The Olive Opinion

  Since its the end of year, I decided to make a list of my favorite movies this year. This would also be a good opportunity to talk about movies I didn't review this year, considering I only started updating my blog a few months ago. To remind you, these are MY FAVORITES from this year of what moved me and what has been stuck in my head and have convinced me to watch more than once. Everyone is entitled to your opinion or what your rankings are but these are mine.  10. A Big Bold Beautiful Journey   This was a movie that a lot of people were not big fan of when it came out. The concept was outlandish. Kogonada decided to make a very Americanized version of a Studio Ghibili movie. But that was not the reason why people did not like it. At least I don't think it is. I think people were expecting this to be a date movie, a rom-com of sorts but like Materialists, this was almost the antithesis of that expectation. The idea of trying to get two people together through a very ...

  James Cameron's behemoth of a passion project returns, this time with a shorter time between the sequels. Avatar: Fire and Ash is seen as Disney's last Hail Mary for 2025 after a very slow year at the box office, but will it be as successful as the previous two? Both movies had earned over 2 billion dollars, but for this sequel to follow suit wouldn't be worth the gamble.  It is not because the sequel's quality is subpar. In fact, Cameron continues to solidify that the Avatar franchise is the most visually stunning of them all, given how much work Cameron and the rest of Lightstorm, along with the outsourced animators, have done over the last 15 years. To comprehend that 90 percent of the film is CGI and that it still looks so realistic is amazing. The fight sequences were exciting. Evoking fear during beautiful sequences is only something Cameron can do and is known for. Certain characters were also given interesting arcs, especially Neytiri, who is finally given muc...

  The number of times I have seen this trailer in the last two months shows that movie theaters wanted it tattooed in the back of people's minds. Plus, with the Sydney Sweeney controversies going on, it was just free publicity at this point. Based on the bestselling book series by Freida McFadden, this was an adaptation of The Housemaid , a book I have seen in almost every bookstore but have never read. I was never interested in its premise.  Lionsgate, however, has more confidence in this film than anyone else, despite not having a true box-office hit in years. They aim to possibly create a new lukewarm franchise here with Sydney Sweeney at its front, at a time of her career that is mostly boiled down to her perhaps aalleged political ties after the infamous American Eagle ad. But the main appeal of The Housemaid is not its titular star but rather everybody else involved. It may bode well with Paul Feig, but no one else in this first film could return for a potential sequel....

  When Rian Johnson decided to write whodunnits, I somehow knew we were in for a treat. Knives Out was the embodiment of sweater weather, especially with Chris Evans wearing one so well in the first one. Then, spawned a franchise inspired by murder mysteries like Agatha Christie, and the films starred top-billed actors playing asshole actors. No one has done it better than Rian Johnson, who writes and directs these movies, and this third installment continues to solidify that Johnson knows what he is doing. Wake Up Dead Man, the third installment, now owned by Netflix, will tonally and aesthetically remind fans of the first movie and of how picturesque Johnson's directing is, unlike Glass Onion. Reflecting on the pandemic, when Glass Onion premiered on Netflix, I had one specific opinion: I was disappointed I couldn't watch it in theaters. Years later, I also did not particularly enjoy it because it decided to go for a much brandier, flashier, summer sequel to the fall, pumpkin...

  I still remember how I had a very different opinion on Zootopia when it first released almost 10 years ago. Among them was that it was not the most inventive movie, but boy, was I wrong. As I grew older, my appreciation for the ambition that the animated behemoth became was unprecedented and everyone agreed. Simply said, it is one of my favorite of the new Disney movies. Zootopia 2 is releasing during a time when Disney is officially standing on thin ice. For the first time in 10-plus years, Disney is not the highest-grossing studio in Hollywood, which is why the reliance on sequels of beloved films have been the recent output as of late because it is a plan executives think it's best for revenue, but is still not catching the eyes of certain House of Mouse boycotters. But is Zootopia 2 another cash grab sequel in the churning franchise machine that is Disney? It has been unpredictable these days, with moviegoers actively not being appealed to most of the Disney outings especiall...

  The Wicked musical has been a Broadway staple for almost 22 years now. Since the adaptation that graced our screens, Wicked is now a global phenomenon, satisfying fans of the original show as well as introducing the origin of these characters to an all-new audience. The cast members were already famous before the movie was released, but they will be remembered for their portrayal of these characters for a very long time.  The time has arrived for the awaited sequel, Wicked For Good . With the first movie covering the story of the first act of the play, this sequel covers, you would have guessed, the second act. As someone who has seen the original show once, and I think a fair number of people share this opinion, is that the second act isn't as strong as the first. It was a surprise to hear that Jon M. Chu was going to split the musical into two movies, and we couldn't help but think it could be a bad idea. When the movie came out last year, M. Chu managed to tell a very m...

When I first saw the trailer for Eternity , I immediately knew I was going to go watch it. There was no way I was going to miss a love-triangle-rom-com set in the 'underworld'?. There was no attachment beforehand towards the people making this movie that drew me to it, but rather more so that Elizabeth Olsen was in it. The bonus being Callum Turner and Miles Teller.  Despite the marketing focusing on Olsen, the plot surprisingly revolves around Teller's character, Larry, after passing away during a baby shower. Guilty that he wasn't by his wife's side in her final days of battling cancer, he has to wait for his wife to join him in a capitalized version of purgatory where the dead have to decide in 7 days what their 'Eternity' might look like. That is probably the easiest way I could explain it without getting too technical. The world-building is fascinating, almost Marvel-like. The bureaucratic, office-like aesthetic is fairly reminiscent of what the TVA loo...

  At a time when Arnold Schwarzenegger was in almost every action movie, Predator was a classic and fan favorite which went on to become a franchise, a more mind-numbing one compared to their nemesis species, Ridley Scott's Alien. After some trial and error, here comes Dan Trachtenberg resurrecting what once was a dead franchise. After The Predator in 2018, it was hard to tell that anyone wanted to tackle the extra terrestial hunters that should have stayed in the 80's. But after the acquisition of Fox, Disney attempted to revitalize their new catalogue, and left a lot of people skeptical, especially after Trachtenberg was signed to make Prey . Surprisingly, Prey shot new life to the franchise with the trust of it's new storytellers, breathing new hope to longtime fans and fans who hopped on along the way (such as myself after AVP became a thing). Predator Killer of Killers , an animation marvel, continued to show off more the new vision that Trachtenberg began to incorp...