Chad Reviews

The Nightmare Before Christmas is truly the film that only Tim Burton could make and perfect. The film starts out with the holiday town of Halloween finishing up this year's celebration of Halloween and preparing for the next. Unfortunately, Jack Skellington, voiced by Chris Sarandon does not want to have another traditional Halloween like every other year so adventures into the holiday town of Christmas. While there, Jack is enthralled with Christmas town and gathers ideas to put a Christmas spin on Halloween this next year.  This movie features a mix between stop-motion and claymation-style animation meaning each frame is individually recorded and stitched together one after another with each little character movement made. As well as being a uniquely filmed animated fantasy, Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas is a musical that features Danny Elfman as music producer and singer to many of the songs.  Each song gives you a clear image of what is going on inside Jack S

This time on Chad reviews I decided to take a look at some Disney+ short films.   These reviews will be short and to the point (like these films) and I will only be providing a rating for each instead of a full-on review. Pixar in Real Life: Brave Merida Visits an Archery Range 8 M&M'S in your popcorn out of 10 Piper 10 M&M'S in your popcorn out of 10 Lava 10 M&M'S in your popcorn out of 10 Mikes New Car 7 M&M'S in your popcorn out of 10 Mater and the Ghostlight 8 M&M'S in your popcorn out of 10 Next up, Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas .

  Bill & Ted Face the Music is the third film in the Bill and Ted trilogy and it once again features Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter . The film starts out with showcasing Bill and Ted's daughters Billie and Thea who we thought were sons at the end of the second film, Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey . The two families are then approached by the daughter of Rufus, Bill and Ted's time traveling friend from the future.  Rufus's daughter, Kelly informs them that Bill and Ted are once again asked to save all of time and space by writing a song that will unite Humanity. This is a near-impossible task as they only have less than 24 hours to create a band, write the lyrics and perform the song, but thankfully Bill and Ted have access to a time-traveling phone to find a future where they have written the humanity saving song. While Bill and Ted are time-traveling, their daughters also traveling through time to gather historical musicians such as Jimi Hendrix, Wolfgang Amadeus a

Phineas and Ferb the Movie: Candace Against the Universe is a direct sequel to the 2011 film Phineas and Ferb the Movie: Across the 2nd Dimension. This flick runs for an hour and a half and satisfies all of your nostalgia needs from your childhood. The film starts out with Candace once again trying to bust Phineas and Ferb for building one of their convoluted inventions. Candace's plan backfires when she gets abducted by an alien race from the planet Feebla-Oot .  After finding out that Candace and Vanessa have been captured, Phineas, Ferb, and the gang quickly team up with Doctor Doofenshmirtz to rescue them. Throughout the film, there are references to older episodes via billboards in the city, flashbacks, and a nice collage at the end of the movie. Unfortunately, there are a few things missing from the film that were in the TV show, such as the amazing musical sequences which made Phineas and Ferb such a unique show for its time. On the other hand, the animation quality has

  The King of Staten Island is a near autobiography of the life of Pete Davidson.  You may know him from Saturday Night Live, if you have not liked the skits he has been in before you may have a change of heart towards his type of acting in this film. The best way to describe this film is a combination of comedy and drama, a little less on the comedy side though.  Judd Apatow directs and produces this film, as well as The 40-Year-Old Virgin , Knocked Up  and  This Is 40 .  The film is rated R so I would not recommend watching this with your children, the film does contain the use of drugs and sexual activity as well as cursing. The movie starts off extremely slow but quickly ramps up speed after the first 30 minutes. This flick is part fiction and part reality as Pete Davidson's father was a firefighter who died in the line of duty on 9/11, unlike Pete's character's father in the movie who just dies in the line of duty.  Though The King of Staten Island is nearly 2 hours an

The musical Hamilton originally debuted on Broadway in 2015 and has since become a pop culture phenomenon that has spread across the world. Unfortunately due to COVID-19, Broadway has temporarily closed and all tours for Hamilton have been rescheduled.  In response to this, Lin-Manuel Miranda, the lyricist and creator of Hamilton partnered with Disney to release a recorded version of their show on to Disney+.  Hamilton tells the story of the forgotten Founding Father of the United States, Alexander Hamilton, but instead of using conventional storytelling means this musical is told through a hip hop beat.  Most of the characters in this film are played by people of colour to fit the style of rap and provide a new experience compared to what you learned in history class.  The plot of Hamilton is based on him being an immigrant and overcoming many barriers along the way.  It was the perfect opportunity to cast many non-white actors to show a relevant story showcasing the current views of

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory was released in June 1971.  The story follows Charlie and his Grandpa Joe who have an adventure of a lifetime at Willy Wonka's world-renowned Chocolate Factory. After Wonka's factory was shut down for 20 years due to opposing candy companies wanting to steal his recipes he decides to reopen it.  Wonka then holds a contest to find five golden tickets and let five lucky people into his factory for a grand tour. This contest was open worldwide and everyone had an equal chance of winning as long as they purchased a chocolate bar. All five winners were children from various parts of the US and Europe; each winner filled a stereotype of that state or country. Charlie wins the last golden ticket to gain access to Wonka's factory tour along with Veruca Salt, Violet Beauregarde, Augustus Gloop and Mike Teavee.  All of the kids except for Charlie begin experiencing weird side effects when consuming the unfinished Wonka candy. The group explores t

Scoob is an animated feature film showing the origin of Mystery Inc. The film starts out with a young Shaggy enjoying one of his awesome sandwich creations when an ownerless Scooby-Doo, escaping the local police, bolts towards Shaggy.  Shaggy claims Scooby-Doo as his own dog, and this where the oddball friendship begins. The film then fast forwards to a teenaged Shaggy, Scooby, Velma, Daphne, and Fred looking for a sponsor to start their Mystery Inc business.  The sponsor turns out to be Simon Cowell from American Idol that demands that Shaggy and Scooby are kicked out of Mystery Inc as they are not a vital piece of the team. The antagonist of the flick, Dick Dastardly attempts to capture Scooby numerous times to use him to summon the ghost of Cerberus to reunite with his long lost dog Muttley.  The movie is chock-full of never-ending laughter that finalizes in one large classic Scooby-Doo fiasco in Athens. Each of the characters' voices is carefully handpicked and made sure the em

Moana is an animated musical featuring Auli'i Cravalho and Dwayne Johnson telling the story about Maui, a Hawaiian demigod responsible for releasing terrible monsters into the real world and causing an environmental catastrophe. As well as a young girl named Moana heir to the chief of the dying island.  She feels like it is her responsibility to provide her island with prosperity it once had. The film features songs written by Lin-Manuel Miranda who is also the director of Broadways Hamilton, so no wonder these tunes are so catchy and memorable! In my opinion, this film features the second real female protagonist in a Disney film, the first being Merida from Brave. The movie combines realistic textures with stylized designs to create an aesthetic beauty that has never been seen from Disney before.  The movie will reawaken your childlike love for Disney. Both characters fit a very specific role in the movie; Maui being the realist blind hero and Moana being the stubborn heroine.  Mo

Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) features Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron as the two protagonists as Max and Furiosa. This film continues on with the theme of post-apocalyptic flicks. Although the apocalypse may be slightly different, it's still an apocalypse nonetheless. The beginning of the film is extremely fast-paced as Max, a drifter, is kidnapped and used as a human blood bag for many feral warriors including one named Nux. Nux is a maniacal servant for his lord Immortan Joe played by Hugh Keays-Bryne. Immortan Joe is a freak of nature clinging to life via breathing tubes and plastic protective equipment over his skin. He controls the areas water supply and limits it to the population. This tyrant plans to keep his clan in power via the use of "breeders", beautiful women forced to provide worthy male offspring as successors to the throne.  Furiosa, the ass-kicking rebel, figures out Joe's plan and she rescues the "breeders" and plans on transporting them, alon

Shaun of the Dead is a British zombie comedy film released in 2004, coincidently the same year as Dawn of the Dead , a horror zombie movie.  The plot of Shaun of the Dead is of course filled with much more hilarity and amusing twists and turns!  This flick features a lot of sound effects to reinforce the sheer force that blunt weapons have on zombie skulls.  As well, the  special effects used in this 16-year-old movie are excellent for that time.   The movie doesn't waste its time showing a 20-minute expose explaining each character in detail, instead every character is explained within 5 minutes; not wasting any time on explaining an elaborate backstory. Despite not having detailed backstories for each character they are all fleshed out and relatable. The story follows a small group of acquaintances in the zombie apocalypse in the UK.  Most of the film is spent gathering the whole crew and driving to the local bar as a potential safe haven from the apocalypse. The relationship

Next on The Chopping Block, Ford v. Ferrari. The film first released November 15th 2019 and grossed 31.5 million dollars on its opening week. This action-packed movie as you expect is a car film, but it's not just any ordinary car film, it is based on a true story and features Matt Damon and Christian Bale as the male leads, Carroll Shelby and Ken Miles respectively.  American car designer Carroll Shelby and driver Ken Miles built a revolutionary race car for Ford in order to defeat Ferrari at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1966. Fortunately, the two friends successfully built the car to finally defeat Ferrari and dethrone them for the next 3 years. The car that was built for the 1966 24 Hours of Le Mans was the GT40 Mk 1. As the film features a lot of high-risk situations with high-speed vehicles and close-quarters racing, most of this movie was made with CGI to keep everyone involved safe in any situation. Just because CGI was used does not mean the film is automatically bad, in

Spies in Disguise features Will Smith and Tom Holland as the voices of the two main characters in the film. Smith as a spy turned pigeon and Holland, a nerdy pacifist scientist. This is an extremely pleasant animated film with an equally positive message, Make Love, Not War . With Will Smith's most recent films being Bad Boys For Life and Gemini Man , his acting in this film is a complete curveball to what he normally portrays.  Smith's character, Lance, is similar to his Men in Black role Agent J, a no-nonsense, kick-ass spy.  Lance is the world's greatest spy and loves to finish his missions with a boom.  Unfortunately, during a mission, Lance's grenade turns out to be a glitter bomb and not what he expected. After finding out that a new employee played by Tom Holland created this glitter bomb Lance fires Holland's character on the spot. Soon after, Lance is on the run from the United States government and requires the unique assistance of Holland's char

If you've heard anything about this movie you would know that it is extremely politically motivated.  I'm not going to get into that, this is an American movie that features American politics and I am a Canadian. Now onto the review, The Hunt is a brutal bloodfest featuring fantastic special effects and an above-average story featuring actors with a variety of acting backgrounds to interpret the story. With stars like Betty Gilpin, Hilary Swank , Glenn Howerton , and Ike Barinholtz the movie has a well-rounded cast that portrays each character's flaws creepily and accurately.  Hilary Swank as Athena portrays a very powerful corporate bully that leads a manhunt against 12 individuals who ruined Athena's and a handful of her friends careers. Although, Athena's "joke" group texts truly caused all this chaos.  These 12 people have to defend themselves from Athena and her colleagues, who are armed with high caliber weapons designed to kill in the messiest way

The psychological horror, The Invisible Man portrays Elisabeth Moss as a mentally unstable girlfriend in a controlling relationship with a brilliant scientist in the optics department. After Moss's character, Cecilia Kast escapes the nightmare of the relationship she was forced into, her abusive boyfriend portrayed by Oliver Jackson Cohen commits suicide, leaving Cecilia a portion of his fortune. Soon after receiving her ex's riches she begins experiencing unusual events happening around the house and at work, such as knives disappearing and work-related material vanishing. She believes that her boyfriend is not actually dead and is stalking her everywhere she goes.  As these events unfold Cecilia's sanity begins to unravel as well as she fights against a foe no one can see. Though the film starts out with a unique story arc it, unfortunately, falls short once all the mindless violence begins, the sheer amount of unnecessary violence takes away from the story of Cecilia

Joaquin Phoenix plays a quintessential Joker like we have never seen before. The films 'R' rating thoroughly allows it to show Arthur Fleck's slow descent from child-friendly clown to vengeful Joker.  Director, Todd Phillips has recreated and reimagined one of the most iconic comic book villains known to man.  Each Joker or Batman film presents a different style of Joker, through actors like Heath Ledger or Joaquin Phoenix . The Joker can be played light or heavy, scary or fun or a combination of all four and Joaquin Phoenix fits the bill precisely. With Todd Phillips history of directing The Hangover and Road Trip you would expect Joker to be a comedy film, but it is the complete opposite.  It is instead a grim, dark, gut-wrenching and disturbing account of a deeply unstable man.  When Arthur Fleck is fired from working as a clown he tries to pursue a career in stand-up comedy.  Robert De Niro's character, Murray Franklin, a late-night show host brings Fleck onto his

Sonic the Hedgehog is a video game adaptation movie that was created by Sega.  About a year ago a trailer was shown for the movie showcasing a very unappealing looking Sonic, after much hate towards this Sonic, the animators changed out this unacceptable Sonic with a more canon looking Sonic. Despite not knowing much about Sonic lore or having played many of the games in the past, I still understood most of what was going on in the film and the various easter eggs hidden throughout it. Jim Carrey played Dr. Robotnik perfectly, he was extremely quirky and fit the personality of Robotnik. Ben Schwartz , the voice of Sonic gave him the personality that he needed: unaware of his surroundings, comedic, childlike and had a lack of self-preservation. Even though Sonic is a fast-paced character, the story, on the other hand, is quite slow a lot of the time. Here is a cool bit of information about the film you may not have known about, part of the filming was done in a small town on Vancouver

Dear Evan Hansen is a book turned musical about a high school student whose life changed forever when his bully found the mental health letters he has been writing to himself. The story slowly spirals out of control as Evan Hansen lies about his relationship with his bully, stating that he was his best and only friend. The story is extremely realistic and showcases what would happen in real life with social media and the death of a classmate. The show is extremely well done for both sound and lighting, one thing about the lighting though, near the end of the show there is a large blue screen used that is very blinding even if you do expect it. Though Dear Evan Hansen is extremely dark, there is a lot of comedic relief throughout the show to compensate for the dark tone of it. #youwillbefound 7 M&M'S in your popcorn out of 10. Next up on the list Sonic the Hedgehog featuring James Marsden and Jim Carrey.

Birds of Prey is a fantastic action film featuring Margot Robbie and Ewan McGregor . The great thing with this kind of flick is that even if it is story-driven there is no need to actually pay attention to the story with the amount of chaos and visual effects going on on-screen. Visually, this film is near-perfect. The story, on the other hand, is extremely basic, it is the "the antagonist is looking for a gem/diamond". Margot Robbie plays Harley Quinn perfectly and there is absolutely no competition for a better Harley Quinn. Ewan McGregor as Black Mask though is very one-dimensional as a character he has one goal and only one emotion, rage.  Though this film is about the Birds Of Prey it felt more like a Harley Quinn movie as the Birds Of Prey were introduced extremely late. The title of the film could have been reversed and it would have been a more accurate movie. Despite these small issues, it is still a fantastic DC movie. 7 M&M'S in your popcorn out of 10.

Colour Out Of Space is a science fiction/horror movie that was originally a short story written by H.P. Lovecraft . The movie showcases one of H.P. Lovecraft's Old Gods as well as the effects it has on the human psyche.  The film features Nicolas Cage and Tommy Chong.   It is an extremely edgy film that in most cases will make you squirm in your seat trying to understand the world within this film. Without spoiling anything about this film, I will clarify that this is not a mainstream film where you can just relax and casually absorb what you are watching, this is a film that is difficult to watch in terms of story but is still visually appealing with the vibrant colours used. It is extremely hard to get a firm grasp on the emotions of the characters as they are ever-changing and unpredictable. Overall, this movie is extremely fun to watch and has an unpredictable story so you'll never know what to expect next. This film efficiently showcases each character and their relevance

Before I start with this review I will give you a fair warning about this film.  If you are uncomfortable with coarse language do not see this film. Do not take this suggestion lightly.  Yet again, director Guy Ritchie has made another fantastic British crime movie. The story of The Gentlemen follows Fletcher, a private investigator hired by a local tabloid. Fletcher is tasked with getting dirt on Matthew McConaughey 's character Mickey Pearson, a marijuana drug lord. Pearson begins the creation of his cannabis labs under the estates of aristocratic homes. He soon realizes he wants out of the business, with how risky it is.  One of these lab locations gets compromised by an unknown enemy and the rest of this film circulates around finding this mysterious foe with the help of Fletcher. With an ever-evolving story, you never expect which character will betray another or who will die next. Though the movie at most times is serious, there is a group of amateur boxers named The Tod

Okay, okay I know this is not a big-screen review but it is still a worthwhile watch. The Citadel Theatre in Edmonton had its opening night of Cost of Living , a Pulitzer prize-winning script about human connections through the eyes of four individuals.  These characters are made up of a former trucker and his recently paralyzed wife, as well as a college student with cerebral palsy and his new caregiver. Two of the four actors in this production actually live with a disability! The two pairs each go through the struggles of having a disability and/or taking care of someone with a disability. The new caregiver Jess is not only new to taking care of John but is completely new to providing assistance to a person with a disability. The former trucker, Eddie is trying to rekindle his relationship with his wife Ani after numerous personal struggles. The show may invoke many feelings in you such as happiness, sadness and absolute surprise, but at the end of the day, you will have a thought

With a well-known cast such as Dwayne The Rock Johnson , Kevin Hart , Jack Black , Danny DeVito and Nick Jonas you expect a long adventure with a lot of excitement and danger along the way and that is exactly what you get with Jumanji: The Next Level. The movie starts off showing the four protagonists, high schoolers, who have previously been inside the Jumanji video game.  Each of these characters follows a stereotype; the nerdy kid with asthma, the jock, the blonde valley girl and the book smart girl.  As with the old Jumanji movie, the four main characters go back into the game to go through with the deadly adventure all over again. Unlike the first movie where the characters got to choose which Avatar they wanted, this time they had no choice and it was random as to which character they played. As well, the location of this game was entirely different.  Instead of being in the jungle, they were in a desert, a tundra and finally a mountainous terrain. The comic relief is abundant