THE RONDO AWARDS for 2022

It’s Rondo season again! For those not in the know…

https://rondoaward.com/rondoaward.com/blog/

… check it out.

I’ve decided to try to catch up with all the nominees for Best Movie. I’d try to catch up with everything in every category, but the ballot is immense and time is finite. So, just the films, ma’m. 

There are 21 nominated films, I’ve already seen 4 of them, so I need to get onto these other 17. 

—- AVATAR: THE WAY OF WATER

—- BARBARIAN

—- THE BATMAN

—- THE BLACK PHONE

—- BLACK PANTHER: WAKANDA FOREVER

—- BONES AND ALL

—- CRIMES OF THE FUTURE

—- EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE ALL AT ONCE

—- HALLOWEEN ENDS

—- MEN

—- THE MENU

—- THE MUNSTERS

—- NOPE

—- THE NORTHMAN

—- ORPHAN: FIRST KILL

—- PINOCCHIO (Del Toro)

—- PREY

—- SCREAM

—- SMILE

—- TERRIFIER 2

—- VIOLENT NIGHT

—- Or write in another choice:

No, I won’t write in another choice. There’s more than enough there already.

I figure to report in here as I watch ‘em, ‘cause why not?

Here, in brief, are some comments on those I’ve already seen…

AVATAR: THE WAY OF WATER…I liked the original well enough. Didn't think it was anything great. It was pretty simple-minded, but certainly nice to look at. But I wondered at the time, thinking of JOHN CARTER as well as AVATAR, when does a live-action film become an animated film? Where’s the line between those forms. Well, this sequel is well over the line. This is a cartoon, folks. And it’s animation supporting a pretty weak script. Soap opera dialogue, elementary school plotting. I saw it on my 55” flatscreen and it looked sharp. Probably looked a lot better in IMAX and 3D and Todd-Ao and Emergo and whatever else they offered. But no matter how good it looked, it still would be a childish cartoon.

THE BATMAN … for the first half or so, I thought I was watching a truly great comic book movie. But then…there was a 10-15 minute stretched which slogged and crawled along, followed by good but standard action. At any rate, no longer anything great.

       I liked that the fate of the world didn’t depend on the final confrontation. Every Marvel movie does that already. This ending is not going to be good for Gotham City, but the world is safe. I appreciated that.

Robert Pattinson is fine. Better than Affleck, maybe even better than Bale (not a huge fan of the Nolan series), but not great. What was wonderful about this Batman was the way we could see his eyes so clearly behind the mask, even in dark scenes. I don’t know if it was lighting or makeup or costuming or computer thumbjiggery or acting or all of the above, but it was a great effect. 

      Also, even considering the dauntingly beautiful string of Catwomen over the years, from Lee Meriwether to Halle Berry, Zoe Kravitz has to go near the top of the list. She’s stunning. And delivers a nice performance as well.

All in all, pretty good as superhero movies go, but not really that much above the norm.

BLACK PANTHER: WAKANDA FOREVER… Not as good as the first one, which was itself probably a little overrated. This one is too busy for my taste. It’s also more emotional than most any other comic book movie, which is understandable considering the tragic, early death of the first movie’s star.

I love Angela Bassett, always have, and thought she was good here, but I was surprised at her Oscar nomination. I mean, she’s not THAT good, and it hardly seems the sort of role which inspires or requires that level of acting. 

Okay, but not much better.

THE MUNSTERS …       I was not a MUNSTERS fan. I watched it weekly in its initial broadcast because it was, you know, Monsters. But I never found it funny and always much preferred THE ADDAMS FAMILY. But I watched it, oh yeah.       So here I am, watching this movie, made by Rob Zombie whose previous movies--with one mild exception--I really didn’t like. Because…they’re monsters, dude.

      I loved that the movie started with the old Universal globe. Nice touch.

      The movie looks just great. The sets, the costumes, the cinematography, all gorgeous.

      I did very much like Jeff Daniel Phillips as Herman. Apart from his laugh, I didn’t see or hear much Fred Gwynne. Phillips, for the most part, made it his own and underplayed quite wonderfully. Thumbs up for him.

      And thumbs up also for Dan Roebuck. It’s much easier to find a lot of Al Lewis in the performance, but I thought the impression was just enough to remind and honor, not so much as to offend or overdo.

      Sheri Moon Zombie is an extremely attractive Lily and I know she can act (she was quite good in Rob’s best movie, LORDS OF SALEM), but the lady seems to have no feel for comedy. Frankly neither does her husband. Maybe she was just following flawed direction. Or maybe she thought she was channeling Yvonne DeCarlo. She wasn’t. And whatever she was doing just was not funny.

       But then again, that’s the problem with the movie overall. It is just not funny, not at all.  I was going to try to split the blame between Rob Zombie and the scriptwriter, but then the end credits told me that Rob was the scriptwriter, so… sorry, Rob. Ya ain’t funny. And when the things in your “comedy” which come closest to being humorous are the supposedly bad jokes told by Herman, well, ya might have a problem.

       Of course, not being a MUNSTERS fan at any point in my life, and never having found them funny, I thought maybe I wasn’t a fair audience. So I texted my son, who is a huge MUNSTERS fan and a huge Rob Zombie fan. I asked him if he’d seen it (he had) and what he thought. He said that it was nice to see the characters again and revisit the family but that it wasn’t funny. I told him I hadn’t laughed once and he agreed, “no,” he said, “it’s totally unfunny.”  My son is very smart.