The Circle: Review

• This is a NON-Spoiler review for The Circle. The only thing that is remotely entertaining about this movie is the fact that Tom Hanks is on the screen for some of this movie. The trailers showed us a thriller and instead we basically got a commercial for this fictional company.

• Plot Summary: "Mae Holland (Emma Watson) seizes the opportunity of a lifetime when she lands a job with the world's most powerful technology and social media company. Encouraged by the company's founder (Tom Hanks), Mae joins a groundbreaking experiment that pushes the boundaries of privacy, ethics and personal freedom."

• This is the third movie out of my most anticipated list that has been disappointing. I was so excited to see Tom Hanks in this role. Tom Hanks shares my favorite actor spot with Harrison Ford. Whenever Tom Hanks tries to play an unlikable character, it usually fails because he is one of the most charismatic human beings alive nad we want to like him. Which is why before I saw the movie, I thought this role was perfect for him. I thought he would play a character that comes off as the very likable Tom Hanks, but on the inside, he was a person doing HORRIBLE things. But because this movie has literally no characters that are against what The Circle is, there is literally no drama. This is one of the most boring movies I have EVER seen.

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• The script is almost as bad as Collateral Beauty from last year. The actor named Ellar Coltrane (who looks and acts like Hayden Christensen) who plays a character named Mercer, has a scene with Emma Watson that was laughably terrible. The dialogue is complete garbage in a lot of scenes and in that scene in particular. The writing is completely lazy. This movie even has a shoehorned appearance from Beck. I will say that I did like Danny Elfman's score. The main cast does as best as they can. Tom Hanks, Emma Watson, John Boyega, Karen Gillan, and Bill Paxton all do the best they can with a garbage script. Bill Paxton also does a really great job with the very small role he was given. Very sad that this had to be his last film. The only acting critique I have with the main cast is that Emma Watson's American accent was very strange at times. Patton Oswalt I thought was very very strange casting but he does okay. John Boyega's character has no reason to be there at all. And pretty much every other actor sucks.

• As I have said, this movie is labeled and advertised as a thriller and there is nothing riveting about the story AT ALL. You go in expecting a thriller because that's what the trailers were showing us. There are seeds in this movie that have you think that they're setting up something intense but it doesn't go anywhere. This Circle is a community that thinks we should all have to have millions of people watching us constantly. I'm sorry but no human being can do that. It's not just about having secrets but you're constantly being worried about embarrassing yourself. Somehow Tom Hanks' character convinced billions of people to be zoo animals. I'm sorry but I just can't swallow that. Emma Watson's parents played by Bill Paxton and Glenne Headly, are the only characters that act like human beings. They're the only ones that don't like having a camera on them at all times.

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• This movie isn't even a story. The characters begin and end exactly the same. NOTHING HAPPENS!!! To make this movie a thriller, all you had to do was have Tom Hanks be a villain who looks friendly who's running this dark company, and Emma Watson has to survive and expose Tom Hanks and get him arrested. But NOBODY EVER questions what he's doing EVER. There's a very simple opportunity for some major drama in this story if they just had ONE character that is against what this company is doing. But hey we all want to pay money to watch Emma Watson vlog her whole life, and work at her desk, and talk to people, and work on new products. NO WE DON'T!

• If you want to go waste 2 hours of your life watching Tom Hanks and Emma Watson say useless words, then you be my guest. But The Circle in my mind isn't even a movie. It's not a story because nothing happens. None of the characters have a brain. The Circle is a movie pitched as a thriller with literally no conflict. The grade for The Circle is a D-. I'm not giving it a lower grade because the acting is okay from the main cast. They're trying. I have the deepest respect for Tom Hanks and Emma Watson and John Boyega, Bill Paxton but I hated The Circle. Whenever it tried to be a thriller, it was about as thrilling as Arnold Schwarzenegger's Mr. Freeze. Don't waste your money PLEASE. Bill Paxton, you will be missed.