fused the Five Nights concept onto a previously non-horror franchise. What makes this movie unique though is Nicholas Cages character, who proves more dangerous than the evil that has possessed the place. I would love to see more of this mute drifter in a sequel. No need to bring back the animatronics though.

On a side note apparently a Five Nights at Freddy’s film is in the works. One wonders how many more rip offs it will have before they actually get the movie out.

9. Venom: Let There Be Carnage

If you have read my review this one you will know I consider it a long way from perfect and yet in it’s simplicity it does manage to entertain. Eddie Brock returns in this film and he and Venom are struggling to find equilibrium in their relationship. But they must learn to get on in a hurry to deal with the threat of the Carnage Symbiote that spawned from Venom and has bonded with serial killer Cletus Cassidy. The final conflict is a solid action spectacle, while the rest of the movie is effectively a buddy cop comedy. It is short and does little different to the original movie but the fact is if you enjoyed that one, you will likely enjoy this.

8. Wrath of Man

While this is very much as Jason Statham film, it is one of his better ones. It’s also classic Guy Ritchie, but it has to be said it isn’t the best for either star or director. It’s just a solid action/thriller that delivers pretty much everything you would expect from the pair. Statham plays “H”, a cold mysterious character that clearly has some kind of hidden agenda working at armoured cash truck company responsible for delivering hundreds of millions of dollars around Los Angeles each week. In classic Guy Ritchie fashion the story intertwines criminal masterminds with each other to see who comes out on top. One of the things I always appreciate with Ritchie is his villains usually aren’t incompetent and so the protagonists need to be either very smart or very lucky to get the upper hand.

7. Pig

Yes it turns out Nicholas Cage made two of my favourite movies this yeah, who could guess? This is a really interesting story that never really goes where you would expect it. This is a story of one man’s attempt to find his prize truffle hunting pig after it is stolen by a pair of drug addicts on behalf of a mysterious third party. On it’s surface it looks like this will be a John Wick type story only with a Pig replacing John’s Dog. That’s not the case, or at least if it is it’s only true if John instead of being a highly skilled master assassin was instead a highly skilled master chef. While the movie presents a bit of action it is really a much more personal story and once again Cage presents one of the more interesting characters of the year. This is one of those films where an mysterious eccentric ends up teaching others life lessons, but it’s more than that as the eccentric himself has his own journey to go on. I highly recommend this unusual movie.

6. Free Guy

This was a movie that from the first trailer I could tell two things: It would be incredibly stupid and; It would be incredibly fun. The final product delivered exactly what the trailer promised. Not much in this movie makes sense when you think about it for more than five minutes, but it really doesn’t matter because the movie packs in so much pure unadulterated fun that you can forgive pretty much any other failing. Ryan Reynolds of course is someone that plays variations of the same character (himself) in every movie, but this is him at the maximum level of Ryan Reynolds you are likely to find him outside of a Deadpool movie. On top of that the movie itself provides a lot of fun for anyone that has ever played Grand Theft Auto or it’s sequels/rip-offs and a good number of other references in between, including some that clearly must have been added after a certain studio purchased another studio as those rights wouldn’t have been available before. Ultimately it great time for anyone that doesn’t exclusively watch Oscar nominated dramas.

5. The Suicide Squad

James Gunn provided one of the most heart felt and fun movies of the year. Yes the plot is complete nonsense, yes Harley Quinn was the weak link this time around, but the other characters were on point both in personality and interaction. Indeed this movie had some of the best character work of the entire year, which is pretty impressive for one of the silliest movies of the year. Then again that is exactly what Gunn does. Say what you like about the man personally, but as a director of comic book movies he is perhaps the perfect director combining the kind of character interaction and banter that Joss Whedon is known for with the knowledge, love and dedication to the source material of someone like Sam Raimi.

I think it always says something about a movie when a character you didn’t think you would like ends up your favourite and that is absolutely the case for me with The Suicide Squad and “Ratcatcher 2”. But she’s not alone, Idris Elba proved his “Bloodsport” to be far superior to Will Smith’s “Deadshot” while John Cena’s deadpan comedic delivery proved perfect for such a ludicrous character as Peacemaker and it seems was so impressive in the role he now has a spin off in the works. The humour won’t land for everyone but as I said it is also a movie full of heart and I think most people will appreciate the character work.

4. Ghostbusters: Afterlife

Of course if we are talking heart, there was no movie this year that displayed more of it than Ghostbusters: Afterlife and having already shared my full review I won’t go into too much detail here. This was a resurrection of a franchise that many people thought dead, a love letter to the original movie and perhaps most importantly an apology to all the fans that were insulted and belittled after the disastrous 2016 movie by the shill media, actors on that film and even the director himself. It made that apology though while not compromising their mission to make Ghostbusters as accessible a franchise as possible, providing a diverse cast and a female lead that everyone (except those still making excuses for “Answer the Call”) can actually get behind.

The story keeps itself simple and on the surface appears merely a rehash of the original movie, but underneath that it is actually a very personal story where the main character is Egon Spengler. Quite a feat considering that character dies early in the movie and Harold Ramis, his actor died years ago before this movie even began production. Eventually the movie provides the reunion of the original team that everyone was waiting for and gives them a final moment to shine and remind the fans why the original was so good in the first place. If you feel nothing after the end of this movie, I worry for you.

3. Dune

I had a lot of doubts going in as to whether Denis Villeneuve and 2021 could deliver a good Dune movie. I knew it would look fantastic, but after seeing “Blade Runner 2049” I had my doubts on the rest o fit. That movie failed to do justice to the characters, story or themes of the original movie, though it did certainly look the part. I did recognise however that unlike with 2049, Villeneuve would be grounded here by the quality and extent of the source material. Fans of Frank Herbert’s classic science fiction series have been waiting a long time for someone to do justice to that series on screen, The first attempt was David Lynch’s 1984 movie that proved heavily divisive amongst Dune fans and the audience in general. For my part I quite liked it, though it was also my first introduction to the franchise having not read the novels. This was followed in the 90’s by a couple of low budget TV shows on Sci-Fi that were actually pretty good too, but suffered from bad 90’s CGI and have dated horrendously.

This new take on the story finds itself in a approach that takes the best from the previous two. Like the TV series, it doesn’t rush to tell the story and of course this is why the movie barely covers a third of that first book, but like the previous movie the acting is top notch and the movie looks and sounds great. I will provide a full review of this in the new year but for now the important thing to note is the movie is epic and compelling, despite the slow pace and long running time. It doesn’t feel like a movie that has taken two and a half hours to tell a third of a story, and while the movies sudden end (and cheesy closing line) leave you fully aware of how little of the story has been told, it also leaves you eagerly anticipating the stories continuation. Definitely a job well done.

2. Spider-Man: No Way Home

If you’ve read my review of “Spider-Man: No Way Home” probably the only thing that shocks you here is that it is not at number one. Yes I absolutely loved this movie, but it’s not perfect and it is ultimately yet another franchise movie, indeed it is two franchise movies the MCU and Spider-Man, the two biggest franchises in the superhero business. It’s success was always guaranteed, though few predicted it would be as successful as it has been. It’s also not a movie free from flaws, but let’s not focus on the negatives here. The truth is this is another redemption story and not just the story of one redemption but multiple ones. It redeems villains, it redeems heroes and redeems entire sub-franchises. By the end of the movie Tom Holland’s Peter Parker is closer to the comic book version than he has ever been and through this I came to realise that this entire trilogy of movies has actually been an origin story. I’m still not sure if that is good or bad, but it certainly leaves a sense of satisfaction.

Like the Infinity Saga before it, this is more than just a movie, it is a huge cinematic event and the culmination of 8 movies and three separate franchises. It does something that has never been done before in the history of cinema and it does it in a way that will leave most people very happy indeed. The only problem is this is something that only really works once. It may have breathed life into a flagging MCU but now they need to course correct with the rest of the franchise.

1. Nobody

What do you get if you take the writers of the best current action franchise, “John Wick”, pair him with the director of breakout cult classic and first person action movie “Hardcore Henry” and ask them to provide an action movie debut to Bob Odenkirk (Of Breaking Bad fame)? Well, what you get is my movie of the year and one of the best action movies I’ve seen for years. Throw in a touch of RZA and Christopher Lloyd as a bonus and you have a real classic on your hands. This is a masterpiece of an action movie, hiding it’s explosive nature under the surface much as it’s protagonist hides his own past and capabilities under the guise of a family man with a boring job. The action sets off from a chain of events beginning with a badly planned home invasion of Odenkirk’s house, which leads to a confrontation with strangers on the subway and the wrath of a local mob boss.

The movie achieves a rare thing and works both on the level of a tense thriller and when it fully ramps up the action outperforms some of the most outrageous over the top action films of recent years. The pacing of the story is perfect easing you in to the gradual increases in intensity and unlike many modern action films you can actually follow every bit of action clearly. It is like the best 80’s action hero meets the best 90’s action stunts and applies the polish of the best 2000’s action CGI fest. If you’ve not seen this one yet you owe it to yourself to check it out and unlike most of the top picks this year, this is an original movie and not part of any pre-established franchise. Top marks all round.

So that is my top movies of this year. I hope you enjoyed my choices, feel free to agree, disagree or share your own in the comments. Happy New Year to you all and see you in 2022.