Aladdin (2019)

Remakes are a tricky bunch.  There are some movies, like Back to the Future and The Princess Bride, that should never be redone.  Both movies are perfect as is.  I don’t think anyone could improve on either one.  In other cases, I can understand.  Time passes and the older version seems dated.  (It’s rare, but there are remakes that are better than the original.)  There are also characters, such as Godzilla, that audiences just can’t get enough of.

Then, there’s Aladdin.  I’ll admit that I never watched the 1992 version all the way through.  However, it would seem that this version stays pretty close to the original.  At least a few of the songs are similar.  So, that makes me wonder why a remake was deemed necessary.

I’m not going to go too much into plot here.  Most people should be aware of the basic story by now.  An orphan named Aladdin meets a princess named Jasmine.  Despite the class difference, he manages to court her with the help of a genie named Genie.  He also takes on an evil Grand Vizier who’s out for power.

This movie still seemed to be operating in cartoon mode.  For instance, the scenery seemed realistic, but there were come parts that still came off as well-rendered CGI.  The characters also seem to be one-dimensional.  (Jasmine is defined by her inability to serve as sultan.  The Genie is defined by his need to serve a master.)

Will Smith seems to have an energy similar to Robin Williams without seeming like he’s channeling Williams’s version, so there’s that.  However, I could see a lot of long-time Disney fans seeing this movie as unnecessary.  (Childhood nostalgia is a dangerous area to wander into.  One wrong move could generate a lot of backlash.)

Fortunately, the movie is pretty safe for children.  They didn‘t add anything scary.  (The PG rating comes from a few dangerous situations and action sequences.)  I’m not sure how similar the movie is.  It’s a perfectly fine movie to take the children to see this summer.  I’m just glad I was able to see it before school let out.

IMDb page

Game Night (2018)

Some people long for adventure while others seem content to fall into a rut.  Max and Annie both have a love of games.  They met while competing.  Eventually, they married and now host game night for their friends.   Kevin and Michelle are also husband and wife.  Then, there’s Ryan, who’s a little on the slow side.  He seems to have a revolving door in terms of his dates.  For the duration of the movie, Ryan’s date is Sarah, a woman way better than he deserves.

The main story begins when Max’s brother, Books, comes back to town for a while .  Brooks has always been more successful than Max at pretty much everything.  Max tries not to let it show, but Brooks knows which buttons to push.  For instance, Brooks comes through the front door when Max and Annie had specifically asked everyone to come in more discretely.  The idea was to not attract the attention of their neighbor, Gary.  You see, Gary’s the annoying neighbor everyone else is trying to avoid.

One week, Brooks decides to put on a special game night.  He’s hired a company that specializes in faking a kidnapping and having the group of friends follow clues to find the faux victim.  If you’ve seen the coming attractions, you may remember that Brooks is actually kidnapped while the would-be players watch in amusement.  When the actual actors show up, the hunt is on to get Brooks back.

I once heard a good definition for what separates a comedy from a drama:  In a comedy, no one dies.  While this isn’t always true, it does serve as a good rule of thumb.  When Max gets shot, it doesn’t seem to slow him down much.  He and Amy stop to tend to it, but it would ultimately seem to be a minor inconvenience.  I would imagine that most people would have died in that situation, or at least have been lightheaded.

The movie is somewhere between The Game and Clue.  On the one hand, it has several layers of what might be real or fake.  The audience knows that Brooks is actually being kidnapped, but we don’t know why or by whom.  There are several reveals along the way, such as what Brooks did that might warrant such attention.  (Minor spoiler alert:  Not everyone is what they seem.)

This is one case where I’d say that the trailer was pretty accurate in terms of giving a good impression of what the movie is about.  It’s not a question of if something will go wrong.  It’s a question of when and how.  This can be difficult to pull off, but it works here.  The situations aren’t over the top.  Well, maybe the scene where they steal the Faberge egg was over the top.  But most of the scenes are more moderate.

IMDb page