Movie review: Everybody Wants Some!!

Hi!

The newest auteur’s Richard Linklater’s picture – Everybody Wants Some!! has finally hit theatres, so let’s talk about it!

IMDb summary: A group of college baseball players navigate their way through the freedoms and responsibilities of unsupervised adulthood.

Richard Linklater 

American director and screenwriter Richard Linklater has made a lot of great movies: the classic coming-of-age comedy/drama Dazed and Confused, which launched a lot of actors’ careers (Matthew McConaughey’s and Ben Affleck’s especially); the most realistic romantic feature(s) and one of my all time favourite stories – The Before trilogy; and one of the most unique cinematic projects in recent memory – Boyhood (which I thought was a gimmick of a movie until I started studying films and realized how much work and dedication this project had to demand). Now, Linklater is back in the genre that helped him to succeed in the first place. 2016’s Everybody Wants Some!! is a spiritual sequel to 1993’s Dazed and Confused. Dazed was set in the 70s, on the last day of high school. Everybody Wants Some!! continues the coming of age idea into the first weekend of college in the 80s. Fittingly, Linklater directs the film in a very old school way. The film has a lot of slow camera movements, no fancy cuts, and a lot of medium shots in a mobile frame.

Story

Richard Linklater not only directed the film, but he also wrote the screenplay. In the same fashion as Dazed, nothing really happens in Everybody Wants Some!! The viewer is following the characters as they try to adjust to new surroundings, socialize with each other, and find themselves. The film finds an interesting way to explore a topic of identity crisis by making its characters go through different stages of partying – from disco to country and from punk to theater. Linklater also explores the gender dynamics (at times, the film does seem sexist) and especially the masculinity of the athletes: how competitive they are, even when there is no need for it, and how they want to dominate or win, in any given situation. The film’s characters seem stereotypical baseball players, yet at the same time, they are all unique, interesting and, most importantly, real .They are just young adults, who are trying to find or create their identities, who seek approval yet want to be weird and unique (individual v team) and who are afraid to end up ordinary, without achieving anything great. In short, they are all well-rounded and complex characters aka real people. The picture also has plenty of funny moments and a perfect ending line – Welcome to College, mot***f**k**s!. I, honestly, don’t remember the last time I giggled so much in a movie (well, probably in Deadpool).

Acting and Characters

The film had a huge ensemble cast – I will try to talk about as many of the characters/actors as I can.

• Blake Jenner as Jake. We open the film with Jenner’s Jake, arriving at college, so I guess he should be considered the main character, although, as I’ve said, Everybody Want Some!! is an ensemble movie. Nevertheless, Jenner was great in the film – all of the sides of Jake were believable (both the team-orientated, partying baseball player and more romantic, quieter freshman). I’m so happy that Jenner’s career is picking up, because I have followed it closely, since he appeared on The Glee Project and, later on, Glee. This year he had a small role on Supergirl and is also starring in a few other films.
• Zoey Deutch as Beverly. Deutch had only a few scenes in the picture but I also believed her as a theater nerd. She definitely has some range as an actress because, in this film, she played a complete opposite of her character in The Vampire Academy (the only other film of hers that I have seen). Speaking about VA – I loved the book series, so that’s why I watched the movie. It wasn’t good but definitely not as bad as the trailer showed it to be.
• Ryan Guzman as Kenny Roper. Guzman surprised me a lot in the film because I have only seen him in Step Up movies and in The Boy Next Door in not very challenging roles. In this film, he was kinda a douchebag but likable one. His mirror scene was super funny.
• Tyler Hoechlin as Glen McReynolds. Hoechlin left Teen Wolf to be in the movie because he really liked the role, and after seeing the film, I can understand why. His character was funny and also kinda douche baggy, yet extremely team-orientated – a great leader. Hoechlin’s crop tops were also on point. Next film for Hoechlin – aA Fifty Shades sequel.
• Glen Powell as Finnegan. The scene stealer and the most interesting character of all. He sounded the smartest and his small monologs were nice to lister to. Powell is currently on Scream Queens.
• Wyatt Russell as Willoughby. Another interesting character that kinda resembled Dazed and Confused’s David Wooderson aka Matthew McConaughey’s character. While McConaughey couldn’t leave highschool, Russell’s character was not ready to say goodbye to college, baseball, and the student lifestyle. Russell has previously starred in 22 Jump Street.
• Other cast members included Will Brittain as Billy Autrey, Forrest Vickery as Coma, Temple Baker as Plummer, Tanner Kalina as Brumley, Austin Amelio as Nesbit, Juston Street as Jay Niles, Quinton Johnson as Dale, and Dora Madison Burge as Val.

Costumes 

1980s setting of the film added a lot of humor. The outfits (those prints and bell bottoms), the hair and the mustaches seemed weird in 2016 and yet so cool and chill. I would have loved to live in the 80s. The costumes were created by Kari Perkins while Michaela Farrell and Jennifer Jackson were the two key artists, responsible for makeup and hair.

Music

The film’s soundtrack was also on point. One of the scenes involving music was the singing in the car sequence – Rapper’s Delight by The Sugar Hill Gang– it was amazing. The soundtrack was picked by Linklater himself and this article on IGN nicely explains all the behind-the-scenes thoughts on music.

In short, Everybody Wants Some!! is an interesting exploration of one of the most exciting periods in people’s lives. The characters drift around and the viewer has a chance to chill with them. The costumes and the music are so 80s and so on-point while the acting and the jokes are pleasing as well.

Rate: 4/5

Trailer: Everybody Want Some!! trailer

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Movie review: Step Up 5: All in + a look back to a whole franchise

Hello!

Another group of movie reviews. Hope you enjoy it!

I have been introduced into Step Up world when I was 9 years old. I remember at that time watching the first Step Up (2006) and falling in love with it. I have seen it countless times and it was like my favorite movie of childhood. Now, as I grow older, I understand that these movies are far from perfect: storylines are really predictable and acting is not that great. However, dancing is badass and no one can argue with that. And let’s face – it is all what we need in a good Step Up movie.

As I said before, I have first seen Step Up (2006) when I was like 9 or 10 years old, my older neighbor who was 13 at that time showed it to me and I remember dancing with her all day after watching it. I liked Channing Tatum in it and I also believe that that story was the most original of them all. Rate 4.5/5

Step Up 2: The Streets (2008) focused more on street dancing and hip hop but most importantly it introduced us to Moose played by Adam Sevani. He acts like glue to this franchise like Agent Coulson is to Marvel Cinematic Universe. He is also my favorite character.  Going back to the movie, that final dance in the rain was my favorite dance number till Step Up 3D came up. Rate 4/5

Step Up 3D (2010) is my favorite step up movie story wise. It also has some sick dance numbers but then again, every Step Up movie that comes out is better than the last one and dance numbers are more kick-ass. I also loved the fact that they brought a lot of previous cast members for the third film and I was also really excited when they decided to do that in the 5^th film as well. In addition, I really liked Alyson Stoner’s and Adam Sevani’s pair, their dance number in the street was super fun. My favorite part of the movie is the montage of preparation for the final battle in that game station basement. Rate 5/5

Step Up 4: Revolution (2012) is also a really fun movie which explores the theme of fighting for what is right. It also includes flash mobs which were so hot during 2012. My favorite parts are the dance in the museum and the dance in the office. Rate 5/5

Step Up 5: All in (2014). So, two years came by and we have another Step Up movie. I went to see it on an opening night so spoilers ahead if you don’t want to know anything about this film.  I liked that they brought all the previous cast members and that the main characters were are also well know (the girl (played by Briana Evigan) is from 2^nd movie and a boy (played by Ryan Guzman) is from 4^th). The whole movie felt like a reunion.

The plot seemed predictable at first but I liked the twist of The Mob turning against new team and then the twist at the end that it was all a scripted reality show. The character development was also better in this movie. We got some Andie’s back story, we also got to know what happened after the events of the 4^th film to the Mob, and finally, we followed up on Camille’s and Moose’s love story. 

However, I got to say that, in my opinion, they ran out of ideas when it comes to dancing. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the performances, especially that Sean’s and Andie’s dance of the carousel in the old Vegas Park and Moose’s dance in the bar but they weren’t super fresh, new or exciting. I guess I have seen too many dance movies and previous 4 Step Up films did not do any favors to the choreography of this film. Moreover, since it is Vegas, everything became more about the show and less about the dancing and techniques. Lastly, I would like to mention two little aspects of the movie which I really enjoyed: Robot love and Twin dancers! Rate 4/5

All in all, my favorite Step Up movies are 3^rd and 4^th, then comes the original movie from 2006 and then The Streets and 5^th film are my least favorite. If they make a sequel I will probably watch it, but be less excited. Hope you have a great evening. Bye!