Director: Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert
Date Watched: 4-15-2022
Where: Tinseltown Cinemark 20, Pflugerville, TX
Rating: 5.5/10
This is a very unusual film. If pressed to describe it, I suppose I’d say it’s as if the “Turn Down For What” music video was an MCU film.
Often, “unusual” films meander, and play out as if the director were making it up as he went along, and ended it when he felt it was long enough, but this movie holds up. There is a narrative theme, and a plot, and all those other good things. It all ties together as it goes along, and it has a satisfying end. That said, I don’t think it’s a great movie, though it certainly has mass appeal.
I mentioned that it plays like an MCU film at times– and those films are a clear inspiration for this one– but it feels in many ways like a dumbed-down MCU film. That, I believe, is the reason for its mass appeal. It’s a film that is not at all intelligent, deep, witty, or clever, but postures as if it is, allowing people who aren’t intelligent, deep, witty, or clever– for lack of a better term, mainstream audiences– to feel intelligent, deep, witty, and clever for a couple of hours.
It’s as if Michael Bay adapted Shakespeare. If you don’t know any better, you might think it’s intellectual fare.