The Aeronauts, HoneyLand, and Sweetheart Weekly Roundup Episode 3
Source: IMDB
Welcome to another episode of Weekly Roundup! Only a couple weeks away till my official Best Films of the Year List is up. Until then, let’s talk about three films I would recommend watching and they can all be available watch on a streaming service.
The Aeronauts Grade: B
The Aeronauts yet again was another Amazon Original film that had a short limited release in theaters, but main release was on Amazon Prime. In 2014 director Tom Harper made one of the worst horror films of all time with The Woman in Black 2, so bad that I walked out early. Five years later Tom Harper has redeemed himself by making two solid films with Wild Rose and now The Aeronauts. The Aeronauts is a fairly entertaining film, featuring a scientist whom is trying to discover a new way to accurately predict the weather, while being with an entertaining Aeronaut gal. Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones have solid chemistry together on screen, making the main characters interesting, likable, and enjoyable to watch. You can say the story can feel over exaggerated at times, especially in the near end as your questioning how this character survived through the entire journey, which I still don’t believe that part is accurate. But if you’re looking a film to sit, relax in your bed, and have a nice time eating your microwave popcorn to... The Aeronauts is that film and certainly visit on Amazon Prime when you get the chance.
HoneyLand Grade: B
HoneyLand is a documentary film, taken place in Europe and features a female beekeeper. Her fellow beekeeper neighbor isn’t as strict nor does he follow the rules, of basic beekeeping duties of taking half of the honey and leaving half for the bees. Also sharing bee hives can become hazardous if not cared properly. Watching this documentary was honestly very intriguing to say the least. This woman really didn’t have much and her only way of income was making jars of honey, her bees would make. The passion and integrity this woman had for her line of work and taking care of her mother was really touching, sometimes at the end emotionally riveting. It’s not your basic documentary, where you would see occasional interviews of the main person of interest discussing their triumphs and struggles. We go through this journey with the beekeeper as the camera only has attention to her and the other family. If you’re looking for a documentary offering something unique to the table, while learning some rules of beekeeping you never learn of or how honey combs are edible to eat... I think you’ll get a kick out of HoneyLand and it’s on HULU.
Sweetheart Grade: B-
The existence of Sweetheart didn’t quite come to my attention, until my brother Mihran put the film on his watchlist on Letterboxd. Seeing that this film was coming on Netflix in December, I was anticipating to watch it as soon as I can. Sweetheart is your common ground human being trapped on one setting kind of story, only with this one has an entity. I found this film quite enjoyable and sometimes entertaining. What makes me not want to give this film a solid B, is due to the fact the film does feature unexpected supporting characters in the second act. It didn’t really provide much purpose for the story being told, also I found the male performance to be quite terrible. Though I didn’t really care for the creature design of the entity, I still found the entity’s appearance quite exhilarating, giving the film some flavor towards a typical story you’ve heard many times before. If you’re looking for a fun film and have patience for that excitement to come... Sweetheart will do just that for you and it’s on Netflix. -Mitch Smietana