Movie Review: The Sky is Pink

Michael's Movie Grade: A-

I think that Hollywood filmmakers need to this movie from India to understand how to make a movie about a teenage girl who has a rare disease so they can make great movies like this instead of films like Five Feet Apart or Midnight Sun.

I have to be honest, after seeing movies like the two I mentioned in the opening sentence, I felt like I could never like a movie with this type of subject again. This movie more than proved me wrong, this is a fantastic film that is extremely moving without a bit of the forced melodrama of those previous films.

The term tearjerker is too simple to describe a movie like this. When I think of a tearjerker, what comes to my mind is a movie that is mostly about making the audience cry over how sad it is. This movie may make you cry (everybody seeing this with me was in tears at one scene). However just as much as a sad movie this is also a celebration of life. Knowing how easily she could die at any time is in many ways harder on our protagonist's parents than her. Though it does get to her at times like it could to anybody, she knows not to let this keep her from enjoying her own life. By the age of 18 she has truly lived life and done things we wish we could have done. Because of this, though we wish she could not have had this disease, she is never a subject of pity and is never defined by her tragedy, Because of this we feel complete pride and love for her. She is a truly incredible person. The fact that this movie is more than a simple tragedy is also defined by the use of narration, from our dead protagonist. She looks back at her time on Earth with great fondness and seems to enjoy telling us the story of her life. She also jokes around a lot, and keeps a good sense of humor about all that happens. This could have come off as forced and at odds with the sadder scenes in this movie. However it doesn't. This is because life is neither completely sad or completely happy. In our own lives our toughest moments are interspersed with moments of happiness and humor. This film captures this feeling perfectly. Because this is a film about life, and therefore can't be defined by one emotion. All of this is enhanced by incredible performances from the whole cast, but especially Zaira Wasim and Priyanka Chopra, as well as great direction by Shonali Bose.

This is a don't miss movie, full of real and powerful emotions both happy and sad.

-Michael J. Ruhland

Movie Review: Booksmart

Michael's Movie Grade: B

Review: Quite funny comedy and with all the raunchiness, it is surprisingly warm hearted.

People who read this blog often will know that I am often not a fan of raunchy comedies and might be surprised that I am giving this movie a good review. The thing is I am not opposed to a raunchy comedy, if it is well done. While there are moments that are simply raunchy for the sake of being raunchy (these are often the least funny moments in the film), there are plenty of times when the comedy comes out of the characters just as much as the raunchiness. Moments like talk about masturbating with a stuffed panda and the girls watching porn in a Lyft are funny not because they are crude but because they come out of the characters. Speaking of the characters our two main characters are extremely likable here, as well as magnificently played by Beanie Feldstein and Kaitlyn Dever. Underneath all the over the top humor, this is a movie about the friendship between these two girls. This is held together by the perfect chemistry between the characters and actresses. You completely believe that these two are besties and inseparable. The relationship is so natural and unforced they remind us of the closest friendships we have had in our lives. I want to hug them both right now, just writing this. Because the characters are so likable and the humor centers around them, this movie successeds where many raunchy comedies fail. This is that the serious emotional moments actually work. Most raunchy comedies have such a hard time balancing these moments with the raunchiness, just making them seem forced. However since both the comedy and drama fully revolve around the characters both work together very well.

None of this is to say this is a perfect movie. Not ever joke hits and it takes a bit for the movie to truly get going. There are also some scenes that essentially feel like padding and should have been on the cutting room floor (a stop motion sequence for example).

I had my reservations about this movie. Looking at the previews I thought I wasn't going to care much for it. I was very pleasantly surprised and I hope that some of you who had the same reservations will be similarly surprised.

-Michael J. Ruhland

Movie Review: Mid 90's

Review Written by Michael J. Ruhland

Michael's Movie Grade: B

Review: While it doesn't reach the heights of the other A24 movies we have had so far, Mid 90's is an enjoyable film that shows Jonah Hill as a talented director.

What works best about this movie is the main characters. It would be easy to have make the older teenagers completely unlikable and all together bad. However this movie shows them as abundantly human. They may be into bad things and introduce a young teenage kid to the world of sex, drugs and alcohol, but they don't set out to hurt the kid. They truly grow to love him. This is shown very well in one scene involving a one on one talk with one of the older teenagers and younger teenagers. This scene is very well written and extremely well acted (by Sunny Suljic and Na-kel Smith). This scene works so well because what we are seeing on screen is treated so real. We believe every word of this conversation and get very much involved in the emotion of the scene. Na-kel Smith's performance in this film is amazing and it is strange to think this is his first movie. I see great things in the future for him. Much of the dialogue in this film is not as touching and heartfelt. In fact it is downright vulgar. While this dialogue could certainty turn me off at times, this is fully the way kids this age talk, giving a sense of realism to the characters. This movie also looks very good. Christopher Blauvelt's cinematography is excellent providing a certain nostalgic feel to this movie that fits the era perfectly. Speaking about the era, the soundtrack is filled with 90's hip-hop and hard rock songs. Truth be told these songs are not my taste in music by any means. However I can't deny how much these songs help evoke the era in which this movie takes place in and how well this works. More to my taste is Trent Razor and Atticus Ross' music score. This is an excellent score that perfectly evokes the emotion of what is happening in the film.


The story in this movie can seem meandering at times. The film doesn't always seem to know what it is trying to say. There are times when I am not sure what various scenes were going for. There was one particularly awkward sex scene that made me feel really uncomfortable. This scene was not uncomfortable in a fascinating or thought provoking way. Instead I just felt embarrassed for watching it and wondered what exactly it was supposed to add to the rest of the movie. I am still unsure of what I was supposed to make of the ending, but still I felt I didn't get whatever emotional connection I was supposed to have to this. While some of the characters are well thought it this is not true of every character. Fourth Grade just felt like poor comedy relief without anything that made the rest of the characters so interesting. Similarly was Stevie's brother, who felt like your typical movie jerk of a big brother, but even less developed.

If you try to compare this to A24's previous work it is bound to disappoint, but taken on its own terms it is quite good.

-Michael J. Ruhland

Movie Review: The Darkest Minds

Review Written by Michael J. Ruhland.



















Michael's Movie Grade: C+

Review: This is by no means one of the best movies of its kind, but for what it is I enjoyed myself and I hope if you see it you will too.

As many people have already said in their reviews of this movie, there is nothing in this movie, that the average movie goer hasn't already seen. Everything that happens in the storyline feels very familiar, and you almost always know what will happen next (even if you don't know, you won't be surprised when it happens). The influences for this movie are way too obvious. Anyone who is even slightly familiar with X-Men or Stranger Things will easily see what this movie took from there. One doesn't even have to be familiar with Watership Down to tell that influence as one of the characters picks up the book and reads a line from it, only for it to be repeated later in the movie. With all this, why did I still give this movie a passing grade? That is very simple, I still cared for what was happening on the screen. The characters are quite likable. They may not be the most fleshed out, but there is enough there for us to relate to them and not want anything bad to happen to them. More than this they have great chemistry. I even cared about the obligatory romance, which somehow never felt forced. The relationship between Ruby (Amandla Stenburg) and Zu (Miya Cech) was also pretty touching.

It is easy to see why this movie is getting panned by critics as it is very unoriginal and much of the story feels rushed, but despite me agreeing on these points, there were still parts I liked and I still had a good time watching this. I would never call this a classic or tell anybody they have to see this, but I had fun and I hope if you see this movie you will too.


-Michael J. Ruhland

Movie Review: Eighth Grade

Review Written by Michael J. Ruhland

Michael's Movie Grade: A+

Review: This is my favorite movie so far this year. It is beautifully moving, really funny and heartbreakingly real.

This movie is a near perfect cinematic look at a very difficult time in many people's lives. What makes this work is how extremely real it is. This brought me back to what life was like for me during eighth grade and how happy I am to have made it threw that. Much of this realism comes from how true the main character rings. There is so much of ourselves (especially me) to be seen in this young girl. We all have felt her anxiety, and her desire to be more popular than she is. She is not perfect, but we can so easily see that she is a good person deep down inside. There are so many times that we just want to hug her and tell her that she can make it through. I found it near impossible not to connect with this character. I felt sad when she felt sad, and happy when she felt happy. This is enhanced by Elsie Fisher's amazing performance. Despite her problems our main character has, this is not a depressing film. A lot of this is due to the movie having a very important and helpful message about how so much of what we spend our time worrying about is very temporary. We know that things will only get better for our main character and what she is going through now will not last, and this makes us feel very proud of her for what she does. I wish I had seen this movie in middle school, as a message like that would have been very important to me, but I also feel that in some ways it even makes me feel better about my own axinites today. The film also features some great moments of humor and I laughed often while watching this film. A scene where she is praying especially made me grin.

All in all this is a must see movie and my favorite of the year so far.

-Michael J. Ruhland