Hurricane Bianca (2016)

Directed and written by: Matt Kugelman

A New York teacher, who moves to small town Texas where he's fired for being gay, returns disguised as a mean lady to get revenge on the nasty town.

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Netflix recommended Hurricane Bianca to me because I have been binge watching RuPaul's Drag Race in the last three weeks. This recommendation came in handy because I had just moved on to season 8 and I hadn't really connected with any of the competitors the way I connected with Bianca Del Rio in season 6. I think I had passed that movie scrolling through Netflix before but didn't really pay attention until now.

The story itself is not the best but it sure is entertaining. It's hilarious, mostly thanks to all these amazing personalities, mostly Roy Haylock / Bianca Del Rio. There's so much charm and humour there, exactly why Bianca became my favourite. She's mostly the force that keeps the movie going. There are also other great performers in the film that keep it alive and save it from falling flat. But if it wasn't for Bianca Del Rio, even those small roles wouldn't help this movie.

The film is entertaining though of course some jokes are way too corny or childish but I'm ready to let that slide, which I don't do often, only when a movie gave me something. And while the humour is the main thing in this movie there's also an amazing meaning and message, which is something I can appreciate.

There was something weird going on in the movie, visually. There was something up with the lighting, and I discussed it with my friend Topi and his guess was that the lighting would've been made for Bianca's makeup, for it to look as good as it possibly can. That can be it, but I don't really know. There were many scenes where people or backgrounds or items looked fake and extremely unreal. 

I got used to it, eventually, but what I didn't get used to was the cinematography. Austin F. Schmidt, what the hell was that? Do you not know the rules of composition, or did you just want to break them as much as you could? Sometimes it was quirky and kind of fun but it was also super freaking annoying. Like if something gave this film an amateur look, it was the cinematography.

The weird lighting and cinematography almost make me want to go to my teachers and ask them to watch this movie only so they can explain to me why the hell does it look so wrong.

Apart from that, a very funny movie! Not the greatest, but certainly entertaining. I really want to see the sequel, I have friends already excited for it, so I'll definitely have company to watch this with.

☆☆☆☆☆☆

6 / 10

When We First Met (2018)

Directed by: Ari Sandel

Written by: John Whittington

Noah spends the perfect first night with Avery, the girl of his dreams, but gets relegated to the friend zone. He spends the next three years wondering what went wrong - until he gets the unexpected chance to travel back in time and change that night - and his fate - over and over again.

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I added When We First Met on my list on Netflix when it came out. Mostly I did that because the movie seemed extremely annoying. Main character is a dude who is heartbroken because he was friend-zoned by the girl of his dreams? Boo-hoo. I guess my instant moment was "well this is a movie that I can write an annoyed review of."

Now I don't know if that makes you want me to love this movie or hate it, but I don't feel strong feelings towards this movie. Well, a little, but that's less to do with the actual movie and it's storyline than my love life feeling hopeless right now. Yeah, a fucking great idea to watch a romantic movie, right?

My very first feeling of this movie is that... it felt a bit stalker-y. Mostly it's because the first time Noah goes back in time he talks with Avery and like guesses most of the stuff about her and then Avery freaks out because she thinks Noah is a stalker. Now we know Noah isn't a stalker, we know he actually is friends with Avery, but it makes you slightly uncomfortable. The whole thing is played off kind of clumsily, and it's really not a strong start for the movie.

It made me think about About Time, where the main character travelled back in time several times to meet The Love Of His Life the Right Way. It was slightly weird it was like dude, give up, you're coming off creepy. I mean of course not to the girl, because she had no idea how many times they actually met. Of course About Time wasn't entirely based on this, like When We First Met is.

It all boils down to how much more this movie could've been played off the right way. Now it's just Noah fucks up different ways. Dude, I don't think you're reacting to time travel the right way.

However, it's not like the movie is entirely bad. There are good scenes, there are funny scene and there are actually moving things about this movie. It's just that the whole movie is just very... average. Like sure it can entertain you for that 90 minutes, but I don't think I'll be thinking about this movie much after writing this review.

Before I launch into the biggest thing I want to talk about, I have few other details I want to say.

First one is the best part of the movie: there was this jazz-y, Birdman kind of score, but it wasn't used as much as it should've been. I love Birdman, and the soundtrack is amazing, and whenever movies have that kind of sound, I'm ecstatic. But here I heard it, what, few times? I think it was used less than "I'm sexy and I know it".

Another thing, I was super confused as to why Andrew Bachelor was in this. I asked myself - and my friends - since when has he been acting? Well apparently since 2010, and I had actually seen another movie where he was. I didn't realise that! Well his acting in movies is better than his vines, and honestly I'd watch him in more movies. Probably one of the most entertaining actors in this movie.

Now to the things that came into mind only because at school we had the pleasure of meeting Dome Karukoski. Not the first time I got to meet him, I was at the press screening of Tom of Finland last year. And Karukoski apparently comes to our school a lot, which is awesome. Anyway, one thing I noticed thanks to him was product placement in this film. Usually I kind of ignore that, but after talking about Jaffa sponsoring Karukoski's film Tyttö sinä olet tähti, I noticed that. Jaffa is a Finnish brand of soda, and while they sponsored the film, they had just said "if you can see Jaffa in a scene that's great", and there just is Jaffa in the background of the film - according to Karukoski, I haven't seen the movie yet. But the product placement I noticed in this movie was kind of... obnoxious. Like the brand is said in a way no one really says brand names and it's just tacky. I don't think I pay attention to product placements usually because there just is a lot of it in films, but this time it was just like egh. No thank you. Never going to use those brands. Get the fuck out of my film.

Another thing Karukoski talked about was how Netflix has so much money to use on content, but they don't have enough creators for content. Well it shows! This film is a Netflix original? Sure, it's not shit, but it's not great either. It's just average. Is that what Netflix is going for?

Content creators everywhere, if you have ideas for better films than this please pitch it to Netflix, they need a wake up call. Netflix original shows are often really cool but movies are very... meh.

When We First Met was an okay film, made me feel like three different emotions, I don't think that's a lot. It's entertaining, but I'd pick a different film if I were you - unless you love average meh films.

  ☆☆☆☆☆

5 / 10