Quick Movie Review: The Unauthorized Full House Story (2015)

Full House is one of my favorite television shows of all time. The nostalgia that exudes from the screen every time I watch it is almost unparalleled. But when making a Lifetime movie about all that happened behind-the-scenes, you have to expect a below average product.

Honestly, I didn't hate it. The made-for-TV-movie happens to hit on what Full House was all about for their audience--escaping our lives temporarily to watch a family that we knew would make it all work out in the end. Full House was far from a technically superb show, but America loved it for some strange reason. It spoke to us, and it had it's own distinct character to it.

But other than fans watching their childhood being made significant with the production of a "biopic", this film is poorly made, thus written off as laughable.

While hardly scratching the surface, The Unauthorized Full House Story gives little depth to what happened off-camera. It provides necessary details of what occurred over a 10 year period for nearly a dozen characters, but doesn't make the conflicts mean anything.

But honestly, I don't think that's what is making people write this one off. I think it's the fact that every little missed detail is annoyingly distracting us from becoming convinced of this world that the filmmakers have created. We want to get sucked in and experience all the happenings of the people we so fondly grew up with. And that's what a biopic is all about--being convinced. But the main actors--other than the girl who played the young Candice Cameron--were ever so inaccurate with their portrayals. Bob Saget comes off as whiny, John Stamos appears to be a prude, and the Olsen twins aren't nearly as precocious as they were famously known to be. We have a hard time imagining the actors playing the characters, therefore taking away from the "magic" that is supposed to be present here. In fact, after lines were delivered, I spent a lot of time stopping to imagine the actual person saying them.

Also, almost nothing about this film feels like it's set in the '80s or '90s. From the first scene, when we see a pre-fame Saget delivering jokes in a comedy club, the camera flashes to the audience who is dressed as if it were 2015. At least make us FEEL like we're there!

But let's face it, most likely we're not going to get a feature film biopic directed by Steven Soderbergh and starring a handful of household names. This is pretty much as good as we're going to get outside of an actual documentary or the followup series being delivered sometime in 2016.

Twizard Rating: 54

Quick Movie Review: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)

The Man From U.N.C.L.E. is based on the 1964 television series of the same name. In the film version, Henry Cavill plays Napoleon Solo--a former thief who now works for the CIA. He must save Gaby Teller (Alicia Vikander) from KGB operative, Illya Kuryakin (Armie Hammer). After reporting to his supervisor, Solo discovers that he must work together WITH Kuryakin in order to steal plans for a nuclear weapon designed by Teller's father for the Nazis.

Despite such intriguing background stories for both Solo and Kuryakin, none of that is shown--only told. The film is intended to act as an origin story, but we only get the latter portion of the origin--the arguably more pedestrian one.

But the part that's shown isn't boring by nature. The plot is really creative with a few twists thrown in. However, the dialogue attempts to explain things in a slick "Guy Ritchie" manner, but instead comes off as more confusing than it needs to be.

At times, it's hard to follow and difficult to understand who everyone is, but if you can figure it out, it's an entertaining film.

The comedy is kept subtle in an Ocean's Eleven kind of way, and Solo and Kuryakin's relationship is fun to watch develop. But besides that, there isn't much depth to it either.

The set pieces are nice to look at. We're really immersed into the era--something that is on the list of director, Guy Ritchie's "pros" list.

Throw in a couple of highly creative action sequences -- the only ones in the movie -- and you get a fairly entertaining couple of hours. But other than that, and a pretty good plot, nothing truly sets it apart from the rest of the movies you'll see this summer--the film's true downfall. And in a year filled with a more-than-usual helping of spy movies, this one is going to end up coming in around 4th or 5th on the list.

Twizard Rating: 74