ANTHONY HOPKINS PERFORMANCE IN "MAGIC" [1978] IS BEYOND TRILLING!

🎥🎞️Movie Review🎞️🎥 - MAGIC [1978] - [R] - Amazon Prime - Directed by Richard Attenborough. Screenplay by William Goldman. Based on the book by William Goldman. Produced by Joseph E. and Richard P. Levine. Stars Anthony Hopkins, Ann-Margret, Burgess Meredith, Ed Lauer, and David Ogden Stiers. Budget $7 Million.

This is a dark drama about a down and out magician/comedian, Charles "Corky" Withers [Hopkins], who is slowly dwindling away performing at sketchy bars to minimal crowds, but he boasts to his mentor, Merlin, that he has great attendance with tentatively active crowds. After his mentor passes, Withers creates a fantastic ventriloquist act with a dummy named Fats. His new gimmick catches the eye of a talent agent [Meredith], who persuades many producers to "Give the new kid a shot." But the problem is that Corky has a building inner fear with self doubt of being successful and  is in terror of reaching for the stars. It's such a problem that he steps away from the limelight and returns to his hometown where he meets and falls for his old high school crush, Peggy Snow [Margret]. He rents a local cabin and tries to sort his feelings about success, using his dummy to try and find answers. But along the way, the dummy seems to guide Corky in the wrong direction, causing great harm to anyone who questions him or tries to help him.

THE GOOD - Crisp cinematography. Strong direction and a brilliant one-man performance by Hopkins. The addition of Ann-Margret was a nice touch for the time and Meredith's performance was starkly familiar with the "Micky" character from ROCKY [1975] that made his part extremely likeable and trustworthy. Location spotting was perfect for the production, giving the film a dark, dying feel to the whole film.

THE BAD - The movie plateaus too soon in my opinion. There is a desperate feel to make Corky seem too paranoid about his surroundings which forces Hopkins to perform the character with an explosive, bipolar fuel of instant anger that just seems over dramatic and drawn out at times. I'm not 100% sure the music fit the film, but it seems that the sound track was rushed an not thought-out well.

POSTMORTEM - This film was filmed with the use of one camera. Most of the scenes were shot in a "soap opera" style format used in the time of the 70's which forced the actors to perform at a higher level. Even though the scenes with dummy was creepy, I feel that the scenes were dumbed down for the audience, leaving some to speculate as to whether the dummy had a mind of its own or not. This is a classic film and something great to watch if you like watching realistic, psychotic, dramatic films.

⭐️⭐️⭐️💫 [3.5 of 5 Stars]

NETFLIX'S "REBEL MOON" IS NOT ONLY MONSTOROUS FLOP...IT'S A COMPLETE WASTE OF TIME

🎥🎞️Movie Review🎞️🎥 - REBEL MOON; Part I [2023] - PG 13 - NetFlix - Directed by Zach Snyder. Written by Zach Snyder. Screenplay by Kurt Johnstad & Shay Hatten. Starring Sofia Boutella, Charlie Hunnam, Ed Skrein, Anthony Hopkins, Michael Huisman, and Djimon Hounsou. Budget $166 Million for two films.

The plot is simple, an edgy farm girl [Boutella] raised by a local farmer after she was found in a crashed warship, proves that she is actually a skilled warrior in hiding after the farmers in her village are threatened by a local imperial General [Huisman]. After an incident of misfortune, she sets out to start a rebellion to help save the local farmers in her community by soliciting the help of other "locally talented soldiers" - led by Hounsou - who eventually become "rebels with a cause" and try to overthrow the imperial forces threatening a larger commune of free worlds.

***Keep in mind - At some time in Hollywood history, Zach Snyder throw in his hat to try and write episodes 7, 8, and 9 of the Star Wars trilogy, and Rebel Moon was his treatment script to Disney that was turned down. Snyder found a few producers and put together his treatment script to film alone.

THE GOOD - This film is an action packed SciFi film filled full of some spectacular special effects, obvious practical monster makeup, and some breathtaking space-filled visual wonders that are plenty and marvelous to view.

THE BAD - There are lots, and I mean LOTS, of slow motion scenes that are truly unnecessary and over utilized in every action sequence for no particular reason at all. There was no clear description of who or what the Imperial forces are or what power they control in the area of their universe; except that they exist. The dialog is cold and strung out at every turn with very little character development, except for the leading character [Boutella] who actually worked for the bad guys after the imperial forces killed her parents and then...well...it's never explained. As a matter of fact, there's very little explanation of anything in this film; you are forced to accept what is because this person is carrying a big gun and that person has two swords that they wield with precision. There's nothing remarkably smart about the dialog or the screenplay.

POST MORTEM - This film is a mosh-posh of Firefly, Dune, Star Wars, John Carter, and Riddick wrapped up on one epic failure with bad story telling. I fought myself from time to time, trying not to check my phone for better entertainment than just watching this piece of shit film. Prior to the films release, there were some awesome trailers that definitely caught my attention, but in the end, this film is going no where and there definitely won't be a line of toy merchandise to help the film bring in profits. 

⭐️💫[1.5 of 5 Stars]