New Releases For Home Viewing This Week

Two new releases for home viewing this week. However sadly not a great week.....but not awful.

BEFORE I FALL

Directed by Ry Russo-Young
Screenplay by Maria Maggenti
Based on the book by Lauren Oliver
Starring Zoey Deutch; Halston Sage; and Elena Kampouris




It is a strange film involving a high school student who crashes in her car after a party, and wakes up that same morning living the day over and over again Ala Groundhog Day.

I love the idea....Samantha played wonderfully by Zoey Deutch ...lives her day as a high school student over and over again, hoping to fix her and her friends bad behavior of:
Bullying
Love for the wrong reasons
Unnecessary bad treatment to family
Understanding mental illness.

All this works. As we kind of watch Samantha grow into an adult as the day plays out over and over again.
Yet.....the problem I find is that all of Samantha's school mates are so generic and annoying and boring. There is not much to them. they are just walking cliches. From the rude asshole boyfriend to the boy who watches from a distance to the leader of the girl pack who is a jerk. It almost seems like lazy writing. This all leads to a strange ending leaving an umbrella of sadness.

Positives?
Well I already mentioned Zoey Deutch as Samantha being wonderful.
Elena Kamopuris as Juliet is wonderful as the girl who holds secrets while she gets treated like a disease. Love her. I just wished they gave her more of a spotlight. Juliet and Samantha were the most interesting characters.

Well 3 stars out of 5 for Before I Fall. I understand the idea. Live each day with love. treat each other with kindness. Remember where you come from. Respect others. It is just ...again a cliche and also sad. I have to wonder if the book dug deeper into each character.








FIST FIGHT

Director Richard Keen
Screenplay by Van Robichaux and Evan Susser
Starring Ice Cube and Charlie Day






Okay. To make a good comedy.....it has to be at least partly realistic. Here...nothing is realistic.

-Undisciplined kids. And what they do, when writing someone must of thought this is funny, it is not funny. The school is a mess. Yes some schools are a mess, but this is unrealistic, No spoilers here but...it was not funny and irritating often. And by the way....being mean is not funny.

-So many things the teachers do are unrealistic, like leaving school to shop during the day. Again very few laughs.  Tracy Morgan seemed like his parts were filmed at a different time and felt like an entirely different film and sadly again...not funny.

-The final scene. Yea. I have to stop...but...really the whole student body??!! And no one there to stop it.

Positives?

Charlie Day is pretty good as the frustrated every man.
And for some reason Christina Hendricks as Ms Monet had funniest lines. I think it was just.... you would not think her lines, or things she says, would be coming from her, which made it funny. She has good comic timing. I hope she does more...but then again she is choosing bad films like Bad Santa 2 and this. Ugh.

Well 1 1/2 stars out of 5 for a comedy with few laughs and just plain annoying.

From the shadows as always thanks for your time.