99 Homes (2014)

An American crime drama directed by Ramin Bahrani, starring Michael Shannon and Laura Dern.
A young man who lives with his son and mother is evicted by a real estate tycoon. He ends up working for this man and making lots of money, but is unsure whether this is the right thing to do.
I liked the middle. At the beginning, there was like 17 minutes of tachycardia sound over everything that was happening. The ending was inconclusive. In the middle, the main character is questioning the morality of the manipulative things that his new boss is having him do. He has a team of people stealing air conditioners, pool pumps and appliances from houses in order to charge people for not having them there. He also does exactly what was done to him: evicting people. Michael Shannon was cast perfectly as the evil real estate boss and the main character, Andrew Garfield looks all honest and innocent, with puppy dog eyes. The plot held my attention until the end and the characters worked. Video all looked great, but the audio was a little on the trashy side. I rate this adequate because it was interesting, but not super-great. You might want to watch it.

Fahrenheit 451 (1966 & 2018)

A fireman meets a woman and they become friends. The fireman is in the business of finding and burning books and the woman is in league with book hoarders. Eventually, the fireman starts questioning why things are the way they are and begins to read the forbidden books.

1966 A British science fiction directed by Francois Truffaut, starring Julie Christie and Cyril Cusack.
The 1966 British film was great. I liked it because the plot fit in with Brave New World, 1984 and THX 1138. It also seemed to accurately reflect what Wikipedia says about the book synopsis. The characters seemed to act like they were on a 1960s British sitcom, but they did fit their roles. Although the special effects looked fake, but were convincing as far as plot was concerned, everything else looked and sounded plausibly realistic. I thought it was a really cool movie and rate it awesome. I would recommend it to anyone interested in the books/movies mentioned above.

2018 An American science fiction directed by Ramin Bahrani, starring Michael Shannon and Martin Donovan.
The 2018 American version was bad. I almost immediately wanted to turn it off for many reasons. The top of these reasons was the plot not accurately reflecting Ray Bradbury's novel. Even the characters and their relationships were rewritten. Montag doesn't even have a wife in 2018! As I said with The Hobbit (2012 - 2014), apparently Ray Bradbury's writing was not good enough for Ramin Bahrani. Who cares if it's classic literature which has stood the test of time? The acting was way over the top: overacting. Compared with the 1966 version, these people should be committed to a mental hospital for the way they played their roles. The special effects looked realistic, but were not convincing in the least bit, except the library fire. Obviously, modern technology allows a reasonably realistic representation of a person being burned. The only thing that I really liked was the "+100" bit. Anything above and beyond expectations was +100, implying that the population had lost conception of numbers and degrees of magnitude. I rate this shit because I ended up turning it off at around the hour and ten minutes mark.

Midnight Special (2016)

An American science fiction directed by Jeff Nichols, starring Michael Shannon, Joel Edgerton, Kirsten Dunst and Sam Shepard.
A boy with special powers is on his way to a certain place with his father. They previously belonged to a religious cult and are also being tracked by the government.
This was modern American mediocrity on display. I thought that an hour and 46 minutes was too long for so little to happen. The plot was so simplistic that it really should have been shorter. There was very little development of characters either forward through the plot or in development of back-stories. The dialogue was written relatively well and the actors gave convincing performances. Sets/locations and costumes would best be described as mundane. Camera-work seemed decent because I could see everything that was happening. Some shots looked good, but it wasn't anything special. The special effects were all digital (a standard of modern American mediocrity) and looked convincing, but again, not extraordinary. The audio was not so great. I thought that music and sound effects were mixed to high and dialogue mixed too low, but again, that is another Hollywood standard. IMDB gives this 6.6/10, Rotten Tomatoes has 83% tomatometer with 67% audience score and MetaCritic rates it 76/100 for and average of 73%. I agree with the C- grade because it wasn't bad, but wasn't good either. I rate this o.k.

My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done? (2009)

A German American drama directed by Werner Herzog, starring Willem Dafoe, Michael Shannon, Chloe Sevigny and Udo Kier.
A mentally disturbed man has just murdered his mother and the police have surrounded his house. His fiancee and the director of the play that he was in arrive and tell the back-story of how this happened.
This was pretty good. The characters were acted very well and the non-linear plot worked. I liked the main character and his crazy uncle the most. The camera-work and editing were fantastic. My favorite shot was the basketball in the tree, closely followed by prescription glasses with a light. There was a compositing shot in the park where the main character and fiancee are in real time while the background goes slow motion. I was impressed with how strange this was. Overall, nice work. I rate it good.