Not any where close to as entertaining as the original. The storyline was the only good thing. Otherwise the movie was actually disappointing.

I enjoyed this movie just as I love the original Mary Poppins. I think it is largely a thankless task doing sequels for beloved films: Christopher Robin and Hook had to pass through a crucible of dislike by lovers of similar original flicks. Remakes are similarly unpopular, perhaps for better reason, in my opinion. O
The makers of Mary Poppins Returns aren't trying to reinvent the wheel, just entertain by using a bit of imagination to bring the original tale to a more savvy modern audience. No reason for us to rhetorically throw our toys out of the sandbox. Okay, I may not watch this new offering as often as I have the original, but it was entertaining without being rude, profane, crude or violent. Kind of rare, that.

The original Mary Poppins was one of my favorite movies when I was a kid and it kind of still is. Thus I was indeed a bit worried when I sat down to watch this one with the kids yesterday. After all there is really so many ways a incompetent writer could have screwed this one up. Especially one with an agenda.
Luckily this was not the case and I have to say that I quite liked this movie. Disney actually managed to keep the ambiance of the original movie and it actually felt like a Disney movie from the good old days. The days before every easily offended retard tried to make every movie into a preaching mouth piece for their personal crusade.
I think I liked the first half of the movie best. It was an explosion of song, magic and, for me, nostalgia. Apart from the hugely improved technology this movie had available to make the magic bits it actually felt like it could have been made back to back with the original. They really managed to capture the atmosphere from back then.
If I had to compare the two directly I would still go with the original as the best one. It was more imaginative and it just felt a bit better two me.
The story is a bit of a rehash of the original. They could have come up with something more original. Also, the second movie seemed to fizzle out a bit compared to the first half. I would have liked to see some more Mary Poppins coolness and magic, like we saw in the first half of the movie, instead of, mostly, conventional stuff. Also the take down of the bad guy was a bit underwhelming.
Apart from that I think sequel was not bad at all.

My expectations were pretty low, but I somehow actually ended up liking it even less than I thought I might. The big setpieces seem to be what _Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter_ is all about, and they are **so bad**. Just abysmal.
_Final rating:★½: - Boring/disappointing. Avoid where possible._

Joyously Bonkers!
It is what it is, a nutty premise made in nutty fashion, but for the undemanding horror fan there's a good time to be had here. Action choreography is of a very good standard, as is, perhaps surprisingly, the CGI. The history aspects of the story, one Abraham Lincoln's accent into justifiable legendary status, are of course a mixture of the based on fact and chaotic popcorn, but it's always interesting, exciting and bloody!
I imagine most horror fans have seen it by now, but if like me you are late to it, and like me you go in with low expectation levels, you could well find yourself having a blast and not hating yourself in the morning . All that and Rufus Sewell looks suspiciously like Adam Ant! 7/10

I was somewhat prepared to be disappointed by this movie due to its rather bizarre title and story but to my enjoyment I wasn’t. I found it to be a quite enjoyable movie.
The story is somewhat bizarre indeed, but then what would you expect when Tim Burton has stuck his fingers into the production? The blurb about the film is also not exactly correct. The 16th president doesn’t discover that vampires are planning to take over the United States. It’s more on the line that he enters politics and actually becomes the 16th President because of the vampires. The story also manages to, more or less, blame the slave trade on the vampires. After all, slaves would make a nice food source for plantation-owning vampires wouldn’t it? As I said, the story is indeed somewhat bizarre.
The film as a whole is quite enjoyable though. Well, I guess you have to like vampire/action movies in order to find it enjoyable but then, why else would you want to see this movie in the first place? There’s enough action to keep the film going most of the time. If anything, maybe the training parts were a bit rushed and too short. The action is quite well done, reasonably blood-splattering, and fun to watch.
The axe-swinging Abraham Lincoln is a cool twist instead of the usual wooden stake, cross swinging or dart throwing vampire hunters that we’re used to see. He must be bloody, as in unnaturally, strong to be able swing around that axe the way he does but what the heck, it’s a vampire movie after all, so one should perhaps not nit-pick on such things.
There’s a scene near the end of the film where a train is about to crash down into a ravine since the bridge, that the vampires have set on fire, is about to collapse. That’s scene was a bit silly and overly unrealistic. There’s also a fairly big whoops in the make-up department where Abraham and his friend Joshua clearly has aged a lot towards the end of the movie, which you would expect, but his wife and his friend Will seems not to have aged at all. How that managed to slip through is somewhat unbelievable.

'The Last Duel' is a fun time. I remember hearing this flopped at the box office (not that that's a sure sign of anything) and had a joke told at its expense at the Oscars, therefore I wasn't too sure what to expect from this Ridley Scott movie. Happily, I comfortably enjoyed it.
The plot is a little bit thin, especially for a 153 minute flick, though due to how it is portrayed via differing viewpoints I was always interested in what I was seeing onscreen. I actually was anticipating it to drag at some point down the line, though that surprisingly never happened.
It's a great cast. The looks of Matt Damon and Adam Driver are questionable at first, though by the conclusion their appearance was one of my favourite things about their respective characters. The performances of Damon and Driver are strong, as is Jodie Comer's.
Ben Affleck is also noteworthy, a word that can also be used in reference to Željko Ivanek and Adam Nagaitis - though, admittedly, for those that is more of a personal thing; it's always nice to see fellows from 'The Walking Dead' universe appear in other media.

Lengthy and rich-looking period drama might have some great set and costumes, and an interesting enough storytelling style with three different viewpoints, I found this not terribly entertaining and everything felt empty and cold. I like Ridley Scott but this is one of his lesser outings. **2.5/5**

There is definitely something of Kurosawa's "Rashomon" (1950) in the compelling watch that Sir Ridley Scott has stitched together here, depicting well, as it does, the rather pyramidical feudal system that provided the legal and cultural structure of life in 14th century Europe. The film centres around allegations made by "Lady Marguerite" (Jodie Comer) that during the absence of her war-hero husband "Sir Jean" (Matt Damon) she was subjected to the unwanted attentions of powerful squire "le Gris" (Adam Driver). By way of a legal presentation to King Charles VI, the narrative now presents us with three equally plausible tales of just how these events may have unfolded. A tale of the initial friendliness between the men and of the ambition, greed, politics and fickleness that led to their current predicament. I cannot say that Damon is particularly good, nor is the blondly coiffured Ben Affleck particularly impressive as their overlord "Pierre d'Alencon", but both Driver and Comer offer us strong and characterful performances as each of their stories are rendered to the Court. The different versions are largely the same, there are but subtle and nuanced variations that you might, were you to be on a jury, have to identify and evaluate - in the end there are no forensics, there is no evidence as such - it is all about whom you believe. Again, this makes the film more interesting. It's not just whom you believe, but whom you want to believe, whom you think you ought to believe. There is the powerful church to consider; the local lords - decisions cannot be made according simply to any "rule of Law" or "code of chivalry". The duel - letting God decide - is the culmination (we see this at the very start of the film before our deliberations begin), but the cleverness of Scott and the writers here is to present us with as near facts as they can - we are left to make our own assessment. We are left to look at the way in which land and people - high born, or otherwise - were pawns in a game knowingly, or otherwise, that frequently became matters of life or death. The photography reminded me a little of the recent "The King" (2019) in that the filthy, muddy, damp and rat-infested conditions in which even the grandees lived are presented authentically and that adds loads to the overall feel of the film. The weather being often cold and wet, the battles being fierce and bloody - all of this contributes well to the strong visual imangery. It is a long film, but I found the episodic nature carried that rather well and the last twenty minutes are certainly worth sticking around for.

**Analysis and Explanation at Spotamovie.com** - The Last Duel is a story of friendship, love and betrayals. But also of violence, war and weak justice. So even if it tries to focus on the role of women within society in the Middle Ages, the film presents crucial topics and a particular narrative structure. And we think this is a hazardous solution by Ridley Scott and his team, but somehow, it makes sense. And we are going to explain to you why in our analysis. The film is based on a true story, and reveal the courage of a woman who defied a nation and made history. - **The Story** - Two old friends, Sir Jean de Carrooges and Jacques Le Gris, found themselves fighting each other in different aspects of their lives. As a result, their military career takes different paths, as well as their social status and lives. Therefore, they build a story of envy, jealousy and betrayals that will change their stories forever. But why? The movie will provide you with three versions of the truth, and we have the challenging role of understanding who is lying. A gorgeous, highly educated woman will make things harder between the two old friends, Marguerite de Thibouville. What is going to happen? For which reasons a duel will be necessary? And who is Marguerite? - Full Analysis at https://www.spotamovie.com/the-last-duel-movie-review-and-analysis-2021-movie/

FULL SPOILER-FREE REVIEW @ https://www.msbreviews.com/movie-reviews/the-last-duel-spoiler-free-review
"The Last Duel became one of my favorite Ridley Scott films, boasting a commanding Jodie Comer who delivers one of the year's most emotionally powerful performances.
Adam Driver, Matt Damon, and Ben Affleck all offer remarkable interpretations, but the actress fully embodies Marguerite de Carrouges' courage amid so much pain and suffering in a theme-heavy, brutally shocking true story.
The perspective-based narrative structure is interesting and efficient enough to overcome its inevitable repeatability issues. Holding technical attributes that will surely get recognition in the awards season - especially Harry Gregson-Williams’ score - the actual duel is one of the most nerve-wracking sequences of the last few years, compensating the audience's patience with a satisfying climax.
Watch it on the big screen, if possible."
Rating: A-

Good watch, probably won't watch again, and can recommend.
This actually reminds me a lot of "Bounty Hunter", but with distinct elements of "Guest House" and "The Hustle".
It's honestly disturbing to me to see the anatomy of a sociopath laid out in a movie like this, but it does thoroughly example both what it is like to have your identity stolen and the kind of monsters that do that sort of thing.
Jason Bateman and Melissa McCarthy are both top notch comedic actors, but some of the scenes were a little hammy, even for them.
A lot of the movie sort of feels like a VERY long SNL sketch where people are going, "Wouldn't this be funny?" and someone always went, "Yeah, put that in, why not?".
It's not that it's not good, but it could have been great.

Friends don't steal friends' identities, do they?
While not quite the abomination that some critics have suggested it is, Identity Thief is a hard film to recommend to film fans looking for a comedy to cheer them up. Too long at just under two hours length, the makers appear to have dropped Melissa McCarthy in the middle of a film, built a load of questionable on going gags around her, and then thrown Jason Bateman in for the charm offensive. Then as the film runs out of steam at the mid-point, it gets caught in a vortex of contrivances and pseudo serious statements. It's a real hodge-podge of a script that does the actors no favours at all. A great premise is not fulfilled, sadly.
Identity Thief only escapes bottom of the ladder status because fans of the two leads will find a modicum of enjoyment in their respective efforts. 5/10

Christian Bale makes full use of his skills as an actor and of the prosthetics department to offer us an engaging, if largely speculative, account of the rise of Dick Cheney. A man of modest abilities at school, he managed to master and then to manipulate the American political establishment to the point where, elected vice-president, auteur Adam McKay would have us believe he was the de-facto ruler of the United States. It's interesting how this domino trail becomes established. The old school network putting, initially, the politically savvy Donald Rumsfeldt (Steve Carell) into a position able to advance the career of the increasingly ambitious Cheney. His wife "Lynne" (Amy Adams) is no slouch here, either - she shares her husband's quest for power and when George Bush Sr wins election, Cheney's unique abilities to exploit the government machine and ensure his own self-promotion and preservation come to the fore. The arrival of the ostensibly rather hapless and out-of-his-depth George Bush Jr in the White House appears to play into his hands still further as the 9/11 attacks and the subsequent invasion of Iraq are presented, here at any rate, as decisions made by a government within a government using the principle of unfettered "executive authority". It hasn't quite the satirical nature of an Aaron Sorkin script, but it's still quite a darkly focussed, at times quite depressingly pitched assessment of the the paper-thin nature of American democracy, of money buying power and of incompetence being no barrier to the nuclear codes. At times that's quite funny, at other times quite scary - but through it all, Bale and Adams work well. Together they form a power couple that might just have put the Clinton's to shame. How much is true, could be true, might be true? Doesn't really matter - US politics is a brutal game and just like as with many European monarchies, it's just as dynastic!

Well, it's not at all hard to make Dick Cheney look like an evil man. Unfortunately this film goes a bit beyond that and comes across as completely and totally bias About ten minutes into the film, it doesn't seem like you are watching something as fair and critical as Stone's W, or even as critical as Liman's Fair Game.
Instead what you get is a film that, well, that feels like a hit piece from start to finish and it comes as a shock when the film ends and the director didn't take the opportunity to blame him for the Reichstag fire.
And, mind you, this is Dick Cheney we are talking about, a man that you can make out to be a monster without turning a film about him into a hit piece. So, when you get the sense that it's taking things a bit far...it's REALLY taking things a bit far.
The plus side is that Bale does deliver and do a really great Cheney, despite the fact he's in a Leni Riefenstahl film. Sam Rockwell, however, plays an absolutely horrible W, to the point where it makes you wish they had cast Will Ferrell.
But, in the end, you have a hit piece that makes little attempt to disguise itself as a hit piece, while covering a man that could easily look like an absolute monster without the over-exaggerations.

Vice (2018)
Direction: 8/10
Filmmaking: 7.5/10
Story: 8/10
Acting: 9.5/10
Entertainment: 8/10
Musical Score: 9/10
Final Grade: 8.3/10
Standout Performance: Christian Bale
Summary: Vice rises up against many of its competitors in the American Political genre of film as Director Adam McKay delivers a very informative, dramatic, and what I can assume to be as accurate as possible tale of Vice President Dick Cheney, and the George W. Bush administration.

**_Pretty enjoyable, very funny, but doesn't tell us anything we didn't already know_**
> _We have guaranteed freedom, security, and peace for a larger share of humanity than has any other nation in all of history. There is no other like us. There never has been. We are, as a matter of empirical fact and undeniable history, the greatest force for good the world has ever known._
- Dick Cheney; _Exceptional: Why the World Needs a Powerful America_ (2015)
As a non-American, I've always been fascinated by the concept of a two party system. Breeding rancour and division by its very nature, with only two sides from which to choose on any issue, the more controversial a subject is, the wider the ideological gap becomes. I'm not sure if it's a cause or a symptom, but intricately intertwined with such deep-rooted partisanship is the fact that everyone seems to be preaching to their own choir; Republicans have Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson, and Ben Shapiro (and Alex Jones), whilst Democrats have Bill Maher, Anderson Cooper, and Chris Cuomo (and Cenk Uygar). The problem is that the people watching _Fox and Friends_ and reading _Breitbart_ are already staunchly on the right, whilst those watching CNN and reading _The New York Times_ are already firmly on the left; everyone is sermonising to the already converted, and no one is listening to what the other camp is saying. Written and directed by Adam McKay, _Vice_ is a good example of this; it's a left-leaning film made by left-leaning people for a left-leaning audience. When McKay was asked by the _ACLU_ if he had any theories as to why Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump allegedly walked out of a screening, his response was telling; "_I think the bigger question is: Why did they buy two tickets and walk in?_"
Ostensibly a biopic of former Vice President Dick Cheney, _Vice_ argues that he was actually the _de facto_ President, with George W. Bush taking a back seat, particularly in the globally crucial years from 2001-2003. Very much a political satire in the vein of Decimus Iunius Iuvenalis and Jonathan Swift, or films such as Barry Levinson's _Wag the Dog_ and Joe Dante's _The Second Civil War_ (both 1997), _Vice_ eschews conventional narrative structure, breaks the fourth wall regularly, intercuts shots of fly-fishing and animals hunting into the middle of tense plot-heavy dialogue scenes, features several self-reflexive references to itself, has a false ending, has a scene in which characters speak in iambic pentameter, and in a deleted scene, the entire cast breaks into song. Much as was the case with recent "based on a true story" films such as Spike Lee's _BlacKkKlansman_ and Jason Reitman's _The Front Runner_ (both 2018), _Vice_ has one eye on the here and now, using Cheney's story as a vehicle to examine the current political situation in the US, positing that without the power-mad Dick Cheney and the Unitary Executive Theory, there would never have been a Donald Trump. However, although there are many individual moments of brilliance, the film is unsure if it's a straightforward biopic or an excoriating satire, ultimately finding a kind of ideological middle ground that mixes comedy with pathos, not always successfully.
Narrated by Kurt (Jesse Plemons), a fictitious veteran of the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars, who claims to have a unique connection to Cheney, the film begins in Wyoming in 1963 as a young Dick Cheney (Christian Bale) is arrested for drunk driving for the second time. It then cuts to the Presidential Emergency Operations Center in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, as Cheney orders the shooting down of any suspicious commercial airliners, despite President Bush (who was en route to Washington from Florida) not signing off on such an order. How Cheney got from being a drunk in 1963 to taking control of the government in 2001 is the film's primary focus, introducing us to a huge cast of characters (played by an extraordinary ensemble), all of whom feature in Cheney's rise to power in some manner – Lynne Vincent (Amy Adams), Cheney's fiancée and later wife; Donald Rumsfeld (Steve Carell), under whom Cheney worked from 1969, later White House Chief of Staff (1970-1971) and Secretary of Defense (1975-1977 and 2001-2006); Gerald Ford (Bill Camp), President (1974-1977), for whom Cheney was White House Chief of Staff; George H.W. Bush (John Hillner), President (1989-1993), for whom Cheney was Secretary for Defense; Liz (Lily Rabe) and Mary (Allison Pill), Cheney's two daughters; Roger Ailes (Kyle S. More), founder of Fox News; George W. Bush (Sam Rockwell), President (2001-2009), for whom Cheney was Vice President; Scooter Libby (Justin Kirk), Chief of Staff to the Vice President (2001-2005); David Addington (Don McManus), Cheney's legal counsel (2001-2005) and Chief of Staff to the Vice President (2005-2009); Colin Powell (Tyler Perry), Secretary of State (2001-2005); Condoleezza Rice (LiaGay Hamilton), National Security Advisor (2001-2005) and Secretary of State (2005-2009); Paul Wolfowitz (Eddie Marsan), Deputy Secretary of Defense (2001-2005); George Tenet (Stephen Adly Guirgis), Director of Central Intelligence (1996-2004); Karl Rove (Joseph Beck), Senior Advisor to the President (2001-2007); Trent Lott (Paul Perri), Senate Minority Leader (2001-2003); Jay Bybee (Brandon Firla), Assistant Attorney General (2001-2003); and John Yoo (Paul Yoo) Deputy Assistant Attorney General (2001-2003). Within this framework, the film hits all the beats you'd expect – the bombing of Cambodia (1969-1970); the formation of Al-Qaeda (1988); the outbreak of the Somali Civil War (1988); the invasion of Panama (1989); the Gulf War (1990-1991); Cheney's time as CEO of Halliburton (1995-2000); 9/11 and the invasion of Afghanistan (2001); the "Torture Memos" and "enhanced interrogation techniques" (2002); the invasion of Iraq (2003); the Plame affair (2003); the accidental shooting of Harry Whittington (2006); the rise of IS; Cheney's 13% approval rating upon leaving office (2009); his heart transplant (2012); and the breakdown in Mary's relationship with her family when Cheney gives Liz permission to oppose gay marriage whilst running for the Senate, despite Mary being a married to a woman (2013).
In writing Vice, McKay focused on five main sources – David Corn's _The Lies of George W. Bush: Mastering the Politics of Deception_ (2003), Ron Suskind's _The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America's Pursuit of Its Enemies Since 9/11_ (2006), Michael Isikoff and David Corn's _Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War_ (2006), Barton Gellman's _Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency_ (2008), and Jane Mayer's _The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How the War on Terror Turned Into a War on American Ideals_ (2008).
_Vice_ presents Cheney as devoid of ideology, with a Zelig-esque ability to alter his manner so as to best deal with whomever it is in whose company he finds himself. In this sense, his political ambition is portrayed as cynical and mercenary; McKay's Cheney has no interest in attaining power so as to influence policy or stimulate ideological change, he is obsessed only with power-for-power's sake. One of the most telling scenes in the film happens quite early when he learns that President Richard Nixon and National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger are planning to bomb Cambodia without going through Congress. Asking Rumsfeld, "_what do we believe?_", he is met by Rumsfeld laughing hysterically at being asked such a ridiculous question. Speaking to The New Yorker, McKay explains,
> _what I found – and I know there are people who disagree with this – was a surprising lack of ideology. I found beliefs that would flip and flop, based on what was convenient and what was strategically useful._
However, although the film presents Cheney as lacking ideology, it does show him as passionate when he adopts (and later usurps) the Unitary Executive Theory (essentially, the idea that the President should have virtually unchecked power to direct the Executive Branch, particularly during times of crisis). McKay tells _The New Yorker_,
> _at one point, he even says the President should have certain monarchical prerogatives._
Speaking to _ACLU_, he says of Cheney's adoption of the Theory,
> _you see it constantly throughout his career – his attempts to expand executive reach, expand executive authority, to operate without transparency, to operate with impunity._
Key lines in this respect include Cheney arguing, "_if the president does it, it's legal_", and, when discussing the issue of the US using torture, "_if the US does it, by definition, it can't be torture_".
Nowhere is his character shown as more ruthless than in a scene towards the end of the film. In 2013, Liz is running for the Senate when a TV advert from a group affiliated with the incumbent Senator for Wyoming, Mike Enzi, claimed that she "_aggressively promotes gay marriage_". Mary had been married to Heather Poe since 2012, and although Cheney and Liz knew it went against their party's doctrines, they had supported her. However, the day after the advert aired, Liz appeared on _Fox News Sunday_ and said she did not support gay marriage. The following day, Cheney and Lynne released a statement supporting Liz, and causing a rift between the family and Mary which remains to this day. The film features a scene the night before Liz goes on TV, in which she asks permission to say she opposes gay marriage. In a chilling moment lifted right out of Francis Ford Coppola's _The Godfather Part II_ (1974), Cheney indicates his approval with a single silent nod of his head. Speaking to _ACLU_ about this scene, McKay states,
> _that to me is what made it a complete and total tragedy and that's the final kind of tally, the final destructive count of power. Is what he did to the country, what he did to countries like Iraq, punching holes in the Geneva Convention, what he did to the checks and balances of our democracy, what he did to the spirit of the American voter, the spirit of the American nation. And then the final thing, the tools that he used_ […] _eventually took down his own family. So to me at that point the tragedy was complete on every level: personal, family, country, world._
Much as in _BlacKkKlansman_, _Vice_ concludes with a haunting montage that brings the story up to date, showing some of the long-term effects of the Bush-Cheney years (instability in the Middle East, irreparable damage to the environment, the rise of IS). In relation to the here and now, although Trump is never explicitly mentioned (and is only shown for a split second in archive footage), McKay is unafraid to admit that the film is not entirely focused on the past. Speaking to the _New York Times_ about Cheney's dismantling of executive checks on power, McKay states,
> _Cheney was the expert safecracker who opened up the safe, and now the orangutan is in there, throwing around the money and the jewels._
He also sees the film as something of a corrective, a reminder of just how bad it was during Bush's time in office, telling _ACLU_
> _somewhere along the line, Donald Trump got elected, and all of a sudden we started hearing people say, "Hey, I kind of miss George W. Bush. You know, he wasn't that bad, him and Cheney." And then I really felt like I got to make the movie. I was like, this is crazy that people are saying this._
As with McKay's previous film, _The Big Short_ (2015), _Vice_ is aesthetically audacious. While there are fewer self-reflexive celebratory cameos explaining difficult terminology in direct-to-camera monologues (sadly, there's no Margot Robbie in a bath this time around), the film is edited in such a way as to remind me of Oliver Stone's "horizontal editing" in films such as _JFK_ (1991), _Natural Born Killers_ (1994), _Nixon_ (1995), and _U-Turn_ (1997). It's no coincidence that Vice was cut by Hank Corwin, who cut all of the above except _JFK_. This style of hyperkinetic editing can be seen throughout the film. For example, as Chaney attempts to manipulate Bush into agreeing to give him more power, there are intercepts of fly-fishing. It's not subtle, but it is effective. Indeed, this recalls an earlier scene when Cheney is teaching his daughters to fish, explaining,
> _you have to find out what the fish wants, and then you use that to catch the fish._
Elsewhere, much as Stone uses Coke commercials and footage from old films in _Natural Born Killers_, Vice features excerpts from the Budweiser "Whassup?" commercial (1999) and _Survivor_. In another scene, when Cheney first learns of the Unitary Executive Theory from Antonin Scalia (Matthew Jacobs), he immediately realises it is his road to power, and the film cuts to a lion bringing down a gazelle. For me though, some of the most effective editing in the film is more conventional. One particularly strong example is as Bush declares war on Iraq, the camera tilts down to show his leg is shaking. The film then cuts to a shot of an Iraqi civilian's leg shaking as the bombs begin to drop.
Also similar to _The Big Short_ is the film's sense of humour, with a tone of irreverence established from the very beginning, as the opening legend states,
> _the following is a true story. Or as true as it can be given that Dick Cheney is known as one of the most secretive leaders in recent history. But we did our fucking best._
A particularly sardonic scene comes about an hour in, as the film shows Cheney stepping away from politics in 1993 and later turning down Bush when he asks him to be his running mate in 2000. At this point, the legend explains that Cheney had chosen his family over politics, and that he happily lived out his days in Wyoming, becoming known as a great philanthropist and fly fisherman. As the Cheneys gather around a family barbeque, triumphant music swells, and the closing credits start to roll, only for the movie to interrupt itself, pointing out that that's not what happened at all, and then continuing with the narrative. It's a very meta technique, and one which both mocks feel-good biopics, whilst also providing a sly criticism of Cheney himself – had he not returned in 2000, the world could have had this happy ending.
Another very funny sequence sees Cheney and Lynne in bed discussing whether or not he should accept Bush's offer, with the narrator explaining,
> _sadly there is no real way to know exactly what was going on with the Cheneys at this history-changing moment. We can't just snap into a Shakespearean soliloquy that dramatises every feeling and emotion. That's just not the way the world works._
This is immediately followed by Cheney and Lynne speaking in _faux_-Shakespearean blank verse ("_Hast blindness usurped vision in you my wife?_", "_Mine own blood and will are yours til pierc'd be the last soldier's breastplate, spilling open its jellied ruby treasures_") as they work themselves up into a sexual frenzy (although technically, this is a duologue, not a soliloquy). There is also a scene in which Cheney meets two oil executives, whose faces are blurred out, and whose names are bleeped every time they are spoken. In another scene, a waiter (Alfred Molina), reads from a menu that features various forms of Cheney-endorsed torture;
> _tonight, we're offering the enemy combatant, whereby a person is not a prisoner of war, or a criminal, which means, of course, that he has absolutely no protection under the law._
After listening to their options, Cheney gleefully declares, "_we'll take it all_". There is also a hilarious mid-credit scene, which sees a focus group descend into chaos when a conservative calls a liberal a "_libtard_", prompting a mass brawl. Ignoring the fight, however, are two young girls who are instead interested only in speculating as to the quality of the new _Fast & the Furious_ film.
For all that, however, _Vice_ isn't a patch on _The Big Short_, for a number of reasons. For example, whereas in _The Big Short_, the self-reflexive _Tristram Shandy_-style narrative structure worked to the film's advantage, providing a way into the complex story, here it has the exact opposite effect, oftentimes distracting from McKay's thematic concerns, preventing the film from focusing on telling us how (and why) Cheney exploited loopholes in executive power to restructure US foreign policy. McKay is also less successful at moving from scenes of quiet tragedy to scenes of comedy than he was in _The Big Short_.
The most egregious problem, however, is that the film fails to give any kind of psychological verisimilitude or interiority to Cheney. Presenting him in an almost robotic manner, there is very little on what drives him, depicting his various deeds without offering anything cogent in terms of his motivations. Is he simply an ideologically-weak opportunist? Is he an evil megalomaniac fuelled by a deeper purpose, and if so, what purpose, and how? Could it all really have been about power, viewing the global geopolitical sphere as his own personal playground and nothing more? And if the film is arguing this, suggesting that this man, responsible for so much pain and suffering, did it all simply because he liked power, isn't that to downplay his agency, to allow one to argue that he didn't really know how much damage he was causing? Depriving him of psychology weakens any attempt to censure his actions. The film's Cheney is ultimately unknowable, and that makes his acts more easily forgivable. The argument that it was all because of power and greed really does next-to-nothing to help explain the man. And in any case, if we accept the thesis that Cheney cared only for power, then surely he warrants serious moral scrutiny, not a self-reflexive and, at times, self-congratulatory narrative that assumes the audience agrees with it before it has even said anything.
_Vice_ traces all of Cheney's acts back to Lynne dressing him down when he was younger, suggesting that without her prodding, this unambitious two-time Yale dropout would never have gotten into politics in the first place (it's telling, perhaps, that Lynne is unenthusiastic when she learns Cheney is thinking of accepting Bush's offer to be his running mate, pointing out, "_the VP just sits around and waits for the president to die_"). But to reduce all of it to being told off by wife, seems far too easy, although it could, I suppose, be cited as an example of the banality of evil. Except that the film's Cheney is anything but banal. In fact, he's terrifying.
Cheney pressured the CIA to find links between Al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein so as to justify invading Iraq. He oversaw the public relations campaign to build popular support for the war. He encouraged the torture of terror suspects all the while denying it was torture. He was responsible for the worst strategic blunder in US history, the growth of a domestic surveillance state, the dictatorialisation of the office of the President, and the deaths of 4,000 American troops and at least 100,000 Iraqi civilians, although possibly as many as 500,000. His contempt for and willingness to rewrite the rule of law makes him a precursor of Trump. Positing him as a man who was power-mad and little else, _Vice_ remains always on the outside, trying to listen through the wall, never managing to open the door and expose his actual inner workings. The comedy and structural experimentation make it entertaining as a film, but it tells us very little about Cheney that we didn't already know. Strip away the artifice, and you'll find it doesn't have a huge amount to say. Never attaining the scale of tragedy to which it clearly aspires, the film functions instead to remind critics of Bush's cabinet why they became critics of Bush's cabinet. In the end, rather than exposing Cheney's dark soul, the film argues that he doesn't have one. And that is a far less interesting thesis.

Being Australian and under 30, Dick Cheney is not someone I ever payed a lot of attention to. I knew he shot that dude and the dude he shot is the one who had to apologise somehow, and that he was one of the evil puppet-master types who stood behind George W. That's it. So while Cheney as a subject matter isn't something I can say I **care** about, it's also not material that's old hat to me either. I ended up watching it only because that's what my mate wanted to do for his birthday, but I'm glad I did. I did not **love** _Vice_, but for the sort of thing I don't normally gravitate towards, I was riveted.
_Final rating:★★★ - I liked it. Would personally recommend you give it a go._

**amazing, beautiful and shocking movie**
I didn't expect that I would like the movie in this way because I have no interest in the singer Elvis Bresley because I have never heard his songs. All I know is that he is a rock and roll legend. I had no interest or any attachment to this character, but the movie made me admire his true personality.
That was so magical with all the beauty of the story and it really hurt my heart. Biographical films about rock stars have something traditional. You see at the beginning of the movies as the hero of the true story he was humble and then you see his rise to the top and his attachment to drugs and his love for women until the end. This movie has this characteristic as well, but the film's direction by Baz Luhrmann was frankly excellent as it had a rhythm The film is fast-paced. It is difficult to take a break between the movie because the rhythm of the film was fast.
Everything was fast until I realized that the story of Elvis could be turned into a series with several episodes, 7 or 8, but when the story was turned into a movie, the events of his life story were transformed into an incredibly fast frame. My eyes were inside the movie as a zoom frame mode following the movie from the first scene to the last scene curiously. The colors were amazing, it was something shiny.

Elvis (2022) is a biopic that offers an insightful glimpse into the life and talent of one of the greatest performers to ever grace the stage. Austin Butler delivers an outstanding performance as Elvis, effortlessly capturing the essence of the legendary artist from start to finish. His portrayal is likely to earn him much-deserved accolades during the awards season.
However, the film does have its flaws. Clocking in at 2 hours and 40 minutes, it's a bit too long for comfort, and towards the end, it starts to lose its momentum, leading to an unsatisfying finish. Additionally, the film's over-the-top and extravagant visual style, while suitable for the musical numbers, can become burdensome and distracting during the quieter moments.
Unfortunately, the film's narrator and one of its most prominent actors, Tom Hanks, gives a surprisingly disappointing performance. His prosthetics often look like they're falling off, and his accent is distracting and difficult to get used to. This issue is compounded by the fact that he's the narrator, which means he's present throughout much of the movie, causing some frustration and annoyance.
Despite its shortcomings, Elvis is still an enjoyable and informative movie that provides an excellent window into the life of a musical icon. While it may not be perfect, there are certainly enough high points to warrant a watch, making it worth a solid 6/10 rating.

I found this movie to be fairly entertaining and, if mostly accurate, how much damage a con man can do to a performer’s career, and indeed their life, if they are unscrupulous and greedy. I had heard that the man who called himself Colonel Parker had forced songwriters to give Presley writing credits before he would let him perform their songs, but I had never dug deep enough to learn how badly he was duping his own client and supposed friend.
And as often seems to happen with celebrities with fame and money, drugs appear to have shortened Elvis’s life. With early rock stars or those living that lifestyle, overdoses often did them in. But With the likes of Judy Garland and Elvis, it was prescription drugs that slowly caused their lives to ebb away. A sad story in many ways. I would have liked to see him more as a father and husband. But the acting, writing and the story of his musical journey was enough to keep me interested. It was funny, but when they related at the end the postscripts to the lives, their description of Colonel Parker’s final years seemed designed to elicit pity or ”serves him right.” But in a weird way, I wonder if her was content powering down his life in Vegas gambling his fortune away. Who else would he leave it to?

_Elvis_ is exactly what I expected going into this and I still found myself having a great time with this film. It is so incredible seeing the highs and lows of an artist's career and being there for the ride is such an intimate experience, even if the actual story is probably butchered to death to fit in a feature length film. But a biopic is only as great as the leading actor carrying this film and I glad to report that Austin Butler absolutely nailed this role. Fantastic through and through. My one big complaint about this film is the runtime. Almost three hours feels entirely unnecessary, but with it being on HBO Max, it is way more digestible in two chunks.
**Score:** _74%_ |
**Verdict:** _Good_

ELVIS (2022) has flashes of brilliance but Baz Luhrmann's scissor-happy editing causes it to suffer as the music isn't allowed to breathe.
And Tom Hanks's Goldmember impersonation is... something.

**Good moments but WAY too long.**
A spectacular performance by Austin Butler, fabulous costumes, and set design were all weighed down by a much too long runtime and the impending doom of focusing on Elvis’ crooked manager.

Film ruined the career of Elvis Presley. In the 1960s, while The Beatles and Rolling Stones were airborne across America, he was caught in a trap: starring in over 20 inane film projects. This allowed the rock n’ roll revolution that centered on Elvis to pass him by. Ironically, this story and more were adapted to the screen last month in the biographical film, ‘Elvis’. The picture was directed by Baz Lurhmann (of ‘Moulin Rouge!’ and ‘The Great Gatsby’ fame) and stars newcomer Austin Butler as our favorite jailhouse rocker. It spans Presley’s career entirely, but with a rigorous focus on the abusive relationship with his manager, “Colonel” Tom Parker, played by Tom Hanks.
The conspiracy theorists have been right all this time. Elvis Presley is alive and well, but young, thirty, and goes by the name of Austin Butler…or at least that’s what I saw on the screen. I can’t praise Butler enough, let alone give him the justice he deserves in this paragraph, so I recommend you keep an eye out for him this next awards season. I am of the adamant opinion that there are three different Elvis Presleys: 50s rock star, 60s movie star, and 70s icon. All three act and move so, so unalike, and Austin understood and played them all. The movie is almost sequenced in this way: giving all three Elvises (Elvi?) their own hour to portray themselves. Similar praises are in order to Helen Thompson, who plays Elvis’ mother, Gladys Presley, and Alton Mason who plays Little Richard, who I wish we would’ve seen more of. The first quarter of the movie is set in the late-1950s, around Elvis’ rise to fame, and a majority of these scenes, especially the few that have Elvis and Gladys conversing about what lies ahead for the both of them, are so tonally gripping and devastating. Every director has a style, whether that be the calculated darkness of Alfred Hitchcock or Michael Bay’s explosions-a-plenty. Baz Luhrmann’s is simply vehement extravagance. I can’t praise his art direction throughout the film enough. Whether it’s the set design, costume design, or the way Austin melts the camera lens whenever he’s on-screen, Baz Luhrmann’s presence is always intensely felt, especially if you’re familiar with his past work. Luhrmann also co-wrote the screenplay, which continues to make me feel as though he was the perfect man for this job. While your ‘Bohemian Rhapsodies’ will play ‘Another One Bites The Dust’ at the drop of any hat, ‘Elvis’ earns every music queue. It doesn’t just use the music, the film reexamines it. Tones in goofy, throw-away songs, like ‘Cotton Candy Land’ and ‘Power of My Love’, are completely overhauled and turned into life-defining theme songs for these real life characters. New songs, such as ‘Vegas‘ by Doja Cat, ‘Tupelo Shuffle‘ by Swae Lee with Diplo, and ‘Let It All Hang Out‘ by Denzel Curry also have this same sense of extravagance, electrifying every scene they’re in. One track that I thought was used beautifully and like never before was the iconic ‘Unchained Melody’, which had the audience ready to sob on the theater floor every time I saw the film on its opening weekend.
Truthfully, there was not much that I didn’t overwhelmingly enjoy. At around two hours and forty minutes, the runtime may be a little much for the average viewer. I’ve come to the determination that, yes, it’s long, but not too long. Nothing in the almost three hours could be lost without the story (and the emotional significance of its payoff) being affected drastically. The story flows like a puzzle, with every piece being important to understand the full picture. Baz states that there’s a four-hour cut somewhere in the archive and while he says it will most likely never see the light of day, I believe it. When it comes to time, though, I hate that we didn’t spend more time in the period where Elvis was forced to make those truly terrible films of the 1960s. You can feel the importance of this wasted time in Elvis’ life, but it’s not explicitly shown and might leave those unfamiliar addled. Our introduction to Elvis’ longtime wife, Priscilla Presley, was quite weak as well, as we never really see them meet. She’s just kind of…there. Sure, she’s not integral to the main story (that of Elvis and the Colonel), but not having your two romantic leads meet is surely a bold choice. Tom Hanks as Tom Parker is something I would have portrayed differently as well. I’ve seen a lot of people online refer to him as “cartoonish” and, when I saw the film with ‘Sabor Latino’ host Cristopher Loya, he could only compare Hanks’ performance to Jared Leto’s ridiculous portrayal of Paolo Gucci in 2021’s laughable ‘House of Gucci’. I have to agree. This cunning, evil businessman should have been lurking in the shadows of Elvis’ story, not ridiculously running around and laughing through halls with a cane. I feel like I’m watching Cesar Romero’s Joker compared to Heath Ledger’s. This is not to say it’s a terrible performance, which it isn’t, but simply succeeded in portraying a different idea than I would have liked it to.
Elvis Presley means so many different things to so many different people. As a man, he is portrayed truthfully here, with very little being held back. The climax of the movie, based around Elvis’ 1968 NBC television special, often referred to as “The Comeback”, shows the man grasping with mortality and relevancy with the undervalued song, ‘If I Can Dream’. This scene specifically says a lot about how the film and its crew feel about Elvis Presley, whether it’s the tears in Austin Butler’s eyes as he belts out the song, the camera’s intricate zoom on the Colonel watching Elvis from the background, or Baz Lurhmann’s distortion of the background with magazine articles, showing us how the world thought at the time. It’s almost an enhanced stage play with thick, thoughtful dialogue throughout. I very much enjoyed the film and it places high in my favorites of all time. While Elton John’s ‘Rocketman’ might still be my reigning, defending biopic champion, second place isn’t too shabby at all. The powers that be all came together to make this one, great cinematic experience that the entire family will be able to enjoy and appreciate. I recommend you do it while the film is still available in theaters across the globe.

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"Elvis features a glorious, electrifying, iconic performance from Austin Butler that will deservedly guarantee him all the awards of the year.
Unfortunately, the actor isn't enough to overcome the many technical issues, besides Tom Hanks' massive miscast and the formulaic musical biopic narrative. Baz Luhrmann's style theoretically fits the legendary singer's vibrant aura, and the filmmaker's intention is clear.
Nevertheless, the frenetic, choppy editing and the restless camera movements rather come off as a messy, confusing, headache-inducing atmosphere instead of elements that elevate the overall piece. The unnecessarily hefty doesn't help.
I was hoping to be surprised, but then again, I'm admittedly not the biggest Elvis/Luhrmann fan."
Rating: C+

After about ten minutes, I was both exhausted and terrified. Was what I had just seen - colourful but frenetic and haphazard going to continue? Well, it does calm down - and continues to quite cleverly interweave the early years and aspirations of this young boy with the openly racist political situation that prevailed in the Southern United States in the early 1940s. From here on in, I am treating this as a provocative and entertaining but entirely speculative drama about this man. Historians always argue about what did happen - or what might have, and I haven't any factual insight to add. On that basis, this is a quickly paced and creatively structured depiction of the main points of the life of Elvis. Austin Butler has an uncanny resemblance. As was often said of Dustin Hoffman, it's a fine line between mimicry and acting, but here I think Butler is more in the latter corner. He puts enormous effort into this portrayal. Physically and emotionally he gives convincingly of his all, leaving us in no doubt as to the talents and raw charisma that drove Presley to sell more records than anyone else. History tells us that he was discovered, and that until his death he had a pretty turbulent relationship with his promoter - Col. Tom Parker (Tom Hanks). Hanks is fine, no better. His make up did distract me, especially as he aged, and his accent isn't the best; but he features surprisingly sparingly even if he is essentially relaying the narrative to us. Virtually all of this focusses on the excellent Butler as he demonstrates the highs and low of this man who ended up craving love and adulation as readily as anyone can crave drugs or booze (though he used his fair share of them too). I could have done with more flesh on the bones of his relationship with his mother and his wife, but the depictions of the parasitic hangers-on who continually bleed him dry leave us with a potent image of a not unintelligent man who brought pleasure to millions with his gyrating, his songs and his personality, but maybe didn't keep that much back for himself. It's planet Baz, so of course it is flamboyant and busy, the musical numbers are fluid and full of energy. Once it settles down it is a vibrant and lively effort that really does fly by and that I really did enjoy.

I mean, I know Ted Bundy was the protagonist... but I got the strong feeling he was the good guy in this. Honestly, as in, that wasn't a sarcastic bit, they try and make him heroic.
And yeah, the title suggests something: "Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile" but it doesn't achieve what it suggests, this is a Ted Bundy story if it was made by pre-woke Disney, and he was the charming prince.
The Serial Killer part is muted to the point where the viewer you think the writer actually thought he was innocent.
And it's a movie about a Serial Killer and rapist that tries to not offend. That doesn't work, Serial Killers and rapists are very offensive people, so offensive we lock them up for life or execute them... unless you are in California, Washington, Oregon, DC, Chicago, New York or New Jersey, where they are more focused on locking up the people that got away for the crime of self defense.
So, that is probably why, in their effort to woke up a movie about a Seriel killer and rapist whilst avoiding as many potential triggers as possible, they succeeded in making Ted Bundy look almost heroic

It's safe to say that Zac Effron wasn't cast to play Ted Bundy for the same reasons that landed Charlize Theron the role of Aileen Wournos. He can't act, but then he doesn't need to; he looks the part even if he can’t be the part — and he needn’t be it, either; unlike Monster, this movie makes no attempt to probe into Bundy's psyche. If one is looking for any motive, reason, or explanation for his crimes, one will not find them here.
Who or what exactly is supposed to be "wicked" and "vile"? The judge (John Malkovich) who sentences Bundy uses those words to describe his crimes. Effron replies: “I do not accept the sentence because it is not mine. It is a sentence from someone else who is not here today.”
Director Joe Berlinger seems to agree with that statement. That is, he focuses on the charming, charismatic side of the sociopath, neglecting to contrast those traits with the character's less agreeable (to put it mildly) attributes. Where's the wickedness? Where the vileness?
Like a true pseudocumentary filmmaker (he also made the companion piece Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes, which, as described on Rotten Tomatoes, "skirts introspection, making it just as illusive as its subject"), Berlinger doesn't let facts get in the way of a good story (or a bad one, as this case proves to be).
For example, at the end we are informed that Liz Kendall, Bundy's romantic partner, "has stayed sober" since the events of the film. This took me completely by surprise; I saw her imbibe a couple of times, but never once did I see her in any condition resembling a state of drunkenness.
There is a much more serious omission, though. It's not until the film's closing moments (in overtime, as it were) that we see, or rather catch a glimpse of, Bundy committing a crime. It's not until the epilogue that there is an admission of guilt. By then it's is too little, too late (there is also a series of brief flashbacks to different points in the film, as if they were clues. Why? This is not a thriller, or at least it shouldn't be one. The only redeeming quality about those flashbacks is that they include a reminder of one of the movie's two instances of unintentional comedy; i.e., when a dog apparently mistakes Bundy for Damien Thorne. The other instance is of course James Hetfield, officer of the law).

**_An interesting approach to the story, but the tone is poorly managed. Worth seeing for Efron's performance, though_**
>_I get very, very angry and indignant. I don't like being locked up for something I didn't do, and I don't like my liberty taken away, and I don't like being treated like an animal, and I don't like people walking around and ogling me like I'm some sort of weirdo, because I'm not._
- Ted Bundy; Interview in Garfield County Jail, Colorado (May 15, 1977)
> _Those of us who are, who have been so much influenced by violence in the media, in particular pornographic viol__ence, are not some kinds of inherent monsters. We are your sons and we are your husbands. And we grew up in regular families._
- Ted Bundy; Interview with James Dobson in Florida State Prison (January 23, 1989; the day before his execution)
> _He would walk me out to my car at two in the morning when my shift was over, and he'd say "Ann please lock your doors, I don't want anything bad to happen to you on the way home"._
- Ann Rule; "Ted Bundy" episode of _Born To Kill?_ (2012)
> _He ruined our lives and he's still part of our lives._
- Belva Kent, mother of victim Debra Jean Kent (February 16, 2005)
>_The reason I wanted to do this film is precisely because it avoided showing the violence. I'm much more interested in making a film about how a serial killer is living his life when he's not killing. To me, that deception and betrayal and manipulation is far scarier. Doing a movie about the fact that people can be in your midst and be killers is more interesting than just doing a movie about the catalogue of violence. Some people have criticised the lack of violence in the film as being disrespectful to the victims, saying we're glorifying a killer. I actually think the opposite, and I'm confused and surprised at the idea that someone showing the worst moment in somebody's existence - the moment where they're being tortured and killed – how showing that means you're not glorifying the killer. I think that's much more disrespectful to the victims of the violent crime. To me, you're glorifying the killer by showing the worst moment._
- Joe Berlinger; "Q&A: _Extremely Wicked_ Director Joe Berlinger Loves Zac Efron, Not Ted Bundy" (Brandon Katz); _Observer_ (May 3, 2019)
Directed by Joe Berlinger immediately after he completed work on _Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes_, _Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile_ is a strange beast. A serial killer film which doesn't show any serial killing, it has been advertised as told from the perspective of a single character, but that character is one who's barely in the second half of the movie. Tonally, it's also unusual insofar as it seems for about 90% of its runtime to genuinely flirt with the notion that Bundy may have been the victim of a vast conspiracy. In reality, of course, given leeway by a judge out of his depth, granted privileges by a prison system unaware of how dangerous he really was, turned into an ironic folk hero by a media unused to such a charming and humorous breed of criminal, and supported by a cadre of women who judged him too good-looking to be a killer, Bundy was the first celebrity serial killer, and remains the best-known example of such (Charles Manson doesn't count as he wasn't a serial killer). And whilst the film is worth seeing for Zac Efron's performance if nothing else, it's a strangely muted affair, neither ghoulish warts-and-all carnage nor restrained psychological treatise. Telling the story of Bundy from the perspective of a woman who was oblivious to his true nature is an undeniably interesting narrative choice, and had Berlinger stuck to this format, it could have made for a fascinating film. However, the longer it goes on, the more it seems to revel in Bundy's flamboyance, and what begins as an intriguing insider's look at living with a killer soon shifts into an underwhelming courtroom drama, only returning to its original tone in the final (entirely fictional) scene.
The film begins in 1989, with Ted Bundy (Efron) on death row in Florida, still maintaining his innocence, although his execution is imminent. Visited by his former girlfriend, Liz Kendall (Lilly Collins), aka Liz Kloepfer, she demands he confess to his crimes so she can move on with her life. The film then returns to 1969, the night Bundy and Liz first met in a Seattle bar. As a single mother with a low-paying job, Liz is surprised to find this charismatic, handsome, and intelligent law student so interested in her, but interested he is, with the duo quickly falling in love, and Bundy treating both Liz and her daughter Molly extremely well. The film then jumps forward to July 1974. When two women are abducted in broad daylight from a packed Lake Sammamish State Park in Washington, the police issue a sketch of a man who resembles Bundy, saying the suspect may drive a yellow Volkswagen Beetle (which he does). The following year, when he is stopped in Utah for a minor traffic violation, the police find a "kidnap kit" in his car (ropes, handcuffs, ski mask, leather gloves, crowbar etc), and take him into custody, where he is positively identified by Carol DaRonch (Grace Victoria Cox), who had narrowly avoiding being kidnapped in November 1974. Bundy vehemently protests his innocence to Liz, claiming that DaRonch was shown his picture prior to the line-up, and although concerned, she accepts his explanations. After a bench trial, Bundy is found guilty of attempted kidnapping, and sentenced to one to 15 years. When he is subsequently charged with murder in Colorado, although she still believes him to be innocent, Liz starts to drink heavily to help her deal with the stress. However, as police departments across California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Utah, Colorado, and Florida start to connect Bundy to a string of recent murders, it becomes harder and harder for Liz to shake the feeling that there's more to her boyfriend than she could ever have imagined.
Very loosely based on Liz Kloepfer's memoir, _The Phantom Prince: My Life With Ted Bundy_ (1981), _Extremely Wicked_ is written by Michael Werwie, and had been on The Black List for several years before it came to the attention of Berlinger. The hook for the original script was that the audience is unaware the character they're watching is in fact Ted Bundy; the film was written as a supposedly fictional story of a young couple whose life is shattered when he is accused of multiple murders, with his real identity only coming as a final act twist. As Berlinger was completing _The Ted Bundy Tapes_, the script was offered to him, and although he found the twist distasteful, he loved the idea of looking at the Bundy story through the eyes of someone who thought him to be innocent. Known as a documentarian for films such as _Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills_ (1996), _Metallica: Some Kind of Monster_ (2004), and _Whitey: United States of America v. James J. Bulger_ (2014), _Extremely Wicked_ is only Berlinger's second scripted film, after the fascinating misfire that was _Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2_ (2000).
One of the biggest appeals of the movie, of course, is the unexpected casting of Zac Efron as Bundy (Efron also serves as executive producer). Known for his early roles in Disney films such as Kenny Ortega's original _High School Musical_ trilogy, and later comedies such as Nicholas Stoller's _Neighbors_ (2014), Dan Mazer's _Dirty Grandpa_ (2016), and Seth Gordon's _Baywatch_ (2017), aside from Lee Daniels's batshit insane _The Paperboy_ (2012) and Peter Landesman's ensemble piece _Parkland_ (2013), Efron has never really had a chance to show any dramatic chaps. And it has to be said, he's excellent here. Although he doesn't look like Bundy _per se_ (Bundy was good looking, he wasn't _that_ good looking), Efron has the mannerisms down to an absolute tee. If you watch the film after the docu-series, you'll really pick up on the depth of the performance, especially in the scene where the gloating Sheriff of Leon County, Ken Katsaris (Kevin McClatchy), indicts Bundy in front of the assembled media - Efron's every movement and gesture, every glance at the camera, the way he smiles, the way he stands, the tone of his voice, everything is perfect. Of course, Bundy's good looks and charisma were his most formidable weapons, and as a very attractive, very clean-cut, and very charming white man, Efron is able to tap into the fact that one of the most important aspects of the Bundy case was his white privilege (something which has been discussed by everyone from Robert D. Keppel to Ann Rule to Stephen G. Michaud). Bundy proved that evil could fester under an extremely attractive façade, and this gives Efron room to manoeuvre, playing every scene in such a way that the subtext is always apparent even though he never ostensibly lets Bundy's mask slip. Indeed, it's the absence of any obvious monstrousness in the performance which is so unnerving. As Liz, Lily Collins makes less of an impact, but that's because she has less to work with (more on this in a moment). Having said that, however, where Collins is especially good is in conveying how the seemingly never-ending series of accusations are having a cumulative effect; every time we see her, she looks wearier than before.
The film also features a fine supporting cast, all delivering strong, if restrained, performances; Kaya Scodelario as Carole Ann Boone (an old friend of Bundy's who ultimately became his wife and mother to his child), Angela Sarafyan as Joanna (Liz's (fictional) best friend), Haley Joel Osment as Jerry Thompson (Liz's (fictional) co-worker), James Hetfield as Officer Bob Hayward (who arrested Bundy in Utah in 1975), Jeffrey Donovan as John O'Connell (Bundy's attorney in the DaRonch kidnapping case in Utah), Dylan Baker as David Yocom (prosecutor in the DaRonch kidnapping case), Terry Kinney as Det. Mike Fisher (one of the lead investigators working the Colorado murders), and Jim Parsons as Larry Simpson (prosecutor in the Florida double murder trial). The only false note from an acting perspective is John Malkovich, who's spectacularly miscast as Edward Cowart, the presiding judge at Bundy's double-murder trial. Apart from the fact that Malkovich looks nothing like Cowart, he chews every bit of scenery anywhere near him, overacting to a painful degree. He's not quite as bad as he is in _Billions_, where he has the worst Russian accent I've ever heard from an actor not named Gary Oldman, but he's not far off (and I say that as a Malkovich fan).
One of the film's most notable components is that, apart from one brief scene near the end, there is no depiction of violence. Ostensibly this is Liz's story, and although Berlinger loses sense of that in the second half, he does adhere to the principle of not just keeping the violence off-screen, but of never showing us anything leading up to any of the murders, or any of the immediate aftermath. The idea, obviously enough, is to present Bundy not with the 20-20 hindsight of history, but with the same degree of ambiguity with which Liz would have viewed him. Indeed, if by some miracle someone stumbled on the film who knew nothing about Bundy, I'd imagine they would view it as a mystery thriller about a woman whose boyfriend may or may not be a killer. It's an interesting way into the story and seems a genuine attempt to do something more than simply reproduce the salacious details of the crimes, dwelling not on Bundy's sadism and savagery, but on his manipulations of the people in his life. In this sense, I'm sure it will disappoint those hoping for gory excess, scenes of decapitation, and copious necrophilia. Prior to the end, the closest the film really gets to the details of the crimes is a sequence of Bundy and Liz in relationship bliss, with 16mm home movie-style footage playing on-screen, over which we hear news reports about the murders.
Of course, if you're making a film about a serial killer which doesn't feature much in the way of serial killing, you're going to need to fill it with something, and in this sense, Berlinger focuses, at least in the first half, on how a killer can lie and manipulate, coming across as completely normal to all who know him (it's not mentioned in the film, but it is covered in the docu-series that The Church of the Latter-day Saints of Jesus Christ, which Bundy had joined shortly before his 1975 arrest, were so convinced of his innocence, they sent representatives to support him in court and publicly defended his character). With this in mind, the first half isn't really a true crime story so much as it is an examination of the lies a person capable of evil must tell to hide that capability. Berlinger himself has said that the film is about the mechanics of how a person can be "_seduced by someone capable of evil_", and it was his intention that the audience actually like Bundy, as he wanted them to feel disgust with themselves – just like Liz, Berlinger wanted them to be seduced by evil, and feel very uncomfortable with themselves for allowing it to happen.
However, as admirable as this approach is, the film has a lot of problems, some of which arise directly because of the unique entry point into the story. For one thing, because the film depicts Bundy not as we now know him but as his contemporaries saw him, it means we only see the performative side, never the monstrous underbelly. Sure, this means that the film avoids exploitation, but in doing so, it could be accused of sanitisation (to be fair, this is something of a damned if you do, damned if you don't scenario - show the murders and you're exploiting real-life suffering, don't show them and you're hiding the true nature of his crimes). And granted, portraying him as a possibly innocent man is part of the attempt to explain how Liz and the myriad of other women who supported him were essentially partaking in a form of mass self-delusion. However, all the good intentions in the world don't change the fact that the film's Bundy is a lovable rogue who bites his thumb at the system, not a murderer, a man who raped and butchered a 12-year-old child, and who decapitated multiple women and had sex with their corpses.
I understand that Berlinger wants to dramatise the reason that Liz and others were duped, depicting how she could have been blinded by devotion to a man that she thought (correctly, as it turned out) was too good to be true. But the problem is that she herself is never characterised enough for this to work. Indeed, one gets the impression that Berlinger doesn't find her especially interesting on her own – everything we learn about her is predicated on her relationship with Bundy; there's nothing about her life prior to meeting him, and what we learn about her life after he was convicted is primarily fictional. This is true to an even greater degree for Carole Ann Boone, who is introduced out of nowhere as an "old friend" of Bundy's, soon becoming his lover and supporter, and conceiving a child whilst he was on death row. Again, we learn nothing beyond her relevance to his story. Additionally, the focus shift halfway through as the film transitions from Liz as subjective focaliser to a more objectively focalised courtroom drama makes very little tonal sense. It's almost as if Berlinger loses interest in Liz when the sensationalist trial begins and Bundy really comes into his own. This transition reduces Liz to a cycle of watching the trial, crying, doubting his guilt, drinking, watching the trial, crying etc, as she's effectively stripped of what little agency she had in the first half.
Another problem created by telling the story from Liz's perspective is that we learn nothing new about Bundy himself; there's nothing about his childhood, for example, or how he got away with the murders for so long, whether he really loved Liz, or if he genuinely lacked the ability to feel empathy, as Dorothy Otnow Lewis, Professor of Psychiatry at the New York University School of Medicine, would claim in 1988 (something not covered in the film). Along the same lines, we learn nothing whatsoever about any of the victims. This was also a problem in the docu-series, but it's far more pronounced here, and because of this, the decision to put the names of Bundy's known victims on screen at the end of film is unearned, crass, and meaningless, coming as it does at the end of a film in which an A-list movie star has just portrayed their killer, whilst most of them are never even mentioned.
The film also makes some strange changes to documented fact, many of which seem designed to make Bundy more sympathetic. For example, there's no mention of the fact that he tried multiple times to pressure Liz into rough sex, particularly choking. The film also has Liz state that Bundy never raised his voice to her or laid a hand on her, ignoring an incident when he pushed her into a lake during an argument. Another scene sees Bundy forcibly restrained in his cell whilst a dentist takes impressions of his teeth. In reality, the impressions were taken in a dentist chair, and Bundy quite happily allowed the dentist to work, sitting down in the chair without any complaint. The film also shows him continuing to try to contact Liz throughout his incarceration, long after his marriage to Boone. In reality, however, he lost contact with Liz entirely in the early 80s, and there's no evidence he tried to find her, nor did she need to hear him confess in order to "move on". Ironically enough, if the film had stayed focused on Liz, these changes would have made more sense, as the entire film could be argued to be subjective. But because of the focal shift, one cannot make this argument, and such changes become more troubling.
_Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile_ is by no means a bad film. But it could have been so much better. The shift from subjective focalisation to court-room drama makes very little sense, and fundamentally undermines what Berlinger seems to have been trying to do. Much like the media which he is so keen to criticise (both here and in _The Ted Bundy Tapes_), and despite numerous statements to the contrary, he seems as enamoured of Bundy the showman as everyone else was and so many still are. Adopting a fascinating approach, the film initially looks at how evil can hide in plain view, creeping into our lives under the guise of normalcy, hiding monstrousness behind affection. Unfortunately, Berlinger allows this theme to recede into the background as he gives the narrative over to Bundy. And yet, he never manages to say anything new, raising the question of why anything needed to be said at all. If this was supposed to be Liz's story, Berlinger takes his eye off the ball badly, allowing the grandstanding, manipulative Bundy to hog the spotlight. And although the film doesn't sympathise with him, and although the decision not to show any of the murders is commendable, the fact is that like he was with the media of the time, like he has been with so many writers and in so many documentaries and scripted films over the last few decades, once again, Ted Bundy is very much the star of his own show.