allisonlscates

I got tickets to an advanced screening of the movie Alpha through Sony and to sum things up, it is a complete snooze fest. Alpha is one of those movies where the trailer is better than the actual film. At first, glance, watching the trailer, I was initially interested in this film because it seemed like there was a lot of action and who doesn't love a cute canine? The movie is about a young boy, Keda and his family of nomads who live 20,000 years ago in Europe. During a hunting trip, Keda is separated from his family and spends the remainder of the film trying to get reunited with his family with the help of his newly acquired wolf that he names Alpha.

The pacing was very, very slow. Things don't start to "pick up" until about halfway into the movie when Keda is separated and has to fend for himself. The first half is about his interactions with his family, but even those interactions, didn't captivate me. I thought that the dialogue didn't add anything to the plot or make me like any of the characters. Every scene just felt like things happening and not scenes building towards something.

One thing that I did hate was the cinematography and the direction. So often there were shots where the camera was constantly moving. The camera would pan so much that sometimes I had to close my eyes because I was getting motion sickness. The movie does have very beautiful shots of scenery and neat special effects, but to me, these shots felt like the director's way of making up for a poorly written script.

Overall it was an okay, movie. I'd give it a 4/10. You can probably wait for this one to come onto Netflix.

I got the opportunity to see an advanced screening of Searching through the Atlanta Film Society and I really enjoyed it! A quick summary, it's about a father, David Kim (John Cho) whose teenage daughter, Margot suddenly disappears and goes missing. David desperately tries to find his daughter by going through her social media and her text messages, and he discovers there was a lot about his daughter that he never knew.

The entire movie is filmed in a unique way, by it being presented through computer screens and POV shots. At first, when I saw the trailer, I thought it was going to be another one of those shaky camera, first person type filming (think Blair Witch Project, Cloverfield) and I was pleasantly surprised that it was nothing like that at all.

I thought that the film was great. I like who-done-its and this one was done very well. It was excellently written and acted. Aneesh Chaganty does a fantastic job building suspense. What was good about the movie is that there are a lot of surprise twists that keep appearing as the movie progresses. When you watch the film, pay attention to all the little details, because they all build to something and serve a purpose in the film.

Overall, I enjoyed the movie tremendously. It was sad, it was funny, and it was suspenseful. I hope this movie does well at the box office.