Film Review: The Eyes of Tammy Faye (2021)

Tammy Faye (Jessica Chastain) and Jim Bakker (Andrew Garfield) discover each other in the college and find the ultimate purpose to live together – spreading the message of God. With time, they become one of America’s biggest showrunners in the history of evangelical television shows. But with immense success comes challenges and personal conflicts that jeopardize their holy rank as America’s most influential and beloved televangelists.

Faye and Bakker led two of the biggest and most popular evangelical television shows, The PTL Club and The 700 Club. The Eyes of Tammy Faye is mostly based on the 2000 documentary with the same name. Most of the sources have been taken from this documentary.

Based on the true story and events, the film guarantees higher historical accuracy. Most of the thick points in the film are correct like Tammy Faye’s permanent makeup, her affair with the record producer Gary Paxton, her segment on penile implants, and interviewing AIDS activist Steve Pieters, etc.

The intensity is built in the middle of the film when Tammy and Jim suffer personal conflicts. I think during all the crises that begin to occur in the middle, the director missed dramatizing Jim Bakker’s affair that shattered their lives and reputation. That was a very critical incident and deserved minutes. The angle of the story bending towards their crisis should have been directed towards the affair.

More than the film’s entire making, average direction, and not-so-tightly-gripped screenwriting, the film earns respect from the audience through spectacular performances by the leading actors, Jessica Chastain and Andrew Garfield. Also, I must not forget to mention the film’s significant plus in brilliant makeup and hairstyling. I have read about Jessica’s makeup that it was prepared to clock around five hours along with prosthetics.

Garfield is in superb form but Jessica recently went on to win the Oscar for Best Actress for this role. She deserves it and I must say that it was really a tough call between her, Kristen, and Kidman for the roles they were nominated for. All the three ladies gave extraordinary performances. But I think Jessica may have won this contest for her incredible performance under very heavy makeup and she also sang some numbers herself. Plus, her portrayal was so spot on. You can clearly listen to the voice of Tammy Faye coming from Jessica’s mouth. If you observe Faye’s real videos on YouTube especially conducting an interview with Steve, you will realize that Jessica gave a very splendid performance.

The winner of two Academy Awards, The Eyes of Tammy Faye is an average drama that should only be watched to see Jessica and Garfield.

Ratings: 6.5/10

Film Review: Spider-Man No Way Home (2021)

After Peter‘s identity is revealed and is framed for the drone attack and Mysterio‘s death, Peter struggles to escape from the backlashes and overcome the damage of his being the main reason behind terrorizing the city. When he seeks help from Strange, he casts a spell for good. But the spell is corrupted due to Peter’s repeated interference that leads to opening doors for people from other universes.

I think it was a fantastic plot and the continuity of the never-ending ever-growing universe has met strong parallels. The concept of multiverses will go further wide that is certain to happen in Doctor Strange’s upcoming sequel, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. But my reason for the plot being really impressive has to do with the characterization of New York’s friendly neighbor. Whatever happened to New York in this film was because Peter couldn’t tolerate the revelation of his identity. The consequences were strong. But Peter made the mess by corrupting Strange’s spell. After all, Peter is a boy, he is not mature. If you notice, he has always needed support from the others in this universe, majorly from Tony Stark. He was Peter’s godfather and after all the support Peter got, Tony died and re-orphaned him. Peter also got the support of Nick Fury and took Mysterio as a crime-fighting partner. In this film, Murdock saved his ass from the charges.

If Peter was mature, he would have faced the consequences after the revelation. He would have never come to Sanctum Sanctorium. Strange further squeezed Peter’s childishness when he couldn’t believe that he didn’t even ‘convince them’ and reached for his help without making an effort. It was a very funny scene and I hit my palm on my forehead but simultaneously that is what Peter Parker in a human was best picturized all this time. After this film, there is no argument about who the best spidey is. Tom Holland‘s Spider-Man is the most ideal portrayal of all time.

At the same time, I was also met with surprises for the wrong reasons. One critical angle that is downplayed is Doctor Strange. Being the new leader of this universe and literally the one who holds the fate of the world by sorcery, how can he ever think of brainwashing the entire world just to make people forget that Peter is Spidey? How come Strange didn’t believe in the critical consequences of what he was attempting? I know it was too funny that he was wandering in the Grand Canyon for half a day. But why? How come he doesn’t have the power to open a portal and return? I don’t have knowledge if that ancient relic was the only support Strange had.

Peter escaping from charges at the start had zero potential to give a dark outcome and face trials and wait for the answers of his non-committed crimes. Director Jon Watts could have given us a gripping segment of his worst phase with all doors closing to his heroism. But all those moments were skipped with Murdock’s one call and Peter all of a sudden goes clean. Murdock’s character would have made more rounds instead of a cameo if we had that difficult phase for at least thirty minutes. All the hype that was built in the end credits of Spidey’s previous chapter met hardly ten minutes.

It was exciting to see all those major villains of the previous Spidey films but their characters and villainous elements were toned down. They looked humble and generous to respond to Spidey and agree for help. Those bad guys were all together and could have easily invaded the city. But Peter taking them to his home looked extremely flat and non-sensical. How can Peter be that dumb and not understand that believing your enemies to help you is straight foolishness? He believed his instincts so much that he decided to snatch the relic from Strange and help the villains?

With the arrival of both Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield as the Spideys of the other universes, the entertainment doubled and also gave us the chance to see them together. I liked the onscreen chemistry that was built between the three. The screenwriting on them was wonderful and heart-touching. It was absolutely fun to watch them trying to understand each other. What an exciting moment that was when Garfield’s Spider-Man saves MJ.

No Way Home has plot issues but also has one of the best continuities of the universe. The film carries too much forced-comedy that tears the thick lines of the writing in the first half but the film also gave us the moments that were essential to make a superhero film genuine like Peter’s character development that I wrote in length above, the chemistry of three Spideys, Aunt May‘s death, Peter-MJ final moments at Liberty and then in the shop.

What is Tom’s Peter’s future in MCU now? There is every possibility that Tom’s Peter will return in the future. If Tobey at 46 and Garfield at 38 can return with an idea, so can Tom who is just 25. Kevin Feige should put a brake on this Peter for some years and introduce Miles Morales. Miles will be heavily inspired by Peter’s heroics and become like him just like Clint‘s inspiration on Kate in Hawkeye. I will ask for Miles’ introduction in a separate Disney+ show where Tom can appear for a minor supporting role.

Spider-Man: No Way Home is a superb entertainer and has moved in the right direction.

Ratings: 8.3/10

Film Review: Tick, Tick… Boom! (2021)

A struggling composer and playwright Jonathan Larson (JL) is reaching 30 but still knocking the doors of the industry to listen to his pieces and grab the opportunity. This film centers around his hardship and personal account of his dedication that was becoming questionable due to not meeting his mark. The film is about JL’s stressful and collapsing sparks of a musical journey before “Tick, Tick… Boom!” happened.

The film, by all means, is an exceptional musical drama where Andrew Garfield is at the heart of the film. He resurrects JL and displays a powerful performance. Maybe the film won’t be praised that much if Andrew was not picked to play the best performance of his career. We may have another musical case in Andrew surely reaching to the Oscars just like Riz Ahmed last here and I won’t be surprised if he wins it. Let me tell you why – facial performance! Just marvelous. Look at him, just look at him when he has to work on the note and electricity is cut. Or when he has an argument with Susan that leads to breaking up. Even his acts in most of the songs were so energetic, especially that crazy number with Vanessa Hudgens was crazy.

The screenplay was the other plus and such fabulous writing was possible due to extensive research on JL’s works. Director Lin-Manuel Miranda and Tony Award-winning writer Steven Levenson got access to his works at the Library of Congress that built most of the script. And this is why this musical drama looks distinguished from the other projects.

While their research helps in shaping a story close to JL’s work there do are damages on the accuracies. Also, the first thirty minutes are too musical to watch. Overall, I think Miranda’s debut as director deserves praise for doing a musical that wasn’t stereotypical but on the aesthetics of JL’s works which I mean is an observer can have a clear idea that this is how JL would have wanted to direct his Tick, Tick… Boom.

Ratings: 6.5/10