Movie Review: Spies In Disguise

Will Smith. Tom Holland. Two big stars in Hollywood, together in one animated spy adventure that's aimed for kids and adults alike and sees the cool secret agent turn into... A pigeon?! With a combination like that, 20th Century Fox and Blue Sky Studios' "Spies In Disguise" is one family adventure not to miss - especially for those looking for the brave, the bold, and the weird mixed into a hilarious cocktail of film that has its share of silliness and good laughs.

Thanks to the folks at 20th Century Fox PH, I got to see this animated adventure for myself before it opened in theaters, and of course I am a fan of the Hollywood stars that have lent their amazing voice talents into this insanely bird flavored flick directed by Troy Quane and Nick Bruno. It's also the first animated movie to see in the big screen this 2020 here in Manila, so if you want to admire CGI and some cool animation from the folks that brought us the Ice Age movies - this one is for you definitely.


SPIES IN DISGUISE | TEAM Trailer

Presented in the same style as famous spy films like the James Bond and Mission: Impossible movies, Spies In Disguise sees Will Smith voicing the role of Lance Sterling - a cocky secret agent who's the best in the business and is good at what he does. All that changes when he underestimates a mysterious villain named Killian - who frames the agent and forces him to go underground. Teaming up with an eccentric yet brilliant scientist named Walter Beckett - Sterling is hilariously transformed into a pigeon after unwittingly ingesting a formula concocted by the young MIT graduate. What follows is an odd pairing that sees both working together to clear their names, catch the bad guy, and change the best agent in the business back to normal before he starts flying away with the birds... Literally.

Outside of playing bad boys and superheroes, Smith and Holland lend some of their best voice acting skills to Spies In Disguise, joined by an ensemble assortment of other talents that includes Rashida Leah Jones, Ben Mendelsohn, and Karen Gillan. Smith in particular is right at home being his confidant and smooth cool cat self - and also acting wacky and hilarious when he becomes a pigeon and banters with the young Holland. It's a weird combination but also something of a refreshing team-up to see, and having some cool eye-catching CG animation by Blue Sky Studios adds to the appeal of this animated flick. Definitely something to see in theaters with your family and loved ones.

Spies In Disguise in now showing in theaters courtesy of 20th Century Fox PH.

Rating - 4/5

Movie Review: Richard Jewell

Happy New Year and hello 2020! We're starting off the new set of dates fresh and looking forward to a lot of new adventures, films, games, and just about anything I can review and talk about - and what better way to start than with the very first film I caught this January 2020 - Clint Eastwood's newest biographical drama pic "Richard Jewell".

Based on the real life 1996 Olympic Centennial Park Bombing incident that saw the man of the same name saving lives and praised as a hero but quickly denounced as the suspect himself, "Richard Jewell" takes a good and long hard look at society, media, and government as they quickly become wrapped in suspicion, paranoia, and breaking the life of a common man who naively believes in the system but quickly learns the hard truth about it.

Thanks to Warner Bros. Pictures, I got to see the film last week in the brand new Estancia Cinemas wing - and what a tale this was featuring a stellar cast led by Sam Rockwell, Kathy Bates, Jon Hamm, Olivia Wilde, and Paul Walter Hauser as the titular character Richard Jewell. This is the kind of movie that should entertain anyone who likes drama and character study performances - Jewell's life as your common man, average joe redneck who has an idealistic impression about law enforcement quickly turns into a real-life tale of heroism when he discovers a bomb planted during his watch as a security guard in an Olympic Games concert held at Centennial Park. Jewell manages to inform his peers and prevent the bomb from claiming more casualties - but things turn upside down when the FBI and press twist his profile and are convinced "he is the bomber". With nowhere else to turn and his life with his mother turning upside down, Richard enlists the help of an old lawyer friend Watson Bryant (Sam Rockwell) - and the fight to clear his name begins.


RICHARD JEWELL - Official Trailer
As the first film I got to see for the new year, Richard Jewell impresses and manages to tell a very relatable and compelling tale of an innocent man's quest to fight back against the system that wrongly judged him. We see in a pre-Social Media setting of 1996 just how gruelling that kind of experience is, and Eastwood has made one of his strongest biographical films yet with strong performances - particularly Sam Rockwell as lawyer Watson Bryant and Kathy Bates as Richard Jewell's mother "Bobi" (for which she has been nominated for an Academy Award). I'd definitely recommend the film to those who enjoy seeing a dramatization of a real life story.

Richard Jewell is now showing in theaters.

Rating - 4/5

Movie Review: Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

It's the FINAL DAY of 2019 - and I should end it with a long overdue review of one of the most anticipated films of the soon to be past year!

It's been over a week since Disney and Lucasfilm finally released the long awaited final movie of the "Sequel Trilogy" to theaters worldwide - also billed as the final chapter of the "Skywalker Saga" that began with the very first "Star Wars" film released in 1977 that introduced us to Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia Organa, Han Solo, Darth Vader, and the rest of the wide fictional universe filmmaker George Lucas created from a galaxy far, far away. In this saga, we are introduced to new players and heroes - such as Rey, Finn, Poe Dameron, and BB-8 who make up the key members of "The Resistance". That new rebel faction faces off against the dark forces of Kylo Ren and The First Order - who will stop at nothing to take over the galaxy and finish what the Empire and Sith started long ago.

Well, I finally got to see "The Rise of Skywalker" - three times in fact and for the most part it is a DECENT Star Wars film. I've said that in two of my video reviews which you can find at my YouTube page here (Non-Spoiler) and here (SPOILER), and I've delved into non-spoiler and SPOILER reactions for the film. Since enough time has passed and revelations are out in the wild, I'll give my honest thoughts in this post about Episode IX - and why I think its serviceable yet a movie that needed much more to make it a perfect conclusion.

Again, SPOILERS WILL FOLLOW after the jump, so read at your own risk.