Summer 2017 movies deliver idiocy, victory

Andrew Shermoen

Its been a rollercoaster of a summer hasn’t it? Especially for film.

The summer is also a cesspool of the worst that Hollywood has to offer, puking out half-baked projects constructed by a 20-team writing committee in the hopes they can push out something dazzling and explosion filled enough to make audiences drag their feet to watch another “Transformers” or some tragic, ill-conceived remake of a classic and beloved 80’s or 90’s film franchise. Thus we present to you the three best and three worst films of Summer 2017.

Worst: “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales”

“The acting is poor, characters are wasted, the plot is contrived and confusing and its tone is messy. It’s time to kill this franchise. The first film will always hold a special place in my heart and overall the first three films are a pretty solid fantasy, swashbuckling trilogy. It is a joke to think these movies should under any circumstance continue. To Davy Jones’ Locker with this franchise.”

Rating: 1.5/5

Best: “Spider-Man: Homecoming”

“Altogether, ‘Spider-Man: Homecoming’ is a really great addition to the Marvel movie series. Moving away from a large-scale worldwide threat to a small crime ring threatening New York City while also mixing in the stress of a secret life as Peter tries to succeed in school makes for a more intimate and interesting story in the Marvel Universe. All topped with incredible performances from Holland and Keaton, hilarious writing and a moving story about Peter trying to prove himself to be a true hero. Fans of Spider-Man will be very pleased.”

Rating: 4/5

Worst: “The Dark Tower”

“‘The Dark Tower’ is a hodge-podge of half realized ideas that make no sense. The Man in Black’s magic allows him to stop people from breathing, but Jake and Roland are immune to this magic for undefined reasons and sometimes he uses alternate magic to defeat people who he can just kill by ordering they cease inhalation. All in all, “The Dark Tower” is a poorly conceived mess that the studios should’ve given up on trying to create long ago.”

Rating: 1/5

Best: “Baby Driver”

“It’s very rare you see action like this in a movie. It’s very grounded in reality but it’s elevated to a supernatural by the simple virtue of its almost musical like soundtrack … Not to mention the creative use of action beats following rhythm adds a humorous and energetic quality to every single action scene. Tires skid against pavement to match humming violins, the hum of engine revs at the same pace to an energized rhythm guitar, semi-automatic fire pulses along with hi-hats and snare drums. It all makes for truly inspired and riveting action scenes where your blood pumps in time with the action beats and the music as one.”

Rating: 4.5/5

Worst: “The Emoji Movie”

“‘The Emoji Movie’ doesn’t know if it’s an over-glorified advertisement for unknown and forgotten apps, or a thinkpiece on how tech-obsessed millennials are. This entire mess of a film is written and directed by Tony Leondis who is clearly unhappy that not enough people liked his last movie “Igor.” That or he just wishes his nephew would hang out with him instead of texting all his friends. Please, please Bradley, hang out with uncle Tony before he makes a sequel.”

Rating: 0/5

Best: “War for the Planet of the Apes”

“There’s something so powerful about the story of ‘War of the Planet of the Apes’ and its predecessors that allow it to transcend the traditional framework of blockbuster films. These are movies that have tackled the fear of pandemic, loss of humanity, the forming of culture, the flexible bands of functional society and much more. All this through the gaze of characters who are CGI, Motion-Capture apes, but despite this the main characters of these movies have never felt more human. I’ll call it now. These new ‘Planet of the Apes’ movies will go down as one of the greatest trilogies in all of movie history.”

Rating: 5/5

The three worst films of the summer and the three best. It was certainly a summer of good and bad. A gag emoji seems appropriate here, but now it just seems counterintuitive.