rananjaychauhan-60620 Reviews

Dunkirk (2017)

Gripping and Immersive, in a typical Nolan fashion.

[9/10 · 26 February 2022]

I have Dunkirk quite a few times and it is a gripping, stunningly shot movie. The movies directorial set-pieces are a courtesy of the one, who just might the best director of the 21st century, Christopher Nolan and his exceptional team. On a directorial standpoint, this is as good as it gets.

Coming on to the movie itself, the source material used to depict the evacuation of Dunkirk and the stakes of it has been put together to give an excellent script. The movie conveniently shifts from character to character without any sense of disconnection. The script goes deep showing 6 different charactorial representations - a soldier who wants to go home by any means, another soldier (pilot) who couldn't stand war trauma, another pilot who just wants to protect those 300000 from air strikes, 2 civilians with a sense of patriotism and service and a man who just wanted to be meaningful. The plot depth is excellent.

The opening sequence established the sense of urgency. The air strike sequence, with its spontaneous nature, maintained that urgency. The cinematography and direction is brilliant. It can be a bit confusing how it changes sequences between Dunkirk and the Sea, and also between Day 1 and Day 2. The ship sequence from in between can be confusing, as it was night but throughout the movie it was day, but that sequence was a giveaway to how this movie spans over a period of 2 days.

It is bloodless, yes. The direction may just a tad bit difficult to understand, yes. The actors may have been under-utilized but none of them could take away what it was, a stunning war-thriller. It is criminally underrated because it compares right with the best.

PS: I am not British. So, I may not be taking the significance of this event seriously. So pardon.

Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)

When you eat Infinity War for breakfast and Endgame for dinner.

[10/10 · 20 December 2021]

My goodness! I was prepping myself to be smitten by this movie but boy oh boy was I underestimating! With No Way Home, Marvel Studios, Sony and director Jon Watts may just have made the best superhero movie ever! I remember reading critic reviews saying that this movie is fan service. While I say that they are completely underestimating and underappreciating this masterpiece of a movie, even if you go into the theaters thinking of this as so, you will not be disappointed at all. Somehow, I feel that this is better than my 3 favorite movies: Infinity War, Endgame and The Dark Knight.

Each moment of the movie is special. The plot exposition along with the expected and unexpected reveals make this a movie to go whoa about. The people inside the multiplex didn't spare any moment to not shout or clap about. From Charlie Cox's Matt Murdock reveal to the extremely unexpected Supreme Strange reveal in the post credits, this movie was anything but sedate. I cannot describe the feeling of the crowd when Maguire and Garfield's Peters show up.

Coming to the movie, it is fantabulous. All the actors have worked their bottoms out. This movie is the right balance of quips, humor and darkness. Things get dark pretty soon. Tom Holland has absolutely nailed it as the new Spidey. Willem Dafoe's approach to the Goblin has always been spectacular and with No Way Home, his interpretation has become even more darker (in a quite Joker-esque fashion). Jamie Foxx's Electro as a power-hungry but human villain was right on the money. Others such as Zendaya, Jacob Batalon and for whatever time we got see Tobey and Andrew, was spot on with their roles.

One of the strongest things about this movie is its plot. It has a masterpiece of a plot. The plot twists were very unexpected, especially where Holland's Peter makes the ultimate sacrifice by making everyone forget that he's Spiderman, without any exceptions. This movie not only makes sure that it not only sets up for "Multiverse of Madness", but also sets up for immense character-development for MCU's Spidey, for the greater future. The plot of this movie easily prevents it from being an "Exposition Dump of Maddening Reveals". The emotional set-pieces of this movie are genuinely hard-hitting and act as an apt reason for the main hero to become what he becomes at the end, i.e., as selfless as the Web-Slinger can be. Aunt May's death was completely unexpected and served as the perfect set-piece for Tom's Parker to do whatever he did. This movies plot goes so vast that the significant emotional moments from the Raimi and Marc Webb movies are also felt in this movie. Andrew's Peter saving Michelle Jones provokes memories of Gwen's death and act as a moment of reckoning and self-peace for him. Tobey stopping Goblin from dying is his moment of self-peace. All-in-all, it was a mix and match everything right and nothing wrong , done in the best possible fashion.

Those who've given negative reviews, while I'm not saying that they are unintelligent for doing so, I'm simply not able to understand what was the issue. For the goofs that have been mentioned on this website, I think they are quite self-explanatory in themselves.

I hope everyone reading enjoyed my view of this masterpiece. I'll go so far as to say that this movie deserves an Oscar more than any other movie. Not only for it has done, but also for how well has it managed to do what it did at such a large scale.