14 • June 2017 •
MOVIES FRIDAY, JUNE 2
Awakening The Zodiac
Maudie
Wonder Woman
The Hunter’s Prayer
Pray for Rain
Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie
It Comes At Night
Hearing is Believing
Dark Signal
I Love You Both
Handsome Devil Vincent N Roxxy Past Life The Exception The Recall
Camera Obscura My Cousin Rachel Beatriz at Dinner Night School Random Tropical Paradise 11:55
Aaron’s Blood I, Daniel Blake
FRIDAY, JUNE 16
Band Aid
All Eyez On Me
The B-Side
Cars 3
Dean
Rough Night
Letters from Baghdad
Once Upon a Time in Venice
FRIDAY, JUNE 23 Transformers: The Last Night The Bad Batch The Big Sick The Beguiled FRIDAY, JUNE 30 Baby Driver Okja Despicable Me 3 The House
47 Meters Down
Amityville: The Awakening
FRIDAY, JUNE 9
Jasmine
Inconceivable
The Mummy
The Book of Henry
The Little Hours
Reviewed by A.D. Beal KING ARTHUR LEGEND OF THE SWORD Throughout Legend of the Sword, it’s clear that director and co-writer Guy Ritchie (Sherlock Holmes) was not the right person for the film. His style, comedy, and editing (especially the editing) just don’t fit with the story of King Arthur. This is really a shame, because the cast could portray their characters amazingly in a better film. This film was intended to be the first in a series of six, or potentially even eight films. If this is an indication as to what we can expect in the sequels (should they go forward), then I don’t have high expectations for them. SLEIGHT After his mother’s death, a young street magician (Jacob Latimore) turns to dealing drugs at parties to support his little sister. When she is kidnapped by his supplier, he uses his sleight of hand and keen intelligence to find her. With only a 90-minute run time, Sleight moves along rather quickly. JD Dillard’s debut makes the most of its $250,000 budget, and the visual effects are quite impressive regardless of the minimal budget. The film showcases how great of an actor Jacob Latimore can be, as well as the rest of the cast. The ending seems a bit anticlimactic, however overall, it doesn’t detract much from the film.
GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL 2 Vol 2 continues Marvel’s winning streak, but it isn’t as fresh as the first film. Some of the humor in the film feels a bit forced and derivative of the first film. On top of that, some characters (both new and old) feel as if they were written to be annoying. Thankfully, other characters continue to be worth investing in, and a few (such as Michael Rooker’s Yondu) get more well deserved screen time. This movie also proves to be one of the rare Marvel films with a great villain (though I won’t spoil who that is). ALIEN COVENANT 10 years after Prometheus and nearly 20 years before the original Alien, Alien Covenant focuses on the crew of the Covenant discovering a signal on a rogue planet, that also happens to house the Xenomorphs that we all know and love. The biggest problems with Covenant are spoiler related, so let’s just say it really messes with the continuity of the series. It also feels like two different films (a Prometheus sequel and a straightforward Alien film) were mashed together, which really hurts the tone of the film. And while the creatures do look good up close, the CG feels very rubbery. That said, it is a very good looking film (New Zealand is where the film was shot), with Dariusz Wolski returning to provide cinematography. The cast is also great (Danny McBride and Michael Fassbender in particular), even if they do make some really stupid decisions (we’re talking Millburn from Prometheus levels of stupid).
HYPER LOCAL NEWS FOR THE PHOENIX NORTH VALLEY / deervalleytimes.com
