PoeticArson
Flick Fan
Member Since: 25 Aug 2024
Location: USA
Bio: Fledgling movie-watcher. Slowly making my way through the canon and various hidden gems. I have rated roughly 350 movies, but many of those came before I started using a 100-point scale (when I used either a five-star or 10-point system). I've decided not to retroactively rate anything; I'll rate old favorites on the newly-minted scale once I get back around to them. This is to say: just because I don't have something rated does not mean I haven't seen it. | Some of my reviews here are cut down from the ones I post over at Letterboxd: https://letterboxd.com/PoeticArson/ | You can also check out my barebones website, where I keep all my reviews and rankings of various media, as well as my poetry: https://poeticarson.neocities.org/
Recent Ratings
Check out PoeticArson's...
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014) - Rated 08 Aug 2025
"First rewatch, I think. Exactly middle-of-the-road. First, it's just too long. And while Garfield and Stone are often good together, the tension of their relationship starts to tire. The villains are conceptually neat, but ill-realized. Not sure what the director told Dane DeHaan to go for, but it's a big swing and a miss. Still, there are some fun sequences here. "Itsy Bitsy Spider" playing on the pylons. Peter distracting security at the elevator. The final shot. But mostly meh."
The Notebook (2004) - Rated 22 Jul 2025
"At least fifth viewing, although I suspect it's much more than that. A well-constructed love story with a distracting frame narrative. Every moment we're not with past Noah and Allie is a wasted one. I'd much rather this have just been a straight romantic period piece (yes I know this is adapted from the Sparks novel). As it is, the 15-minute, present-day, septuagenarian ending saps the energy right out of the film. Still, I'm a sucker for the chemistry Ryan and Rachel have together here."
Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999) - Rated 07 Jul 2025
"First viewing. Baffled by the positive consensus surrounding this one. This kinda sucks, no? Too ponderous and poorly choreographed to be a good action film. Too woolly and stilted to be a good character piece. Too corny to be a compelling philosophical film. What is this supposed to be? Forest Whitaker does some good, but the writing is of little help. The French best friend quickly wore thin. And this story is a mess. The drain assassination and RZA's soundtrack are the two bright spots."
Zathura (2005) - Rated 25 Jun 2025
"Umpteenth viewing. First in probably fifteen years. All told, not quite as effective as Jumanji. A decent amount of fun is mined from the board-game-as-pandora's-box gimmick once more, and the kids at the heart of this turn in some solid performances. Ultimately, it's all a bit insubstantial and not quite rip-roaring enough to make up the difference."
Little Giants (1994) - Rated 18 Jun 2025
"TIL that Alexa PenaVega is in this. Umpteenth viewing. First in almost twenty years I would think. I've certainly never watched this on anything other than VHS. It's still handsomely quotable, but this is a pretty limp little number. Neither Moranis nor O'Neill bring the comedic chops necessary to punch this thing up and none of the kids manage to pull out a surprising performance. There's just not a whole lot here. "Giants! Giants! Help us God!""
Jeepers Creepers (2001) - Rated 16 Jun 2025
"Second, maybe third watch. First in like fifteen years. There are a surprising number of striking shots in this joint, as well as some solid set designs and location choices. But my goodness, the creeper sure is dorky and the sibling energy at the heart of this gets rather tiresome. There's also a howler of a performance from Patricia Belcher, although thankfully she doesn't arrive until 2/3rds into the film. Dark ending was a nice touch."
Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) - Rated 09 Jun 2025
"Probably around my third watch. This is a strong entry in the series (still doesn't approach Iron Man '08), boasting its fare share of high-octane action sequences—although, the final battle is a bit of a mess. It also does an admirable job of establishing Captain America in his new world with the dynamic between he and Black Widow strong enough to carry this thing to the end, and with Falcon adding some decent spice to the mix. That said, there is no shortage of contrivance in this joint."
The Avengers (2012) - Rated 08 Jun 2025
"Probably third or fourth watch. Couldn't say. Generic, certainly, but still impresses as the culmination of, at the time, four (or five) other films. The set pieces are mostly great, with the plummeting helicarrier the standout, and The Hulk is a highlight. I can't help but project my now pronounced superhero fatigue onto this film retroactively. Still, this was a good moment in time. We couldn't have known how dire things would soon become."
The Pagemaster (1994) - Rated 08 Jun 2025
"Watched this a lot when I was a kid, but I hadn't seen it in many moons. A lovely premise, but I can't help but feel the movie never pushes the premise as far as it could go. Everything here is surface level, and with the whole wide world of collective fiction to explore, that's disappointing. And the characters don't break this trend, all of them various shades of uninteresting. Archetypal. And while there are certainly some beautiful sequences of animation, even that aspect is uneven."
Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) - Rated 28 May 2025
"At least second viewing. Not sure when my first viewing was. Truly a product of the MCU, this is ultimately too much of a galavant to really feel like a Spider-Man movie. The insistence of Tony Stark, and then Peter at the end of the film, that Peter be a "friendly, neighborhood Spider-Man" puts an even finer point on this. It's all much too grand, which, if memory serves, only worsens as this trio of films progresses. Holland certainly belongs in the role, but he's in search of a better film."
