2000s – Page 11 – PopCult Reviews

Movie Review – The Matrix Reloaded

The Matrix Reloaded (2002)
Written & Directed by Lana and Lily Wachowski

After the unexpected success of The Matrix, it was clear to all parties involved they were going to make more. The Wachowskis had initially toyed with the idea of expanding the story but didn’t necessarily have every detail hammered out. To say The Matrix Reloaded builds on the first movie would be an understatement. It is chock full of everything from the first picture ratcheted up a thousand percent. That means more ambitious action set pieces and also more philosophical talking, both showcasing a level of indulgence that is incredibly satisfying but also a tad disappointing. As is the case with almost all media, there’s something to be said for budget constraints and creators being forced to be creative. When you get access to high-end special effects tools, that can lead to movies that get lost in themselves.

Movie Review – Spider-Man 3

Spider-Man 3 (2007)
Written by Sam Raimi, Ivan Raimi, and Alvin Sargent
Directed by Sam Raimi

By 2007, Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man film series had been a massive success. The following year would see Marvel’s first production of Iron Man, which, as we all know, would kickstart the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Audiences were incredibly hyped for this third installment. Through the marketing, it made it clear that we’d finally be seeing the Spider black suit and Venom in the movie. However, we were also told the conflict with Harry would be resolved, and there’d be a third villain in Sandman. Pretty crowded movie, but Spider-Man comics are often filled with subplots and supporting characters. So when I went to see the picture, I didn’t have any apprehensions about going into the theater.

Movie Review – Spider-Man 2

Spider-Man 2 (2004)
Written by Alfred Gough, Miles Millar, and Michael Chabon
Directed by Sam Raimi

How do you follow up Spider-Man? With what is undoubtedly one of the best superhero films ever made. So many unplanned franchises/trilogies often suffer in their second installments. They seem to follow a playbook that bloats their cast and overcomplicates their plot. The result ranges from disappointing to middling. Even Superman 2, a sequel that was planned at the same time as the first movie, is a mess both in its theatrical and director’s cut forms. I think the key to Spider-Man 2’s success is Sam Raimi and Sony Pictures choosing to step away and let the filmmaker continue his love letters to the comic books he grew up with.

Movie Review – Spider-Man

Spider-Man (2002)
Written by David Koepp
Directed by Sam Raimi

Superhero movies are by design intended for children. The audience they should aim for are kids who are just waiting to be awe-inspired by seeing amazing feats and colorful characters. The modern superhero movie began with Richard Donner’s Superman (1978), the first production to attempt to balance the sillier aspects of the genre with more grounded, emotional weight. Due to how successful this movie was financially and narratively, Superman: The Movie became a template for other films. 1989’s Batman played with the formula by presenting a world where the hero was already established and revealed their origin throughout the picture. Both movies adhered to the structure of pitting the hero against their chief nemesis, a clearly defined battle of good versus evil. Sam Raimi came along in the early 2000s to create his vision of Spider-Man, obviously influenced by these previous genre-defining entries but also intent on bringing to life what he saw as a child on those pages illustrated by Steve Ditko.

Movie Review – Noroi: The Curse

Noroi: The Curse (2005)
Written by Kōji Shiraishi and Naoyuki Yokota
Directed by Kōji Shiraishi

By 2005, J-horror popularity in the United States was peaking. There were so many poorly made and poorly received adaptations that producers began looking elsewhere for something to exploit. That’s a shame because Noroi became a film criminally overlooked by audiences in the States. This is one of the best found-footage horror films I’ve ever seen, and I’m someone who typically hates this subgenre. Noroi works because it doesn’t just stick with the framing of seeing the movie through the eyes of someone walking around, holding a camera the whole time. Instead, it engages in mass media as part of its narrative, cleverly telling its story through complex structures that add up to a single disturbing whole.

Movie Review – Ju-On: The Grudge

Ju-On: The Grudge (2002)
Written & directed by Takashi Shimizu

One of the common themes I’ve seen in my look at J-horror thus far is an exploration of loneliness and a focus on the victimization of women & children. If you’re making existential horror in Japan, then it makes sense there will be some big ideas to tackle. They apply to almost every nation on Earth, but these movies look at them from the Japanese perspective. This movie is also a weird anomaly in that many viewers assume it’s the first in the Grudge franchise but is actually the third picture, just the first to get a theatrical release. You wouldn’t know it by watching Ju-On as one of its strengths is that it slowly lays out the core haunting and the bits of history behind it. It’s a franchise encompassing 13 films, including the horribly bad 2020 sequel. The less said about that one, the better.

Movie Review – Pulse (2001)

Pulse (2001)
Written & Directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa

Japanese horror cinema didn’t come into existence in the late 1990s/early 2000s, but it certainly reached a peak in terms of its exposure to the global movie-going market. You likely know of the ones that got American adaptations, The Ring and The Grudge. Pulse also got a less well-received American version, but I have always heard positive things about the Japanese original. With this in mind, I decided to do a short dip into the J-horror of this period, focusing on the “classics” to get a sense of what was popular. These were movies I was aware of, some of which I actually saw, and seemed to have a significant impact at the time in American popular horror.

Movie Review – Thumbsucker

Thumbsucker (2005)
Written & Directed by Mike Mills

Mike Mills has been a director that has intrigued me since my college days. I don’t know how to describe his particular aesthetic, and it has undoubtedly changed from his first feature to the present. With his newest film, C’mon C’mon, being released this weekend, I thought I should revisit that debut film and see how it holds up sixteen years later. I have enjoyed all of his output (Beginners, 21st Century Women) and think those earlier music videos and short films haven’t aged with the times very well. Mills certainly isn’t offensive, but he is very twee in how he tells his stories.

Movie Review – Halloween (2007)

Halloween (2007)
Written & Directed by Rob Zombie

For a minute, we almost had a Michael Myers vs. Pinhead (from Hellraiser) movie. With the success of Freddy vs. Jason, Dimension Pictures seriously looked at pitting those movie monsters against each other. I don’t think that would have been a great idea. An idea was pitched to bring back Jamie Lloyd. That didn’t go anywhere. This was around a time when reboots and reimaginings were becoming a hot thing. Texas Chainsaw Massacre had a moderately successful reboot based on its budget, and telling the characters’ backstory was the thing to do (see the Star Wars prequels, Batman Begins). Setting a standard that would be followed by Freddy and Jason a few years later, Rob Zombie was brought on board to flesh out the origin of Michael Myers.

Movie Review – Halloween: Resurrection

Halloween: Resurrection (2002)
Written by Larry Brand & Sean Hood
Directed by Rick Rosenthal

Jamie Lee Curtis said she was done. So at the end of H2O, she beheads Michael, and the movie ends. But the producers wanted to keep milking the franchise. Moustapha Akkad, the producer who owned the Halloween film rights, provided a clause in his agreement with Dimension Pictures that Michael could never be killed. So when the inevitable sequel was announced, they went to Curtis and asked if she would play Laurie Strode again. Exasperated, the actress told them that if they couldn’t kill off Michael, they would have to kill Laurie in this next movie. So they did. The result is the worst entry in the entire franchise. It’s disjointed, with the first twenty minutes feeling like a short film with Laurie. Then the rest of the film is a poorly aged god-awful mess that completely misunderstands the entire series.