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From: "Ian J. Ball" <ijball@mac.invalid>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.tv
Subject: What Did You Watch? 2024-05-10 (Friday)
Date: Sat, 11 May 2024 08:36:32 -0700
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On Friday pay day(!), after getting some work done (but not enough!!), I 
resolved to make yesterday a "movie day" when I got home, so I basically 
did.

First, I put "Double Jeopardy" on Showtime on in the background. This is 
a long-time guilty pleasure of mine, but I haven't see it in likely over 
a decade. This time, I noticed that Keegan Connor Tracy has a bit part 
in this (context: this film is set in Washington state and New Orleans, 
but was primarily filmed in Vancouver!) - I didn't know Tracy has been 
around that long!! Also, I had forgotten that Michelle Stafford (Y&R, 
and one-time GH) almost had a film career, having a notable bit part in 
this film too!
    In watching this, I realized there hasn't been a film like this in a 
long-time, and Hollywood needs to put out another flick like this with a 
plucky betrayed woman/wife on a mission of revenge! Righteous REVENGE!! 
while being pursued by somebody like Tommy Lee Jones!!

Bloodshot (Hulu) - In glorious 4k!! (which is unusual to get on the Hulu!!)
    I think I remember seeing ads for this flick in 2020 (was this 
during COVID?!), and thinking I wouldn't mind seeing an "action picture" 
like this. But then I must have promptly forgotten about it!
    Apparently this is based on a comic series I have never heard of.
    This is YA Vin Diesel film that is partly financed/produced by the 
Chi Comms - I am starting to find it disturbing how many Diesel films 
have a Chi Comm tie-in (though this particular film sports no Chi Comm 
main characters, interestingly enough...)
    Diesel stars as Ray Garrison, some kind of special forces marine(?). 
After successfully rescuing a hostage in Kenya, he is attacked in the 
home of his and his wife's (amusingly, I didn't even recognize that the 
wife was played by Talulah Riley until I checked the film's 
end-credits!! - distressingly, Riley has not worked since 2022 and 
getting (re)married...  :(  ), where they are both held captive, and 
then eventually both murdered(!).
    Ray wakes up after, with no gunshot wound to the head and no memory 
of who he was, apparently brought back from the dead by a "mad 
scientist" type (Guy Pearce - anyone taking bets as to whether Pearce's 
character is EVOL!!1! or not?!) - the scientist has brought Ray back 
from the dead via the use of "nanites" which give Ray pretty substantial 
superpowers, like the ability to near instantaneously heal from almost 
any wound.
    The scientist dude wants Ray to be part of a team of other soldiers 
who have been technologically enhanced, among them Eiza Gonzalez 
(sporting an impressive push-up bra that must involve some next-level 
physics!!).
    But soon Ray remembers his wife murder at the hands of the scumbag, 
and runs off on a mission of revenge, sweet revenge!!
    If that was all that was going on here, this flick would be pretty 
flat. But luckily there's "twist", which makes this more interesting (if 
not more believable!!) than the film's initial simplistic premise.
    This flick won't be winning any awards. But it was a perfect way to 
scratch my "mindless Friday night action movie picture" itch. And it 
looked pretty decent in 4k, and is well shot in several (action) scenes.

Deadly Invitations (Tubi) - This is the Tubi original film starring 
Natalie Brown and Lola Flannery (from The HUNDRED! [sic]), and 
apparently filmed in Vancouver, not Toronto, that was released in the 
last couple of weeks.
    Out of all the Tubi original films I have seen, this was the most 
like a straight-ahead Lifetime film - as other Tubi original films have 
ended up on Lifetime, I am pretty sure this one will end up being shown 
on Lifetime in 6 months to a year as well.
    Brown plays a recent widower - she is convinced that her husband's 
death was not a suicide, but some kind of murder. Her daughter 
(Flannery) is a teen brat, who blames her mother for her father's 
suicide, and is some kind of social media "influencer", but one who has 
had a recent scandal (I don't think we are ever told what this "scandal" 
was!).
    Anyway, soon enough the daughter is getting mixed up in some kind of 
weird (sex and drugs?!!) club, involving (Hollywood?) big-wigs who all 
wear masks (for "anonymity"!?) at the club. This, of course, is the same 
club the mother is convinced is somehow involved in the husband's "murder".
    Dangerous (and rapey?!) wackiness ensues.
    This was OK. Brown's character is incredibly unsymapthetic, as is 
Flannery's (mostly). But I am glad to see that Flannery is still acting, 
so there's that.
    But, like I said, this might as well have gone straight to Lifetime, 
as there is nothing that particularly identifies this film as a "Tubi 
original".


What did you watch?!