Motel Destino and The Crow, which are in the cinema, are disappointing!

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Many movies opened in theaters this week. And two of them were highly anticipated, The Raven e Motel Destino. The first is a remake of the famous film that had a scene where actor Brandon Lee died. The second is the national production that was among the films selected for the Cannes Film Festival this year. Unfortunately, neither of them convinced me. Honestly, I found them poorly directed, with poorly written scripts, and some really bad actors (but both have others with good performances too).

The Raven

The 1994 film was remarkable, especially because of the tragedy with Brandon Lee. It became a cult classic, and had some smaller sequels and even a series (available on Looke). I’ve been hearing about a possible reboot for years. At one point, Luke Evans was linked to the project, and Jason Momoa too. In the end, it ended up happening with the always great Bill Skarsgard. The director was Rupert Sanders (Snow White and the Huntsman). The basis is the comic book written by James O’Barr, from 1989. In the story, Eric and his girlfriend Shelly Webster (FKA Twigs) are brutally murdered. That’s when Eric has a resurrection that leaves him invulnerable, and sets out to seek revenge to try to bring Shelley back from the dead.

The movie is a huge disappointment. It wastes a lot of time on the first moment of Eric and Shelley’s romance. In other words, it takes an hour to start the story. In addition, everything is dirty, with a lot of drugs, and kind of disgusting. But the worst thing is really FKA Twigs in the role of Shelley. She is a terrible actress, and she still imitates Zoe Kravitz’s looks and mannerisms. It doesn’t work. With that, it is in the hands of Bill Skarsgard – always an interesting presence – save the story. But even he can’t. It’s worth sticking with the 1994 version, unfortunately currently unavailable on streaming.

Motel Destino

Karim Anouiz is one of the most prestigious Brazilian actors and directors. His film Motel Destino was even selected to participate in the Cannes Film Festival. However, despite an interesting story, paying homage to a genre I really like, Film Noir, the film doesn’t work.

Motel Destino takes place mostly in a roadside motel on the coast of Ceará. The plot revolves around Heraldo (Iago Xavier), a young man who arrives at the Motel Destino and radically changes the lives of those who live there. The motel is run by the temperamental Elias (Fábio Assunção) and his wife Dayana (Nataly Rocha). Heraldo is a fugitive member of a gang, and he arouses Dayana’s curiosity. This begins a dangerous dance of power and desire between them. In the midst of this scenario, a bold plan for freedom begins to take shape.

There are good things in the film, of course. The idea of making a film inside a motel, with all the noise and embarrassing situations, is a good idea – especially adapting it all to the concept of film noir. In addition, there is a great moment with Fábio Assunção as the husband, who is always a problem in this type of story. But the direction is very rough, which surprised me a lot. It seemed like the first film by a director from the 70s. And of course, the main actor, Iago Xavier, is very weak, poor guy. He can’t hold the situation, especially as the protagonist. What a shame!