Puss in Boots: The Last Wish (2022) Review

Time: 102 Minutes
Age Rating: Violence, coarse language, some scenes may scare very young children
Cast:
Antonio Banderas as Puss in Boots
Salma Hayek Pinault as Kitty Softpaws
Harvey Guillén as Perrito
Florence Pugh as Goldilocks
Olivia Colman as Mama Bear
Ray Winstone as Papa Bear
Samson Kayo as Baby Bear
John Mulaney as “Big” Jack Horner
Wagner Moura as the Wolf
Da’Vine Joy Randolph as Mama Luna
Anthony Mendez as the doctor
Director: Joel Crawford

Puss in Boots discovers that his passion for adventure has taken its toll when he learns that he has burnt through eight of his nine lives. Puss sets out on an epic journey to find the mythical Last Wish and restore his nine lives.

I was surprised that Puss in Boots of all things was getting a sequel, especially over a decade after the first movie. I enjoyed the Shrek movies and the initial Puss in Boots spin off, but I wasn’t really thinking that I was going to rush out to watch the sequel. So I was curious that it quickly became one of the most popular movies of 2022. I decided to check it out, and I can at least say that it is way better than it had any right to be.

So I had been hearing about how special and different Puss in Boots 2 was, it’s really not that different from what you’d typically expect. It’s a very straightforward and linear story with familiar story beats. However, it handles this familiar structure very well. Unlike the first Puss in Boots which was serviceable, but clearly banking on the success from the Shrek brand, The Last Wish feels like there’s actual passion behind it, and the story is heartfelt and genuine enough. I wouldn’t call the movie dark at all, but it does have some somewhat heavier aspects that you wouldn’t expect in a Puss in Boots movie, with themes involving mortality and inevitability of death. However, it’s done in such a way that the film is appropriate enough for children, while having enough things here for adults to enjoy. Some jokes don’t work, but most of them do, and there are particularly some really funny running gags.

Overall, the voice acting is strong and the cast does well at portraying the memorable characters. Antonio Banderas and Salma Hayek reprise their roles of Puss in Boots and Kitty Softpaws, with Banderas having the best outing of his character yet. Many of the other actors including Florence Pugh, Ray Winstone, and Olivia Colman voice their roles very well. I thought all the characters were pretty good and worked in their roles, though a comic relief character in the form of a dog I was less amused by. The film also benefits from some memorable villains. One of these villains is Jack Horner voiced by John Mulaney, who is a blatantly and cartoonishly evil character and all the more fun for that. However, the standout is a wolf named Death, voiced by Wagner Moura, who is hunting Puss in Boots over the course of the movie. Any time the character showed up he had such a strong presence, and he was definitely a highlight.

The animation is really the strongest aspect of the movie, so fresh and unexpected. It doesn’t go for a shiny photorealistic look like most animated movies nowadays. A very fair comparison has been made between this and the animation in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse; there are a lot of similarities between them, but The Last Wish does enough to make it not just a copy or riff on Spider-Verse. The colours are vibrant, exaggerated and gorgeous, the camera movements are fast and dynamic, the movements of the characters are swift and particularly shine in the snappy and exhilarating action scenes. It’s really helped by a good score from Heitor Pereira.

Puss in Boots: The Last Wish is surprisingly good. The story may be familiar, but its handled very well, it is entertaining, funny, creative, and benefits strongly from its stunning animation and great action. It’s also potentially the best movie in the whole Shrek franchise, at the very least it is in competition with Shrek 2. Well worth checking out.

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The Gray Man (2022) Review

Time: 129 Minutes
Age Rating: Violence, offensive language & cruelty
Cast:
Ryan Gosling as “Sierra Six”
Chris Evans as Lloyd Hansen
Ana de Armas as Dani Miranda
Jessica Henwick as Suzanne Brewer
Regé-Jean Page as Denny Carmichael
Wagner Moura as Laszlo Sosa
Julia Butters as Claire Fitzroy
Dhanush as “Lone Wolf”
Alfre Woodard as Margaret Cahill
Billy Bob Thornton as Donald Fitzroy
Director: Anthony Russo, Joe Russo

When the CIA’s top asset — his identity known to no one — uncovers agency secrets, he triggers a global hunt by assassins set loose by his ex-colleague.

I knew of The Gray Man as it was coming up to its release date, one of the newest movies from the Russo Brothers post Avengers: Endgame. It’s an action spy film with a massive cast including Ryan Gosling, Chris Evans and Ana de Armas. The movie looked like standard Netflix fare, but I went into it open minded; I found it passable.

The writing is a mixed bag to say the least. The Gray Man has a generic spy plot and as such it falls into many annoying cliches of the genre. I guess it is fine, but at a certain point the story stops mattering, as there’s a lot more importance placed on the set pieces. You kind of forget what the initial plot setup was by the third act. It is also hard to care about what’s going on despite the script’s best attempts. The characters aren’t that interesting, the only one who is remotely developed is Ryan Gosling’s protagonist. It makes an effort to make the character played by Julia Butters the heart and soul of the film, mainly with Gosling’s connection with her, but it feels lifeless and obligatory. The humour for the most part didn’t work, with some very dry jokes. The pacing is generally okay, but there is a section which has an extended flashback and while I get the reason for that section, it really halts the plot while it conveys the information. I get the feeling that the movie would’ve worked more if it came out in the 90s. As it is released today, its missing the charm that a movie like that might have. Not helping matters is the ending not feeling fully resolved, and its very clear that they were already intending to make sequels to this.

There is a massively talented cast here and while they are generally decent, none of them are doing great work. Ryan Gosling was the standout as the titular Gray Man. It’s certainly nowhere close to being one of Gosling’s best work by any means. However, he was pretty good with what he was given, it certainly helps that he’s the only character with any form of backstory or development. He was also quite convincing during the action scenes. Chris Evans plays a psychopathic ex-spy sent after Gosling in a rare villain role; it’s the type of role that John Travolta would’ve played in the 90s like Broken Arrow or Face/Off. It seems that Evans is a little miscast, even though he has played darker more villainous characters in other movies and done well at them. I think the problem is that the character is written quite generic, despite the movie deliberately showing how crazy he is. For this character to work, it would’ve required an actor who could deliver a certain kind of crazy to elevate it, unfortunately Evans is not that. For what its worth, at least it looks like he’s having fun and hams it up. It’s just a shame that despite the movie building up the concept of the two facing off, the two actors don’t share that much screentime. The supporting cast are fairly underutilised including Ana de Armas, Jessica Henwick, Rege Jean-Page, Alfre Woodard, Billy Bob Thornton and Julia Butters, but they are okay in their roles.

The Russo Brothers have delivered better in their previous movies, their work here is just fine. For a 200 million dollar budget movie, it could’ve been so much more. The movie is generally shot okay, but it can also look a bit bland visually. The action set pieces are nice and chaotic, however the cuts really take away from it. There are lots of drone shots, its fine but probably not as good as in other movies. It especially doesn’t help that earlier in the year, Michael Bay’s Ambulance utilised drone footage in a more exciting way. The Gray Man uses it an attempt to be flashy but ultimately it was pointless.

The Gray Man is a fairly entertaining yet forgettable spy movie, which is only memorable for the actors in it. As far as Netflix action movies go, it is on the better end but considering some of their other films, that isn’t saying a lot. Its okay. but you wouldn’t be missing much if you didn’t watch it, a shame considering the talent working in the movie.