Death of a Unicorn and Freaky Tales – Movie Reviews

Death of a Unicorn, written and directed by Alex Scharfman, starring Jenna Ortega and Paul Rudd revolves around an attorney and his daughter who are heading to the mountains so that they can finalize a deal with his boss that will set them up for life. While driving there, they hit and kill a creature that seems to have healing properties.

Unfortunately, I found Death of a Unicorn to be middling. I like the basic idea of the film. A magical creature is exploited by the wealthiest among us to become even wealthier for no particular other reason than greed. Love that—very true to real life. There were some good performances, particularly from Will Poulter, who really goes for it in this movie, and I really appreciate that. However, there was just a lot of flaws in the film too.

The unicorn CGI during the day scenes wasn’t the best. Jenna Ortega’s character is one that I’ve seen her do before, from Wednesday to Beetlejuice Beetlejuice  and I’m starting to get a little tired of it. I thought there was an underdevelopment of themes/ideas. Lastly, I felt that the last act dragged on for far too long. All in all, Death of a Unicorn takes a creative idea and doesn’t do all that much with it.

‘Death of a Unicorn’ Rating – 2.5/5

Freaky Tales is co-written and co-directed by Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck (‘Captain Marvel’ fame), stars Pedro Pascal, Jay Ellis, Ben Mendelsohn and begins in Oakland, California, 1987 with four stories, each told separately, all twist together to tell the tale of a city in a specific time.

Holy fuck! I loved this movie. There are so many things I could go into—balls to the walls 80’s, dripping in an amazing score, amazing acting, perfect casting of Pedro Pascal and Jay Ellis, stories about the underdog rising up, Tom Hanks having his best scene in years, and so many nazis absolutely getting their shit rocked.

There are some negatives that I realize—a bit uneven in the first two stories, some editing mistakes that mess up the continuity, one scene with the VFX with Pascal’s character in the back of a car was pretty bad, in the first story the blood really needed to look better. But man, this is one that wears its heart on its sleeve, and if you can’t get with it then I don’t know what to say. All in all, Freaky Tales is a blast, a hoot, and a holler.

‘Freaky Tales’ Rating – 3.5/5

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