BEFORE: Adam Sandler carries over from "That's My Boy". You may recall I already used him as a link back in January, then he popped up unexpectedly in a couple documentaries, and now I've added three more films, for a total of 7 appearances this year. Yeah, he's doing OK and he'll be part of the year-end countdown for sure. Some Movie Years just turn out to feature certain actors again and again, what can I say. I made certain decisions in January and I made different ones in June, and so we're Sandler-heavy this time around. I'll try to cap it here and go in a different direction tomorrow as we head toward the Fourth of July. I think I'll have to either drop something or double up to get there on time, we'll see which makes the most sense.
FOLLOW-UP TO: "Murder Mystery" (Movie #3,489)
THE PLOT: Full-time detectives Nick and Audrey are struggling to get their private eye agency off the ground. They find themselves at the center of international abduction when their friend, the Maharajah, is kidnapped at his own lavish wedding.
AFTER: Three years and three months ago, I watched the first "Murder Mystery" film on Netflix - I barely remember what happened in the movie, so thank God it's not that important to enjoy this one. A couple of characters other than the leads carry over, but you can still catch up pretty quickly if you don't recall what happened in the first film. But back then, March 2020, we were all still at the start of the pandemic, or maybe it was the start of the middle, but then again, nobody knew how long lockdown was going to last, so we couldn't be so bold as to presume it would all be over in a few months. I used the time at home to catch up on all my shows on my DVR, filed for unemployment so I would have some income for at least a while, and then I set on really figuring out what I could watch on Netflix to pass the time. (Remember, when everyone was bingeing "Tiger King" and then making lists of what to knock off next?)
Now it's 2023 and things are totally different - I'm facing two months at home again, but for completely different reasons, still, thanks to the writers' strike I've been able to catch up on all my TV shows on my DVR, and I think tomorrow I'll file for unemployment so I'll have some income for a while, and now I really need to figure out what I can watch on Netflix to pass the time. Wait a minute...this is all feeling very familiar all of a sudden.
OK, so it's deja vu all over again - Father's Day films are over and it's time to watch some mysteries, followed by some superhero films, that should at least get me to the weekend. I think maybe I should have a "summer blockbuster summer" and try to get out to the movie theater a few times in July, now that I'm not working at a movie theater three or four times a week. "The Flash", "Spider-Man: Across the Spider-verse" and the new Indiana Jones film all look like solid options if I can work them all in, plus I need to catch "Ant-Man 3" on Disney and when are they going to start streaming "Guardians of the Galaxy 3"? I've been a little busy. (But it turns out "Secret Invasion" is a Marvel TV series, not a movie, so I can watch that one any time I want.)
Nick and Audrey Spitz do NOT have kids - so as I said, films about fathers are done, right on schedule. But they do bicker a bit, and also argue about things, so yeah, definitely a married couple. Like the famiilies in "Blended", they could really use a vacation, and summer's a perfect time for that. The Maharajah (from the first film) is having a wedding on his new private island and he invites his favorite crime-solving couple - gee, you don't suppose that a murder will take place on the island that they'll have to solve? Well, close, there is a murder but mainly they have to solve the kidnapping of the Maharajah, and try to figure out if any of his closest family members, exes and employees are in on the scheme. Logically there MUST be someone still on the island who's part of the plan, it says so right in the detective handbook, or something, that there had to be a person on the inside working with the kidnapper(s).
The couple also has a rival, a guy named Connor Miller, a former MI6 agent and also the guy who literally wrote the book that the Spitzes have been studying, and he covered everything from hostage negotiation to ransom drops to hand-to-hand combat. Umm, gee, I wonder if any of those skills will be relevant here to this situation. But then, there's also the possibility that the expert on kidnappings might also be working with the kidnappers himself - so who can they trust?
Yeah, I realize this film isn't as complex as a Shakespearean tragedy, but it turns out that when compared to "That's My Boy", it appears very well put together, at least by comparison. Yeah, I could see the poorly hidden set-ups in the story, but I was LOOKING for them. But hey, if you're an amateur filmmaker, there's an important lesson here, if you want people to enjoy your film more, just make sure that right before they watch YOUR film, they watch a much more terrible film right before. Well, it couldn't hurt - I'm not sure how you'd arrange this, but it might be worth a try. I sure enjoyed this one a lot more over the previous Adam Sandler offering.
This one also calls to mind "Glass Onion", in that it's set on a very rich person's private island and the suspect pool is just six or seven people. No, it didn't use the same plot points, and the detective in that other film was a professional, not a couple of amateurs, but still, there are some basic similarities. No spoilers here though.
Then the action moves to Paris where the couple has to make the ransom drop in exchange for the Maharajah, but things go bad during a van trip that turns into a quite exciting car chase, and then in a restaurant halfway up the Eiffel Tower, the kidnap victim is turned over, the villain is revealed and there's some more action that will mess with you if, like me, you're afraid of heights. Maybe there are a few too many reversals here, but the action scenes are all thrilling and the comedy isn't too obnoxious, maybe they found a good balance here by keeping Sandler in check and not letting him do any of his "funny" voices. And hey, he probably got to take his family to Hawaii for the third time, and maybe Paris for the first time.
Some jokes do go nowhere - particularly the repetitive one where Sandler has to keep moving heavy furniture that's blocking the door every time somebody comes into their hotel room - if the table and the plant are in the way, then why do you keep moving them BACK, genius?
Also starring Jennifer Aniston (last seen in "The Object of My Affection"), Mark Strong (last seen in "Shazam! Fury of the Gods"), Mélanie Laurent (last seen in "Operation Finale"), Jodie Turner-Smith (last seen in "White Noise"), John Kani (last heard in "The Lion King" (2019)), Kuhoo Verma (last seen in "The Big Sick"), Dany Boon (last seen in "Murder Mystery"), Adeel Akhtar (last seen in "The Electrical Life of Louis Wain"), Enrique Arce (last seen in "Terminator: Dark Fate"), Zurin Villanueva, Jillian Bell (last seen in "Brittany Runs a Marathon"), Tony Goldwyn (last seen in "King Richard"), Annie Mumolo (last seen in "Confess, Fletch"), Larry Myo Leong, Carlos Ponce (last heard in "Ice Age: Collision Course"), Anouar H. Smaine (last seen in "Hustle") and the voice of Ray Chase (last seen in "Licorice Pizza").
RATING: 6 out of 10 confusing business cards
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