Red Notice

2021 Netflix

Rated: PG-13

Length: 1 hr 58min

Action ~ Comedy ~ Thriller

Starring: Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds, Gal Gadot and Ritu Arya.

RED NOTICE: The highest level of arrest warrant issued by The International Police Organization (INTERPOL). Reserved for the world’s most wanted criminals.

Though many know the tragic love story of Antony and Cleopatra, the wayward Roman general who fell madly in love with the enchanting Egyptian queen, both of them taking their lives rather than face a world without each other, few know the secret story of the most sought-after prize and unsolved puzzle of their time. The mystery of Cleopatra’s third egg. On their wedding day, as a symbol of his undying devotion, Mark Antony presented Cleopatra with three bejeweled eggs, each one more exquisite than the last. For centuries, these eggs were thought to be nothing more than myth, a rumor. But then, in 1907, just outside of Cairo, a local farmer unearthed two of them.

Cleopatra’s first egg is on display for all to see at the world-famous Museo Nazionale di Castel Sant’Angelo in Rome. The second egg has been sold at auction numerous times and currently is held in a private collection. Some say the third egg was never found. Others claim it was discovered, but just as quickly lost, never to be seen again. Join us as we explore that very question. What happened to Cleopatra’s lost egg? Who may hold it in their possession? And most importantly, will we ever see the day in which all three eggs are reunited for the first time in over 2,000 years?

Ryan Reynolds stars as Nathan Booth, the world’s second most wanted art thief. As the movie starts he is making a copy of Cleopatra’s first egg which is on display at the National Art Museum in Rome. Thanks to an anonymous tip Interpol Agent Urvashi Das (Ritu Arya), accompanied by FBI Profiler John Hartley (Dwayne Johnson), swarms the museum with an entourage of Police and agents, convinced that Cleopatra’s egg is to be stolen today. John Hartley doubts the authenticity of the egg on display and pours coke over it and it promptly melts.

They immediately rush to seal the room but Nathan Booth, who has stolen the egg, escapes and is chased by John. Eventually, after a high action chase through the museum and construction scaffolding, Nathan loses John and escapes to his house in Bali. As he opens up the suitcase to reveal his newest prize possession, The stolen Cleopatra egg, he is surprised by John Hartley and Interpol Agent Das who promptly arrest him and take possession of the egg. As John Hartley is putting the egg in it’s protective case in the back of the armored police vehicle and walks to the front to get in, it is stolen and replaced with a fake by……..

The Bishop (Gal Gadot), the world’s most wanted art thief, and Nathan Booth’s Arch Nemesis. What follows is a globe trotting adventure full of action and comedic one liners as Nathan Booth, The Bishop, Agent Das and John Hartley all pursue Cleopatra’s infamous three eggs and each other. Ryan Reynold’s is in top form with his wise cracks and comedic one-liners. Dwayne Johnson is The Rock we all know from his other movies, able to fight and throw out one-liners to equal Ryan’s at the same time. Gal Gadot is a beautiful, sexy, smart and talented art thief who holds her own against any man physically as she outwits Nathan and John.

It is a familiar story with a twist. Think The DaVinci Code, The Indiana Jones movies, Mission Impossible, The Man from Uncle….I swear some of the soundtrack sounded like Mission Impossible with a couple of different notes just to avoid copyright, or maybe to pay homage. I think a scene at the end mimics and pays homage to one of The Indiana Jones movies. There are ALOT of twists and turns you don’t see coming. It really keeps you guessing and it is very entertaining. Lots of thrilling chase scenes and fights along the way. I have seen this movie at least three times now and I still enjoyed every minute of it.

There are rumor’s of a Red Notice 2 & 3 to fill out a trilogy but no official word. Red Notice 2 is unofficially supposed to have started production right about now but that’s all I the info I can find on that. The ending lends itself to a sequel, I would love to see it.

Highly Recommended!

Two Thumbs Up!

The Out-Laws

2023 Netflix

Rated: R

Length: 1 hr 35min

Action ~ Comedy ~ Crime

Directed by: Tyler Spindel

Starring: Adam DeVine, Nina Dobrev, Ellen Barkin, and Pierce Brosnan.

“First off stop crying. When I hear babies cry I start to lactate. I can’t ruin another suit.”

Adam DeVine stars as Owen Browning, a bank manager engaged to Parker McDermott (Nina Dobrev). The couple are set to marry in a couple of days and Owen has never met his in-laws because Parker’s parents have been in the Amazon jungle for a couple of years. BUT, out of the blue they call Parker and inform her they are coming into town for a visit and will be there for the wedding. They surprise Owen in their house after work having broken in to the locked house.

Parker is at work and Owen is in the kitchen putting groceries away singing at the top of his lungs how he is going to “boink” Parker tonight. And suddenly there they are, Billy and Lilly McDermott (Pierce Brosnan and Ellen Barkin). To sum it up, Owen’s bank is robbed and he starts to suspect that his in-laws might be the infamous “Ghost-Robbers” and responsible for the heist.

I tried but couldn’t make it all the way through the movie. I made it to the 37 minute mark mainly out of courtesy to Pierce Brosnan and Ellen Barkin. But, God bless them, even they couldn’t save this movie. I thought ,”Well….. I’ll finish it in the morning as I write the review.” I pulled it up on Netflix but couldn’t bear the thought of having to watch it, I tried. I fast forwarded it to see if it got any better, it didn’t. About the time I saw Adam DeVine enter a bank dressed up like Shrek complete with green skin and a water pistol, I was done.

I always put a tagline in my reviews to kind of sum up the movie. Not sure what the tagline for the movie is but when I saw the scene with Adam Devine and Lauren Lapkus, I watched just long enough to hear, “First off stop crying. When I hear babies cry I start to lactate. I can’t ruin another suit.” Yup, that sums it up. It is supposed to be a comedy, but it so full of pre-adolescent humor it was way too stupid and pathetic to laugh at. I felt sorry for Pierce and Ellen for having got involved in this mess of a movie.

Adam Sandler produced the movie and it seemed like there was a skeleton of a script and they just winged it with whatever direction seemed funny to him. I guess I don’t get his sense of humor. The biggest thing that turned me off right away that I couldn’t get past was Adam DeVine. Horrible. I had to quit watching Hubie Halloween because I couldn’t get past Adam Sandler’s voice as Hubie. Adam DeVine’s performance as Owen was terrible, reminded me of a really poor Jack Black impersonation. Just like Hubie, his whining voice and over the top acting attempt at being funny was just too annoying for me to hang.

It’s bad, really bad.

This marks the third movie I couldn’t hang with:

Unfrosted
Hubie Halloween
The Out-Laws

That’s it, that’s the do not watch list. I am going to have to add that to the Top Ten Lists category. The Top Ten movies you shouldn’t watch.

DON”T WATCH IT!!!!!

DON”T WASTE YOUR TIME!!!

That’s my thoughts….

Two Thumbs down, way down!

Brothers

2024 Amazon MGM Studios

Rated: R

Length: 1 hr 29min

Action ~ Crime ~ Comedy

Directed by: Max Barbakow

Starring: Josh Brolin, Peter Dinklage, Glenn Close, Marisa Tomei, and Brendan Fraser.

“Family is a life sentence.”

Josh Brolin stars as Mike “Moke” Munger who is recently married and has a baby on the way. His wife is throwing a housewarming party and has invited his in-laws to come. She instructs him to bring home a BBQ Party Platter from work. He works at SWEET ASS BBQ but upon arriving at work his boss informs him that he is fired. He tells Moke that he received a call from the Bureau of Labor and Employment. They informed him that Moke neglected to let them know about his prior criminal convictions and have to let him go. Upon arriving home he is surprised by the appearance of his Twin Brother……..

Jady Munger (Peter Dinklage) who has been serving time in prison for getting caught in a robbery. Jady and Moke had always been a criminal team but that night Jady got caught, Moke escaped and swore off the crime life and has been trying to live a straight life. He has come to convince Moke to do one last “Job”, he can’t do it without him and they both really need the money. Moke reluctantly agrees and they head out on the road. Jady tells him they have to make a stop to a woman’s house he has been corresponding with for the last seven weeks from prison. Moke again reluctantly agrees and they stop, knock on the door, and……

Bethesda Waingro (Marisa Tomei) comes to the door, and Jady and Moke are invited in. Jady has an ulterior motive for meeting Bethesda that Moke doesn’t know about. She is unwittingly going to help them in their “Job”, Jady is going to steal her work badge. Jady and Bethesda go off into the bedroom to spend some time and Moke waits in the living room. And is suddenly surprised by an orangutan who sits next to him on the couch. They hightail it out of Bethesda’s house, Moke running from the monkey and Jady running from Bethesda. They go to the hotel where Moke is surprised by…….

His Mother Cath (Glenn Close), who has been gone for thirty years after running from the police following a jewelry heist. It’s the beginning of a dysfunctional crime family caper full of adventure and laughs. M. Emmet Walsh plays the crooked Judge who is the father of Jail Corrections Officer Farful (Brendan Fraser). Officer Farful used his father to get Jady out of prison to track down Cath who has hidden the unrecovered Jewels and is blackmailing him into finding them. And Brendan as the whacked out very intense Corrections Officer was pretty funny. It was nice to see Marisa, beautiful as ever, as the freaky hippy lady. The Orangutan Monkey was surprisingly completely CGI, given the closeness of the scene with Josh Brolin, they didn’t want to take any chances with a live animal.

I purposely didn’t watch this right away when it came out thinking, “That’s just going to be too silly and stupid for me to handle.” Josh Brolin and Peter Dinklage as twin brothers? Look at them, they couldn’t be more different physically. But I was running late last night and really didn’t have two hours to watch a movie and this is a short one. And I thought, I could stand to watch some comedy, something light-hearted. It was everything I thought it would be and more. Yes, it was silly, a little stupid, but then again, that is the point. And it delivered that and much more. It was a familiar plot line and yet it was a little different.

I found myself rooting for Moke and eventually Jady. Trying to do good for themselves and constantly knocked down by life. I really started to believe that they were brothers in spite of their difference physically. Josh and Peter did a great job of convincing me they had known each other all their lives and had that kind of family bond. I enjoyed it, I found myself laughing quite a few times at their antics. And I felt for the two of them trying to be a better version of themselves. And in the end it was all about family, how you never give up on your family, no matter what. I thought that was a good message and a little heartwarming at the end as they gathered for Thanksgiving.

So yes, I would recommend it, just remember it is good clean silly fun.

Two thumbs up!

The Lost City

2022 Paramount Pictures

Rated: PG-13

Length: 1 hr 52min

Action ~ Adventure ~ Comedy ~ Romance

Directed by: Aaron and Adam Nee

Starring: Sandra Bullock, Channing Tatum, Daniel Radcliffe, Da’Vine Joy Randolph and Brad Pitt.

“Dulcius Ex Asperis……..Sweeter after difficulty.”

Sandra Bullock stars as Loretta Sage, a widowed Adventure Romance Novelist whose life and career has been very negatively affected by her husband’s death five years ago. Her Publisher Beth Hatten (Da’Vine Joy Randolph) has been trying desperately to save her career from going down the tubes and with it her livelihood. She has hired a younger woman to run her social media campaigns and has arranged a highly publicized book tour for Loretta. As Loretta and her publisher arrive at the first stop and public appearance on the tour, Loretta is dressed in a purple sequin sparkly jumpsuit against her better judgement. Beth tells her how important this is and that she also booked……..

Alan Caprison (Channing Tatum), the cover model who portrays the hero Dash in her Romance Novels. Loretta is horrified and wants nothing to do with it but is convinced by Beth to “Go On with the show.” The appearance ends in disaster when Loretta accidentally gets Alan’s wig caught in her watch as she tries to rip off Dash’s shirt to satisfy the female crowd yelling for Dash to do so. Alan falls off the stage and Loretta is left onstage with his wig dangling from her watch. She rushes off stage and heads outside. The doorman calls a car for her, but before it comes she is forced into a car and taken to meet……….

Abigail Fairfax (Daniel Radcliffe), a billionaire who has discovered a lost city on a remote island he believes might be where the lost treasure, The Crown Of Fire is located. He believes that Loretta and her late husband had done extensive research on this subject and will be able to help him decipher the scrolls that reveal the exact location. He explains that he has kidnapped her and they are flying to the island he now owns. As they arrive and Abigail persuades Loretta to cipher the information he needs, Beth and Alan are busy trying to figure out what happened to Loretta. Alan thinks he knows someone who can help find her and calls……..

Jack Trainer (Brad Pitt), a former Navy Seal and a CIA operative. Together Alan and Jack fly to the island to free her. Jack turns out to be a complete bad-ass, a one man army. Kind of like Denzel Washington in The Equalizer Movies, using everything in the room as a weapon to quickly decimate the enemy. From here on out it is a hilarious action-filled adventure as they free Loretta and traipse through the jungle running from the billionaire and his henchmen. There is one last scene in the movie with Brad, Sandra and Channing that appears halfway through the end credits. If you’re not paying attention to the credits you might miss it, it changes what you think is the end of the movie before the credits.

I have seen it three times and still enjoyed it. It is goofy, funny, full of silly one-liners, a rom-com in the end and a great action adventure comedy. I really liked Brad Pitt as Jack Trainer, Channing Tatum is laughable and loveable as “Dash”, and you gotta love anything Sandra Bullock is in.

Two Thumbs up!

My Old Ass

2024 Amazon MGM Studios

Rated: R

Length: 1 hr 29min

Comedy ~ Drama

Directed by: Megan Park

Starring: Maisy Stella, Percy Hynes White, Maddie Ziegler, Kerrice Brooks, and Aubrey Plaza.

“If you weren’t young and dumb you wouldn’t be brave enough to do anything.”

Maisy Stella stars as Elliot who is about to turn eighteen. She has decided to go camping with her two best girlfriends Ruthie (Maddie Ziegler) and Ro (Kerrice Brooks) on an island in the lake near where they live. Ro has acquired some mushrooms for the celebration and they head out on Elliot’s small boat to the island. They set up their tents and build a fire, and when the sun sets they brew tea with the mushrooms. They ingest the brew and Ro and Ruthie start to hallucinate from the mushroom tea. Ruthie passes out and Ro starts dancing into the forest completely in her own world. Elliot starts getting upset that the tea isn’t working for her and she is not getting high when all of a sudden………

An older woman (Aubrey Plaza) is sitting next to her on the log, toasting a marshmallow on a stick over the campfire. Completely surprised Elliot screams out, “Who the f*ck are you?”. The older woman explains to Elliot that she is indeed high, that the mushrooms have worked and she is hallucinating. ‘Dude….I’m you….the 39 year old version of you.” After telling Elliot some personal things about herself that nobody else could possibly know, Elliot realizes that she is indeed high and talking to her older self from the future. Elliot at first is terrified but then gets excited at the opportunity to talk to her older self and asks lots of questions. Her older self gives her some advice on living in the moment and enjoying these last three weeks with her family before she heads off to college. And warns her to beware of “Chad”.

The next morning Elliot thinks it was just a hallucination from the mushroom tea, and they all head back home in Elliot’s boat. A couple of days later Elliot takes a break from working in her family’s Cranberry bog and goes down to the pond to take a quick skinny dip. As she is enjoying the water “Chad” (Percy Hynes White) pops out of the water and surprises her. Chad explains that he has been hired by his parents for the summer to help with the Cranberry farm. Freaking out at meeting the “Chad” that her older self in her hallucination told her to avoid, she immediately leaves and wonders how she could possibly talk to her older self again.

Later in the day as she is on the boat in the middle of the lake chilling, she starts looking through her contact list on her phone and sees a new contact…..”MY OLD ASS”. Freaking out she texts the number and is shocked when her older self texts back. She again warns Elliot to stay away from Chad and Elliot does her best to avoid him. Over the next couple of weeks she takes older Elliot’s advice and spends more time with her family. Enjoying every moment as if it were her last before she leaves for school. She takes her advice on working on herself to become a better Elliot, but falls short on the advice to avoid Chad at all costs. She keeps running into him everywhere and finds herself, in spite of the warning, developing strong feelings for Chad.

It is a hilarious heart warming coming of age drama centered on the eighteen year old Elliot and her older self. In spite of all the wisdom her older self gives her, in the end it is Elliot who has advice for her older self. “If you weren’t young and dumb you wouldn’t be brave enough to do anything.” I liked it, thought it was good. It kept me involved. I really liked Maisy Stella and Aubrey Plaza as Elliot, and Percy Hynes White was very likable as Chad(as Elliot can attest).

I don’t think I would watch it again but it was definitely worth watching.

So maybe we’ll refer to that as a “One-off”.

Two thumbs up with a one-off rating.