JoeMama's Movie Reviews

Jungle Cruise Starring Dwayne Johnson, Emily Blunt, Jack Whitehall, Jesse Plemons Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra Disney is known for being a multi-billion dollar (or possibly multi-trillion, or whatever money amount is higher than trillion, I'm not going to look it up) corporation that will sell its literal soul to make more money by turning whatever they can find into a hopeful profit. Not even the rides at Disneyland are safe from the greedy hands of the corporation who has turned some of its famous (and sometimes infamous) rides into big-budget films, but most of them fell completely flat ("The Haunted Mansion," "Tomorrowland," and that abysmal "Country Bears") and bombed terribly. Then there was "Pirates of the Caribbean," and they realized that they had a money-making franchise on their hands that they'll literally plow into the ground. Capitalizing on the concept of water and quirky captains, it was only a matter of time before they...

Old Starring Vicky Krieps, Gael Garcia Bernal, Rufus Sewell, Alex Wolff Directed by M. Night Shyamalan When you ask people what their biggest fear is, you're bound to expect the classic answers: heights, spiders, enclosed spaces, your in-laws. There's another answer that many people answer with when asked this question: getting old. Its not the thought of aging that's often the fear, but the regrets that comes with getting older. You look back when you age and think of all the things you didn't get to do, the missed opportunities, the valued time you should've spent with loved ones before they passed away. "Old" should've been a film filled with intense dramatic moments such as this, but instead it stays to the typical Shyamalan model of showcasing absolutely no emotions but everyone acting like robots as they blindly, blandly traverse the meager script handed to them as the film itself feels so long you'd think you aged a few years by the end of i...

Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins Starring Henry Golding, Andrew Koji, Haruka Abe, Takehiro Hira Directed by Robert Schwentke The Marvel Cinematic Universe isn't the first franchise to interconnect a series of different films featuring different characters into a unified whole, but it's one of the most successful. Ever since 2008's "Iron Man," they've slowly amassed a series of films that coherently (more or less) tell a unified story, and ever since then other franchises have tried their hand at a shared universe. Some - like the DCEU - have had moderate success, while others - like the Dark Universe - fell flat on its face. Regardless, it seems like everyone wants to develop their own successful MCU by sacrificing unique, original stories in the hopes of possibly making something bigger in the future. "Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins" is one such film, a movie that could've stood on its own with a powerful story, but instead served as the opening chapt...

The Tomorrow War Starring Chris Pratt, Yvonne Strahovski, J.K. Simmons, Betty Gilpin Directed by Chris McKay Alien invasion films are nothing new, and neither are films dealing with time travel. "The Tomorrow War" tries to blend these two subgenres together to provide an action-packed spectacle, but it just turns into an overly long caricature of what it wanted to be. Instead of pulse pounding suspense, action, and blowout effects, the film instead gives overly long performances, generic action sequences, and CGI that's often as bad as a SyFy Original when seen from afar, and not even the charisma Chris Pratt oozes could save it from mediocrity. Former Green Beret First Sergeant Dan Forester (Chris Pratt) is now living his mundane suburban life with his wife Emmy (Betty Gilpin) and daughter Muri (Ryan Kiera), and is now working as a science teacher at a local high school, yet he still believes that he can offer something to better humankind. While watching a soccer game, ...

False Positive Starring Ilana Glazer, Justin Theroux, Pierce Brosnan, Gretchen Mol Directed by John Lee Ever since Roman Polanski's epic horror masterpiece "Rosemary's Baby" hit the big screen in 1968, any would-be expecting mother horror film to follow has to live in its insurmountable shadow. Even when you try to stray away from the traditional tropes, there's obvious parallels to "Rosemary's Baby" that can't be denied, and it's even worse when a film tries in a sense to give a modern re-telling of the film. While "False Positive" doesn't seem to wholly encapsulate this, the parallels between the two are stronger than most, and while it does offer an important message about the male-dominated world of fertility clinics, it doesn't quite stick the landing in lieu of presenting an off-the-wall conclusion that's utterly insane and unbelievable. Married couple Lucy (Ilana Glazer) and Adrian (Justin Theroux) Martin have bee...

Escape Room: Tournament of Champions Starring Taylor Russell, Logan Miller, Holland Roden, Indya Moore Directed by Adam Robitel The concept of Escape Rooms were much more in demand before Covid-19, but due to obvious reasons they've fallen by the wayside in the past year. People don't want to touch things that've been touched over and over by other people before them, confining people in a small room, and all that anymore. Yet the novelty of an Escape Room is still as entertaining as ever, which was what propelled the original 2019 "Escape Room" to earn enough money to warrant an unnecessary sequel. Now, however, it feels more like a throwback to a bygone era, where Escape Rooms were all the rage and everyone was doing them (although now they might be picking back up again), and much like the nostalgia of pre-Covid days, "Tournament of Champions" relies on the past to try to bring forward the future, and in the end we get a film that's parallel to th...

Space Jam: A New Legacy Starring LeBron James, Don Cheadle, Cedric Joe, Sonequa Martin-Green Directed by Malcolm D. Lee 1996's "Space Jam" was an enjoyable little film where superstar basketball player Michael Jordan is transported to the world of Looney Tunes and must play a high-stakes game of basketball with the Tunes in order to save themselves from enslavement at an evil man's amusement park. It wasn't great by any stretch of the imagination, but it was fun, funny, and filled with heart and humor. Ever since, there's been ideas pitched to Warner Bros. about a possible sequel (including ideas like "Race Jam" with Jeff Gordon, "Golf Jam" with Tiger Woods, and "Skate Jam" with Tony Hawk), but none of them thankfully came to fruition. When it looked like they had finally given up on providing a lackluster sequel to a beloved original, LeBron James was cast in the new "Space Jam: A New Legacy," and the results turned out...