Pain will journey with us

Basically it's just a story of the first dog. This dude 20,000 years ago gets lost from his tribe and by sheer accident tames a wild dog. And alright little thing because dogs are nice and our ancestors are pretty cool as well.

Forever bothering individuals

Tiny Marvel creatures are fighting for a superior quantum technology in molecular disequilibrium. I grew tired of the story after the first 15 minutes, but finished the rest of the movie because I had nothing better to do and I still had hope it would turn into something good. Fat chance.

Parched by the sun

A grumpy old man gets even more grumpier when his wife kicks the bucket. With nothing looming on the horizon, he prepares to die himself, making his own coffin and all. However when there's his granddaughter knocking on the door, things are about to change. Hard to get too offended by drama comedies where the acting bit is done with passion, but offers so little otherwise.

Never go on vacation

A documentary of two Finnish businesses. The other one - selling pulled oats - is a groundbreaking, inventive, modern company trying to reach international markets. And the other one sells heirloom meat and runs a derelict funfair in small Finnish villages. The movie displays the sheer hard work and extra dose of energy that is needed in entrepreneurship. And the toll it sometimes quite dramatically takes.

The wizard of thousand kings

They defend this movie saying it's 'fun' which is pretty desparate because everyone else seems to be shouting it's a travesty of the original Venom, the graphic novel of pretty violent and vile nature. I don't read graphic novels, so I don't care, but to me the funniness in the movie was just tasteless and the creature merely a household pet.

Ritches to the conjurer

The writer/author Ari Aster knows his art. Hereditary is quite near perfect old-school horror. It's rich in oppressing dark ambience, it tickles your mind with sudden shocking thrills and disturbing silent moments, allusive mysticism, ghosts and spirits. One of those movies you want to see immediately again to find and pinpoint all the hidden clues that lead to the resolution in the ending.

Slaves of lust

It ain't too tempting to be a prisoner in a Thai Department of Corrections. Heroin addict Billy Moore's last straw of survival is his boxing skills. A Prayer Before Dawn is fair and square prison movie, it looks pretty grim although I suspect doing time in Thailand is in fact even worse. In the risk of losing authenticity however I wish they'd they had done something with the story, it's a bit thin to be honest.

It's boring to talk to a corpse

There's a monster roaming around northern England. American David survives a werewolf attack, but according to a friend, Jack, who is caught up in a limbo between life and death, David will become a lycanthrope himself when the moon is full. Directed by John Landis in 1981 and it's still pretty funky and cool. And you realize its importance once you've read some trivia of the film (first film to earn the Academy Award for Best Make-up, John Landis' personal favorite film of his own, influential to Michael Jackson's Thriller video, and so on).

A killer dressed up as a hero

Confusingly fast-paced thriller of U.S. intelligence people after five pounds of highly dangerous nuclear powder. The story is suffocated under a chaotic cinematography and it's boring in its highspeed nonsense and mindless action.

Shake a tail feather

British secret service agency MI7 has been cyberattacked exposing all its secret agents therefore they need to call for a retired agent to find the terrorist. Johnny English is the man to save the British Intelligence from total humiliation and through chaos and 'funny' shit he gets things done. I have nothing against the Johnny English franchise or Rowan Atkinson comedy at such, but it is getting more and more embarrassing. At least it didn't make me laugh, not once, so perhaps my sense of humour is outdated and I am a humourless git for evermore.

An offering of blood

I haven't paid too much attention on how many Saw movies have been made because the only one that made a difference is the debut. Jigsaw is another sequeal and even though I read that the notorious culprit was killed in one of the previous sequels, he's quite well alive and murderous again. Trivial horror soap opera.

Fuhgedaboudit

FBI agent Joseph D. Pistone had to be involved in heinous things to gain confidence from crime family. Donnie Brasco is one of the greatest - yet oddly forgotten - mafia movies of all time. It's quite brutal, and the short, violent and fiery gangsta life full of paranoia is depicted to perfection. And still Al Pacino's role as a kind of sympathetic main guy stands out.

Brush the dust away

Five Yankee mercenaries have a plan to execute a heist worth of few hundred million dollars and kill a bad Brazilian drug lord. They've really thought it through, they are true professionals, it would be a miracle of anything would go wrong. However halfway through the mission they turn into morons and everything turns to shit. I don't get it how they lost so much potential in so little time in this movie. The first 30 minutes in and I thought I was in a one of the best action movies of the year, but it turned into a pretty laughable farce to be honest.

Storm the gates of the fallen ones

Robert McCall is a cab (or Lyft) driver, but whenever he has free time keeps himself occupied with neighborhood watch. Be it kidnapped children, yuppies messing with date drugs, hustlers on the block, or illegal graffiti, he's on the case. However when his friend is brutally murdered he steps into a dangerous world of international crime. The film continues where The Equalizer (#1) left off. All in all a very thin story, nothing too memorable or mind-blowing, but kind of fun and good enough.

Humans are parasites

Tina is a kooky and misshapen customs official who senses or smells if something ain't quite up to the norm. She's so sensitive in fact that the local police department quite happily utilizes her skills. However Tina ain't too happy with her current life, living deep in the woods in Sweden with her boring husband. She likes the wildlife alright, bonds with foxes and wolves and all the other Nordic creatures. Until she meets another troll-like human, bestial instincts ignite and bizarre truth of things unfold. Based on John Ajvide Lindqvist (Let the Right One in) novel and this modern fairytale is both disgusting and scary.

Living according to bitchy mood swings

A writer with a crippling writer's block and an actress making an international career are a couple. The author hasn't done shit for his career the past few years and the actress, against her true beliefs, gets trifling roles in motion pictures. They are both frustrated and suffocated in their own artistry. The director Aleksi Salmenperä is the greatest Finnish director on the field right now, Tyhjiö equals his best works Häiriötekijä (2015) and Paha Perhe (2010). Full of crazy painful irony and witty chuckles.

Power to the people

Such a big fuzz about nothing. Started out great, but somewhere along the line BlacKkKlansman lost its focus and Spike Lee's inability as a director took the reins. Important - still valid - issues, historical embarrassments, were scrutinized and the first half of the movie looked so much like an entertaining motion picture without the underlining political agenda that took hold later and where the entertaintment simply just vanished. Lots of potential, but fucked itself blind.

From chaos to glory

One of the funniest mini series that I have ever seen. Probably won't go down to the people who haven't witnessed the absurd world in the ferries between Finland and Sweden in real life. The fact that this tragicomedy stirred in a bowl of black humour is actually out there day-in-day-out makes it even more funnier.

Start a war with everyone

DEA conspires a civil war between two Mexican drug cartels only to find out they have an outraging bodycount and one kidnapped girl in their hands. The first Sicario still fresh in mind, losing magical director (Denis Villeneuve) and brilliant contradictive character Kate Macer (Emily Blunt), Sicario 2: Soldado does alright, proper action and thrills, but still somewhat focuses on the wrong things.

Land of the wolves

Picked up Sicario because its successor is on line in few weeks time. DEA, CIA and FBI have to work with another evil to get to and annihilate the other. I hope the follow-up is anywhere near as cool brutal shit as this one.

Humans deliberately malfunction

Quadriplegic Grey Trace gets an oppurtunity to avenge his wife's murder. He's implanted an illegal microship so he can walk and operate again, but little did they know that the super chip has a mind of its own and, at best, can break all hell loose. Wonderfully refreshing - even funny - scifi crime noir.

Living in the past is dying in present

Every May for 30 years a group of men have played a game of tag because playing keeps them young and literally untouchable Jerry is a resilient little devil that no one has ever caught. Perfect example of the decline of western humour.

Crushing through the bones

There's a secret world beneath the Mariana Trench and it's the kingdom of the great super shark species called megalodon. People tresspass their privacy and they are out to get a revenge. Too bad the massive prehistoric killing machines are just supporting actors because the people spew out ridiculous clichés like there was no tomorrow.

Blissful ignorance

Had there not been the 1973 Papillon film with Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman, this (with Charlie Hunnan and Rami Malek) would have been more than alright. I just can't get away from comparing between these two and, frankly, there's no way whatsoever the new one stands the comparison. Somehow I'm still glad they did it, it was interesting to see it, a decent enough an attempt.

Relentless purple butterflies

Mom acts against all logic when her son is kidnapped. Actually everyone else is oblivious to the heinous crime taking place even though the mom and kidnappers leave a high-speed car chase, couple of car crashes and one dead cop on a busy highway behind. The only thing more annoying is Halle Berry's character who constantly speaks to herself. It's an often occurring 'mistake', it only reveals that the filmmakers fail to deliver an option how to keep viewers up to date with the story.

Be kind for everyone's fighting hard battle

Auggie ain't quite an elephant man but he has facial differences enough to get bullied and ridiculed at school. Basically, it's the same story that has been told a thousand times, but the rollercoaster of emotions hits its mark, so much so that I truly wished it hadn't an unhappy ending.

The souls of men

The cover of the DVD has Ethan Hawke wielding a gun and it also says 'from the producer of John Wick.' Didn't bother reading the synopsis on the back cover. Hawke's character is a semi-retired super agent who dies, is temporarily fixed and has only 24 hours to live but a few hundred people to kill. That's exactly the sort of shit you expect from the producer of John Wick, if bullets are fired from left to right, there's no need for anything profound. And if you add enough useless flashbacks, there's enough to go by and call it a full-lenght feature film. Probably the worst movie I've seen thus far this year.

King of madness

Catching up with the Derren Brown shows I've missed before from Netflix. With a selected group of elderly he cleverly executes an art robbery. Yet again, the hoax is brilliant.

Down the road apiece

CIA and FBI were too busy measuring their dicks than co-operating with each other to inflitrate and properly investigate Al Qaida cells before the '98-'01 terrorists attacks (most notoriously in Kenya, Yemen and the World Trade Center) took place. The Looming Tower grabbed my interest immediately, as far as I know it's mostly based on true events, the characters were real people, so seeing how things played out is - in spite of the horrible consequences - exciting and entertaining. Jeff Daniels - in particular - as FBI's counter terrorism expert John O'Neill excelled.

Pigs have wings

A boy barely out of school gets what he wished and serves in the trenches of the frontline of the First World War. He finds out that war is hell and most of the veterans are either mad or act insensitive, but they all are scared out of their tits because the Germans are coming for the final kill. Solid British war drama, tension and thrills built up nicely and splendid performances throughout the line.

The ballad of man on fire

With the boxing movies you kinda know what you get. In Jawbone there's a boxer gone astray. He's a lonely penniless alcoholic about to get evicted from his childhood home. He gets a second chance and you just see where it goes from there; baby steps to get back into profession, Alcoholics Anonymous, the final fight, the whole nine yards. Not bad, but easily forgettable.

When the lizards sleep

WWII, former athlete, baseball player Moe Berg has been assigned to locate - possibly assassinate - Werner Heisenberg, German physicist and principal scientist in the Nazi German nuclear weapon project. Paul Rudd does alright as the secretive agent as does the rest of the famed cast (Paul Giamatti, Tom Wilkinson, Mark Strong, Jeff Daniels, Guy Pearce), but unfortunately the movie looks like bad TV drama.

Green River killer

Ted Bundy is probably the most famous serial killer of all time. He was a sadistic sociopath who raped, mutilated and murdered at least 30 young women. Netflix's Ted Bundy Tapes immerses itself on Bundy's modus operandi and unlocks the cases enough to advocate death penalty.

Thrown into a shredder

Chose to watch it just because I want to know what to hate. But I really hadn't the time to hate Ocean's Eleven reboot because I was so occupied in the sheer stupidity of the whole damn film. Constrainedly built up group of clever multiracial girls steal jewelry. I shivered in embarrassment.

New world unfolds

WWII rages on and a small island in the English Channel called Guernsay has been occupied by the nazis. In order to survive, a few neighbours have to make up a sudden excuse for going about outdoors during curfew, therefore they establish a literary club, hence The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society. A few years later, after the war, the club still stands and gains interest from a Times journalist who soon realises it's a story far too heartfelt and intricate than just bunch of literary enthusiasts. In spite of the aftermath of horrible war, a beautiful tale of love of literature, friendship and romance.

Hope is not a strategy

I admit, I lost a plot there. It's packed full information and disinformation, different intelligence agencies and terrorist cells, good guys and bad guys, backstabbers, agent and double agents, and so much action that if your concentration wavers a bit, you might have lost something important. It happened to me, but luckily the action is so high octane that I didn't even care. People were exchanging a vile terrorist to missing plutonium and it was all very exciting.

Dirty old town

Police are investigating the death of former Olympic gold medalist and find out several people had reasons to hate him. Quite sympathetic little Finnish crime movie from 1988, but cinematically terribly out of date.

Lost in the blue hotel

Conan Without Borders on Netflix. Conan O'Brien travels to various countries to make fun of himself. There's Cuba, South Korea, Mexico, Israel, Haiti and Italy. The Italy episode stands out because of the weird chemistry between the host and his associate producer Jordan Schlansky.

Feeding the monster

People come to speak with a nameless man to find solutions to their problems. The man gives them tasks to do and if they succeed, their wishes are met. Blind man wants to see, a girl wants to be prettier, a man wants to fuck a calendar girl, and so on. But in request, are they really willing to rape, kill or steal to acquire personal benefits. Who is this all-powerful man? A devious jester, psychologist from hell, magician or plain bullshitter? Anyways, it makes a wonderful film that is as surreal and intriguing as the main character and it's open to aplenty interpretations.

Long gone before the storm

A boxer hurts his brain on a Championship fight and its fuckenlot trouble for him and his family from there on. Read a lot of great things of this film, but somehow all the misery and sorrow and struggle for life just seemed all too underlined and predictable. Patty Considine directing himself and can't see much of a fighter oozing from him either.

Mother of shit

The most popular students in school are dying because Penelope's teen angst has a body count. The hilarious dark comedy is still one of its kind. Probably the best college comedy ever. Winona Ryder, Christian Slater and Shannen Doherty truly boosting their careers, while all the rest dozen or so young actors sunk into oblivion.

Through the stars of the voiceless

There's a UFO sighting, but the FBI covers it up. An argumentative whiz kid at the University of Cincinnati don't buy the explanations and starts deciphering recorded signals using mathematics. He finds out that the aliens will come back in a week! Are they hostile or do they come in peace? And do we get answers to one of the most important questions in the world? FBI wants to keep everything shrouded in mystery, but the college kid is determined as fuck. Mathematic and scientific musings in the film left little room for anything else.

The duck of death

It's been whopping 27 years since its release and at least I still call Unforgiven as one of Clint Eastwood's more recent releases. Be as it may, it has lost none of its charm, aged remarkably well, a proper old western.

Down in the gutter

This thing is set around a scrubby roadside motel somewhere in Florida, its tenants and manager (fantastic Willem Dafoe). It shows the other - uglier - side of the land of the free. Kids have nothing to do, everything is noisy, dirty and hopelessly derelict, people are desperately poor, uneducated and they eat junk. It ain't the Florida you get when you google it up, it's the one no one speaks about, a proper nature of things, a third world country hidden in the shadows of a once great nation. It's still a very good movie, the kids steal the show, their performance is so natural that it looks improvisational and if it is, it's even more amazing.

Seven minds are better than one

One child earth. The fucking thing is so overpopulated that we've run out of food and space, plus polluted the globe to shit, so the ingenious solution is to uphold one-child policy and deep freeze all the leftover siblings in cryobanks, so they can wake up later to a less crowded world. One particular family with a set of identical septuplets has a bit of a dilemma. The director Tommy Wirkola (the Død snø movies) has seven different Naomi Rapace's character's under his wing and his dystopian thriller has a cool storyline, but fails to really deliver.

The kingdom of vipers

Could quite well be the sequel to Die Hard films. Huge building is one fire and the hero of the day is involved in aplenty hair-raising situations. Too bad that Dwayne Johnson as Bruce Willis ain't much of an actor.

Messy but necessary

An elderly couple run off to have one final vacation together. They hop into an equally old Winnebago motorhome and just drive into the horizon. Their kids are obviously worried of their parents wanting to reminiscence the past on the road. Overall a lacklustre piece, but still rather openly and warmly delves into the issues of health, aging and death.

Dry bones in the alternate world

Wayne Caraway is a hillbilly officer of the law, he's a bad crooked cop, but even a worse father. His daughter and her new boyfriend are frightened beyod belief, but bagful of one million of dollars just might be their way of escape. Bill Paxton's last major film before his untimely demise, too bad the movie is frustratingly tiresome at times.

Surrounded by the spirits of the dead

Derren Brown's live stage show and I have absolutely no idea of the craftmanship of his trickery. It was absolutely spellbinding. His television programs are one thing, fluctuating from decent to great, but the delivery in the live shows? Thunderously clever and entertaining tricks of the mind.

Chinaman is not the preferred nomenclature

If I turn on the television and it's showing Big Lebowski, I start watching it. This time around I purposefully watched it from start to finish, chose it as a New Year's film. Seen it a few dozen times. Makes me fucken happy.

2018

MOVIES

American Made (Doug Liman)
American Valhalla (Josh Homme, Andreas Neumann)
The Apostle (Gareth Evans)
Armomurhaaja (Teemu Nikki)
Avengers: Infinity War (Anthony Russo, Joe Russo)
The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (Ethan Coen, Joel Coen)
Before The Flood (Fisher Stevens)
Brawl in Cell Block 99 (S. Craig Zahler)
Brimstone (Martin Koolhoven)
The Commuter (Jaume Collet-Serra)
The Death of Stalin (Armando Iannucci)
Deadpool 2 (David Leitch)
Detroit (Kathryn Bigelow)
The Disaster Artist (James Franco)
Dunkirk (Christopher Nolan)
Eagles of Death Metal: Nos Amis (Colin Hanks)
Field of Dreams (Phil Alden Robinson)
Happy Death Day (Christopher Landon)
Hevi reissu (Juuso Laatio, Jukka Vidgren)
The Hitman's Bodyguard (Patrick Hughes)
Hostiles (Scott Cooper)
The Invitation (Karyn Kusama)
Killing Them Softly (Andrew Dominik)
Loveless (Andrey Zvyagintsev)
Man of Fire (Tony Scott)
Murder on the Orient Express (Kenneth Branagh)
The New York Ripper (Lucio Fulci)
One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest (Milos Forman)
The Outlaw Josey Wales (Clint Eastwood)
The Player (Robert Altman)
The Pledge (Sean Penn)
[Rec] (Jaume Balagueró, Paco Plaza)
Revenge (Coralie Fargeat)
Ricky Gervais: Humanity (John L. Spencer)
The Ritual (David Bruckner)
Thelma (Joachim Trier)
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (Martin McDonagh)
Train To Busan (Sang-ho Yeon)
You Were Never Really Here (Lynne Ramsay)

TV-SERIES

Ash vs Evil Dead
Better Call Saul
Dark
Game of Thrones
Norsemen
Seinfeld
Sledge Hammer
The Staircase
Stranger Things
Vikings
The Walking Dead
Westworld

GAMES

Far Cry 5
Fifa 2019
Red Dead Redemption 2

R.I.P.

Kofi Annan (diplomat) born 1938 (age 80)
Davide Astori (footballer, Fiorentina) born 1987 (age 31)
Bernardo Bertolucci (director, Last Tango in Paris) born 1941 (age 77)
Steven Bochco (producer, Hill Street Blues) born 1943 (age 74)
Anthony Bourdain (chef) born 1956 (age 61)
Barbara Bush (first lady) born 1925 (age 93)
George H.W.  Bush (president) born 1924 (age 94)
Fast Eddie Clarke (musician, Motörhead) born 1950 (age 67)
R. Lee Ermey (actor, Full Metal Jacket) born 1943 (age 74)
Milos Forman (director, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest) born 1932 (age 86)
Arethra Franklin (the Queen of Soul) born 1942 (age 76)
Stephen Hawking (physicist, cosmologist) born 1942 (age 76)
Brett Hoffmann (musician, Malevolent Creation) born 1967 (age 51)
Dave Holland (musician, Judas Priest) born 1948 (age 69)
Perttu Häkkinen (journalist, musician) born 1979 (age 39)
Markku Into (poet, underground activist) born 1945 (age 72)
Esa Kaartamo (musician, Broadcast) born 1961 (age 56)
Reijo Kallio (singer) born 1933 (age 84)
Ingvar Kamprad (business magnate, Ikea) born 1926 (age 91)
Matti Kassila (director, Vodkaa, komisario Palmu!) born 1924 (age 94)
Killjoy (musician, Necrophagia) born 1969 (age 48)
Koko (western lowland gorilla) born 1971 (age 46)
Jussi Kummala (hardcore activist, Today's Waste) born 1974 (age 44)
Armas Lahoniitty (mayor) born 1944 (age 74)
Stan Lee (superhero) born 1922 (age 95)
Sondra Locke (actress, Sudden Impact) born 1944 (age 74)
John Mahoney (actor, Frazier) born 1940 (age 77)
Olavi Mäenpää (politician) born 1950 (age 67)
Arto Paasilinna (author) born 1942 (age 76)
Vinnie Paul (musician, Pantera) born 1964 (age 54)
Randy Rampage (musician, Annihilator) born 1960 (age 58)
Burt Reynolds (actor, Deliverance) born 1936 (age 82)
Dolores O'Riordan (musician, The Cranberries) born 1971 (age 46)
Philip Roth (author, American Pastoral) born 1933 (age 85)
Otis Rush (musician) born 1935 (age 83)
Conway Victor Savage (musician, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds) born 1960 (age 58)
Mark Shelton (musician, Manilla Road) born 1957  (age 60)
Hanna-Riikka Siitonen (actress-singer) born 1970 (age 47)
Mark E. Smith (musician, The Fall) born 1957 (age 60)
Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha (owner of Leicester City club) born 1958 (age 60)
Pete Shelley (musician, Buzzcocks) born 1955 (age 63)
Sebastian 'Basse' Särekallio (friend) born 1970 (age 48)
Chris Tsangarides (producer, Painkiller) born 1956 (age 61)
Elmarie Wendel (actress, 3rd Rock from the Sun) born 1928 (age 89)
Tony Joe White (musician) born 1943 (age 75)
Jerry Williams (rock and roll singer) born 1942 (age 75)
Scott Wilson (actor, The Walking Dead) born 1942 (age 76)