Mickey 17
Written by Ashley Kelmore, Posted in Reviews
2 Stars
I think I don’t ‘get’ a lot of popular satire. Like, I walked out of Book of Mormon at the intermission. It didn’t seem clever, or insightful – it just seemed like a way for some people to be mean and racist under the guise of satire. And most people I’ve mentioned this to just say ‘huh, I really enjoyed it’ and then we move on.
I thought Parasite and Snowpiercer, both by Bong Joon-ho, were fantastic. They were interesting glimpses into different ways of looking at class (one hyper-dramatic, another much more insidious) While not the same, I do feel like part of the reason I dislike Mikey 17 so much is because it claims to be satire, and I just … I just don’t get it. I am not alone in this opinion, at least. But it is still a bummer, as we really only go out to the movies maybe twice a year at this point.
The main issues I had, beside the fact that the film was WAY too long, is that it was so on the nose that it felt almost childish. Like, a kids’ film about the perils of cults and capitalism, but only adults are allowed to see it. The Mark Ruffalo and Toni Colette characters were so on the nose it seemed a bit like a quick improv scene in a college theatre class, where one doesn’t have loads of time to prepare and so just goes for the very obvious laughs. Especially Ruffalo’s Trump/Musk hybrid person. Also, the Creepers (the alien life) were the victims of some pretty brutal cruelty, which felt a bit like watching cats be tortured, and I’m not so much interested in seeing that in the movies I choose to watch.
Overall, I thought Robert Pattinson’s acting was fantastic, and some of the moments were interesting. There was just so much more potential there, but it seemed like any time there was an opportunity to explore an interesting discussion about ethics, politics, capitalism, relationships, religion, etc., the filmmakers decided to just cut to a different scene.
