May, oh May, what a bad movie month. While there were a few things I enjoyed well enough, very little of this month stood out to me beyond being "fine." In fact, while I watched quite a few of this year's releases trying to get back on track for my 365 new release challenge, most of what I watched this month were releases from earlier in the year just because there wasn't a lot I was crazy interested in seeing. That said, I managed 10 new May releases so let's go through them.
#10- Tarot
[Watched in theaters]
I like a schlocky horror movie and when I saw the trailer for this the first time, I was hopeful it would at least be fun. It wasn't going to be "good" but I could've had a good time with it. Instead, we got some hot garbage in the acting department, a nothing story, and not even any on-screen carnage. The least this movie could've done was commit and go Rated R just to do the gore fest it clearly wanted to be, but instead it has all the generic tropes of a supernatural teen (they're college age but whatever) horror flick that
Cabin in the Woods made fun of thirteen ******* years ago. Absolute dog****, do not watch this movie.
#09- The Garfield Movie
[Watched in theaters]
This is the kind of movie my grandma would've taken me to as a kid when she was babysitting four cousins and just needed a break from us. It's an empty void of a movie with next to no personality stuffed with celebrity voices for absolutely no reason. I was mildly okay with Pratt as Mario, as I've said, I think a whole movie with the "Mario voice" would've been grating, but Garfield is not the role for him in the slightest. This is low-tier child movie garbage alongside most of Illumination's stuff and while I don't think it's the worst thing ever, I don't think it needed to exist and I do think kids deserve better entertainment focused at them.
#08- IF
[Watched in theaters]
I don't think
IF is a terrible movie, it has elements of charm and fun to it, the cast is mostly alright with the little girl being excellent, and the story is nice enough. That said, this is definitely a huge step down from the
A Quiet Place films in terms of Krasinski's directorial features. It's not really kiddie enough to appeal to kids, too much deep emotional stuff focused on nostalgic adults, but there's also not enough of that to counteract the goofy kiddie stuff to make this a movie geared towards older people. This movie isn't really "for" anyone and I think that's what hurts it the most.
#07- Living with Leopards
[Watched on Netflix]
This year hasn't just been rough in terms of narrative features, the documentaries have been pretty tough to sit through as well. While
Living with Leopards is a competently-made documentary about leopards growing up (something that is tough to film due to their illusiveness, especially with young) that doesn't go beyond the very surface of what a documentary like this could achieve. Leopards are a highly persecuted species that education for is minimal in our cultural zeitgeist and a leopard doc could've done the species a lot of good. For someone who just likes to watch animals on screen for an hour and a half, it's fine and beautifully shot (as most nature docs are) but to me it lacked substance beyond the novelty of filming leopard cubs growing up.
#06- The Fall Guy
[Watched in theaters]
This movie was a beautiful mess. It was too long, too messy, too convoluted, and yet I can't not love both Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt. They were clearly having fun here and their charm and charisma alone pushed this movie this high up the list. The plot is mostly forgettable and the characters even more so, but the movie has some really awesome practical stunts and the performances are decent enough to give this one sixth place.
#05- South Park: The End of Obesity
[Watched on Paramount+]
You know it was a rough month when the newest
South Park special ends up in the top 5. That said, I'm pretty tired of the specials that they keep doing, I wish they'd just go back to making episodes or end the series entirely, there was zero reason for this to not just be an episode of a recent season of
South Park. The commentary on the American healthcare system was pretty funny and the
Mad Max: Fury Road homage at the end was also a good time, but this really would've just served better as an episode over a special.
#04- Jim Henson Idea Man
[Watched on Disney+]
Now we get into the four that I actively enjoyed a lot. As
@JokersWild said, this documentary was a great insight into Henson as both a person and an artist and follows almost his entire career from local public access television to
The Dark Crystal and
Labyrinth and also touches on the Disney partnership without Disney sucking themselves off like they tend to do with these things (*cough*
Stan Lee from last year *cough*). This was a great little documentary with some awesome stuff that any
Muppets or Henson fan should definitely check out.
#03- Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga
[Watched on Disney+]
I guess I'm in the minority here, but I really enjoyed
Furiosa, like, really enjoyed it. Yeah, the CGI was a bit iffy in parts and it's definitely no
Mad Max: Fury Road, but that was probably the best action film of the 2010s, so I didn't really expect it again. I thought the deeper dive into Furiosa's character and her revenge plot was great, I thought both actresses who played Furiosa were phenomenal, I thought the action here (though less than expected) was phenomenal as well, and I thought Chris Hemsworth gave my favorite performance he's ever given. I get why it wasn't everyone's cup of tea, but I'm really sad watching it flop as it has been because I had a great time with this one.
#02- Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes
[Watched in theaters]
"What a wonderful day!"
I loved this. I get why not everyone does as much as me, I understand the gripes and even agree with them to an extent, but I thought Noa was a great protagonist, I absolutely ADORED Raka, seriously he's probably my favorite ape in the series, and I found Proximus Caesar to be a phenomenal villain who I hope we get more of eventually. The effects here are also astounding and I'm so glad I got to see it in IMAX (sorry
@TheOriginalTiki).
#01- I Saw the TV Glow
[Watched in theaters]
I know I kind of gave this one's placement away when I saw it, but man did I connect to this movie so much. The visual aesthetics were absolutely gorgeous and the cinematography was amazing, plus I love the feeling of corrupted nostalgia and identity that it plays with. I loved the director's work on
We're All Going to the World's Fair and playing with notions of creepypasta and online storytelling and while this movie is less focused on that, it definitely took inspiration from one of my favorite internet stories
Candle Cove as well as serialized YA paranormal series that I grew up loving. This isn't everyone's cup of tea and I totally get that, but it's also why I love it so much. Expect this one to be high on my end of year list and to probably reveal its place at the second annual Golden Tikis.
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Alright, May is finally over and we look forward to another month of uninteresting fare in my humble opinion. I guess if I had to pick my most anticipated for the month, it'd probably end up being
Inside Out 2, not because I think it's gonna be a great movie (I don't love the first) but there's just not a ton to be super excited about this month. I hope I can be proven wrong though.
