The Princess Review

By Paul Anthony

Late last month, I heard about this film and went on vacation and nearly forgot about this film. It was on my radar because it starred Joey King, Though King is still young she has proven that she can act and has over 30 films to her name and has been nominated for a golden Globe and primetime Emmy for acting in the drama series The Act. The film also stars Dominic Cooper as the villain in this film. The film was released on july1st on HULU and was rated R and for good reason. Now this movie won’t confuse you if you miss a few seconds of it or not but for good measure let’s break down the plot.

The film is set in the medieval times and the princess (King) awakes but is handcuffed to her bed though she doesn’t fully remember what happen the night before, but she sees two men entering the room and she overhears them that they are preparing to rape her, which when they uncuff her, she basically begins to kick their ass and even as more men enter the room, she still wins the fight. At this point she does remember being ambushed the night before. At this point we meet Julius who seems to be the one that planned this sacking of the castle. We see the King and the queen and the younger princess Voilet, being controlled by Julius’s men. Still, we don’t fully know what is going on and why he is taking over the castle. Though we would learn through more flashbacks that The King doesn’t have an heir apparent to the throne because he has two daughters, and the princess knows how to fight because she was trained by his top advisor’s niece based on the approval of the queen who wants her daughter to prove to the king that she should be the heir as the oldest child. The King refuses to see this and wants her to wed Julius. well, the wedding is planned but she refuses to say I do which leaves Julius mad of course and that is why he sacked the castle and plans to force marry the princess to become king. However, the princess keeps working her down the castle with the help from her trainer Linh and slowly they keep getting the upper hand. But they do take their share of bruises as well. The princess now has her back against the wall when Julius tells her his plan but being a strong fighter, she reveals that if she is forced to marry him, he will have to worry about his life, so a one-on-one fight between them begins with the princess slowly winning and cutting off his head and the King realizing he was wrong about his daughter, not only does he knight her but names her the heir apparent, all ends well on a high note.

Now I knew Joey could act but I did enjoy seeing her become an action star in this film, sadly Joey’s performance and action scenes were the best part of this film. You really didn’t even have names for the king, the queen and King’s character the princess, they do show more effort to avoid their names rather than just giving them their names. Cooper’s character doesn’t stand out either he falls into that category of an evil being who is a wimp in the end. The story was weak at best and half the characters you could care less about. Heck even the king is two face he’s a peaceful king but doesn’t believe women should be a leader, which doesn’t make sense to me. In the end Joey can’t carry the film by herself, so in the end I am giving the film a D+ or 65 percent for the rating.

Spiderhead Review

By Paul Anthony

Short stories can be so hard to turn into movies, how can you take something that takes just a few minutes to read into a movie that is nearly one hour 47 minutes long? Sure, stuff has to be added to fill the gaps, but does that make for a good movie? Todau we are reviewing the film Spiderhead that was released on Netflix on June 17th which stars Chris Hemsworth, Miles Teller and Jurnee Smollett. The film was based on the short story written by George Saunders, which was released in 2010 in The New Yorker. Now going into this film, I never heard of these short stories, so it took me a moment to follow along to the point of the story. Now I know Netflix’s movies can be a hit or miss at times and both Chris and Miles are having a good year with Top Gun 2 and Thor: Love and Thunder. Let’s look in the plot like always first.

At first, I missed what Spiderhead actually was but quickly learned that it is a prison but a prison like no other. Here the prisoner’s roam the building freely and are here to help reducing their sentence. Now being here which was voluntary, they must take drugs that alter their emotions and their perception of their surroundings. The prison is controlled and ran by Steve Abnesti (Hemsworth) who seems like a very nice funny guy who is very understanding. Then we meet an inmate Jeff (Teller) who pretty much says yes to every drug hoping to make a difference from him drinking and driving and killing his best friend. Though we learn later that his best friend’s girlfriend was also in the car and sadly died as well. The first drug we see Jeff use is a love drug that makes him fall for another inmate though he doesn’t like her until the drug takes affect and they both have sex with each other, However Jeff has his eyes set on Lizzy another inmate at the prison which is played by Smollett. Lizzy claims that she is in there for armed robbery. Things start to turn for Jeff when Steve informs him the higher ups want him to pick between Lizzy and Heather to see who Gets the next drug which is called Darkenfloxx which Jeff doesn’t pick but it ends up being Heather and once the drug kicks in she sadly commits suicide and to jeff horror Steve blows it off as a failed experiment. Jeff starts digging around finds out the truth and that Steve has no higher-ups, it’s his company all long and a fight breaks out between them Steve reveals Lizzy’s true crime and that is she accidentally killed her nine-month-old child who she tells Jeff the whole truth, Steve also reveals that both Jeff and Lizzy have been free. Steve reveals also that his parents abandon him and hence why he’s inventing drugs for humans to do what they are told so crimes can go down. Soon the cops arrive to shut the place down, but Steve tries to escape but dies when he flies into a mountain and Jeff and Lizzy leave on the boat.

Okay let’s talk about the character development, I get it Jeff didn’t mean to commit his crime, but we don’t see enough of his back story to see what kind of person he truly was. Lizzy was the same thing; this was big thing to show us to feel sorry for her, but they didn’t do that. Sure, they made her feel sorrow and regret but not enough to feel sorry for her and want her to be a free person. Steve’s story could have been shown as well though, I did enjoy the idea of him being friendly despite his back story. Steve’s charm and Jeff’s reaction provides the laughs though I would have like it more if this was darker film because of the subjects that were in the film. The length was just fine, so was the pace. In the end I am giving this film a B or 80 percent. Though it was above average they could have done more.

Hustle Review

By Paul Anthony

I have to admit that I don’t watch many sports drama films and I have to admit at times I try to avoid anything with Adam Sandler in it. Because at times it seems like he keeps hanging on his style of comedy that people just grow up from, but he doesn’t grow from. But the trailers caught my attention for some odd reason, and I had to watch it. The film has a mix of real actors and NBA stars either playing themselves or playing characters. Besides starring Adam Sandler and Queen Latifah, the film also stars Ben Foster, Robert Duvall and Jaleel White. Now with the NBA players in this film you have Juancho Hernangomez as the lead Bo Cruz, Anthony Edwards as Kermit Wilts. The film was released on June 8th and was 117 minutes long and it was released on Netflix.

The plot of the film shows Sandler as Stanley Sugerman a scout for the 76ers who travels the road to scout out fresh talent for the 76ers but the road life takes a toll not only on him but his family as well, until finally he is promoted to assistant coach which will have him home more with his family, but owner dies, and the team is taken over his son who puts Stanley back on the road as a scout. There he sent back on the road to search for talent and when that fails another door opens and he meets Bo Cruz a young man who is a construction worker but hustles on the basketball court for extra money to help his mom and daughter live. Vincent denies Bo basically so it up to Stanely to get this kid over to America and Play ball. This dispute ends up costing Stanley his job, but he made a promise to Bo’s family, and he is determined to keep that promise though it takes a toll on him financially. Though he doesn’t tell Bo that. But Bo has competition in the draft and that comes from Kermit Wilts who is determined to prove he’s the number one overall pick and he wins the battles by getting under Bo’s skin after a number of public games it’s a private game that he gets the Upper hand and proves his skills. Its then reveals that Vincent is fire and his sister is taken over who Stanley has a great relationship with, and she rehires him as a coach and it’s revealed that Bo did make a team and that Team is Boston though Bo and Stanley remained close friends.

Wow let me start off by saying the story alone was a powering one which involves redemption and the power to thrive and overcome anything and everything that you face. This film did delver a good message and Adam Sandler now this is the Adam Sandler that I want to see more often in movies because he did in fact put on a great performance that will be remembered for years to come. I don’t know where in this this film ranks among the best sports films but I will say this and that is this film was a pretty damn good film. In the end I am saying this film was a good A or 90 percent for me and I will say that this was a must watch film.