Love & Mercy- Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys Story

A long time ago my dad mentioned that Brian Wilson was the heart and soul of the Beach Boys. I was excited when I found out they were doing a biopic of sorts with Paul Dano as a young Wilson and John Cusack for an older Wilson. The movie spends time going over the writing/creating process for Wilson in the earlier years of the Beach Boys, though after at least their first successful album and firing their dad as manager. Wilson is a musical genius who would know exactly what he wanted without having to ever write it down on paper. He could blend choruses and different musical instruments together in his head, but like most geniuses struggled to verbalize it to others. The difficulties with this are shown, and it delves into his mental issues that shut him down for three years and various times throughout his life. There is so much to cover in his 50+ years of music, so the focus was mental issues, Beach Boys drama, and a bit about meeting his current wife. It does a really good job of blending those themes and Cusack and Dano both do great jobs with the difficult issue of playing a genius with severe mental issues (which they never tell you what the proper diagnosis ended up being, though they know mention it is not paranoid schizophrenia). Bottom Line: 7.6 out of 10. Fans of the Beach Boys should absolutely watch this. It was a $1.00 rental on Amazon Prime and it's certainly worth the watch to just have a view into the Beach Boys creative process I felt.

The Force Awakens: Star Wars Part: VII

The newest installment of the Disney-era Star Wars movies has launched. It's killing it at the box office, but it felt like it was just a the first building block of creating a mega-franchise with off-shoots in a lot of directions. Without trying to give anything away because the film was as closely guarded as our nuclear codes the film picks up 30-40 years after Return of the Jedi, probably closer to 30 than anything. The Empire has morphed in the First Order lead by a Supreme Overlord and policed by Kylo Wren, a clear Darth Vader disciple. There is still a Galactic Senate ruling, but there exists a resistance, very similar to the Rebellion before it. They dust off some old characters, introduce a cavalcade of new ones, and hope they advance the ball far enough in this film to leave everyone happy and the potential for many more films, which it accomplishes. The CGI is excellent. Story is acceptable. Acting is very good. I was personally disappointed in the lack of Wedge Antilles, the true hero of the death star battles, but I'm probably flying solo on that one. Bottom Line: 8.5 out of 10. I'm a Star Wars guy, so I'm trying to be somewhat objective. I do like the new characters introduced and see them having successful careers stemming from this series. I'd see this in theatres, mainly because it's a cultural revolution apparently, but it's also very entertaining.

Creed: Was This a Rocky Movie?

I bit on Creed since I'm a huge Rocky fan and it was getting great reviews. Michael B. Jordan is going to be a star, if he isn't one already. He plays Apollo Creed's bastard son Adonis who, after a few stints in group homes and juvenile centers is adopted by THE Phylicia Rashad (Mrs. Cosby!), which it was great to see her acting again. You catch up with him as he's quitting his, assumingly, high paying job at a financial firm to focus on his passion of boxing, though his mom is violently against it. He leaves L.A. since nobody, including Duke's (Apollo's former trainer) son, played by Ed Woods (The Wire is all over!). He goes to Philadelphia knowing he wants Rocky Balboa and only Rocky to train him. If we forgot Rocky is just existing in a strange state of apathy/depression running Adrian's restaurant and doing very little. He is fast-tracked to the game by fighting a very good fighter in his first match. Jordan is very believable as a fighter and took the role very seriously, that is apparent. They toss in a love story because they had to. Across "the Pond" the light heavyweight Champion "Pretty" Ricky Conlan was recently released from prison and looking at the twilight of his career. In the weigh-in for his title defense he sucker punches the other guy, breaks his jaw, and ruins it. After finding out Adonis is Creed's son, a fact he tries to hide, he is given the title shot vs. Conlan. Conlan looks like a dude they rolled off the couch, which bothered me a ton. He isn't very believable as a fighter because I've never seen a boxer who isn't in good shape fighting for a title at light heavyweight. In any case you get your mix of training montages/scenes, the budding love story, the touching moments of personal growth, etc. from your standard Rocky film, but it didn't feel quite the same. Bottom Line; 8.1 out of 10. It's good, not great, though Jodran is excellent and Stallone really plays the aging Balboa very well. It's worth seeing in theatres, but it can wait.