Why can't David Fincher suck?

I've mentioned David Fincher a few times before, but have never outright talked about him and his films as a whole.
Put simply, the man's a genius behind the camera, and easily my favourite director.

He's made films better than entire careers of lesser directors, he's made thousands and thousands of people demand better crafted films because of his control over a project, and most importantly: he's never won an Oscar.

Calling Fincher "One of the greatest living directors right now" is a huge cliche for sure, but that doesn't make it untrue in the slightest.
To talk about Fincher and his work is to talk about the very best cinema has to offer: he can manipulate the camera to show as much visual information as he likes, directing and misdirecting a viewer's attention to key threads in a web full of deceivers and meticulously planning and plotting a scene even down to the subtlest movements and expressions of a character.
These elements (just to name a few) make up Fincher's body of work, spanning a relatively short time, considering other director's and how long it can take for them to find their own flavour of film (Spielberg, Nolan, Villeneuve).

This speedy understanding of the medium, that is quite specific, can only be found in only a few other filmmakers, such as Stanley Kubrick or even Edgar Wright, I've found.
There are some names that come to my mind that may reach this point at some time in their future, but these last few are the ones universally recognised as being the forefathers of their respected genres and themes today (Wright- Visual Comedy, Fincher- Tense Thriller and Kubrick- Dueling Forces) which prove how well they know (and knew) the medium.

But back to just Fincher, I think it's important to expand on what I said in my micro review of Alien^3.
David wasn't instantly a genius director with a full know-how on film with his first film, far from it, but we can see even from his first feature- length film that we had something special, and from then on we saw a change and a growth; culminating in important and convention- destroying films using social commentary and dark humour to get across a new view point to a shaken audience.
All this from an overly long movie about an acid- bleeding, four legged alien killing off boring characters.

I believe it's very noticeable how much better Fincher becomes with each new project he works on. He can adapt to so many styles, themes and genres while keeping that potential of information fully tapped, and can keep expanding on or evolving his own themes and conventions. By making each new production different and familiar, the audience can be wowed and comforted, and this is the best state for being shocked in.

David now has the scene of 'two people in a room talking' down to as clever and subtle as you possibly could by this point.
Mindhunter's four Fincher flourishes are excellent examples of how perfectly he can convey invisible exposition on any character by simply letting the camera follow their movements, mimicking how they move and ultimately telling us how this person acts in this specific setting through body language.

The slow panning camera as someone walks, the veering of focus as we learn some new info and the tightly choreographed pace are all hallmarks of this refined style, coordinating an experience uniquely belonging to Fincher.

Logan (2017) Review

Yeah, so I've only now just watched Logan, what a piss poor superhero fan I am, huh?
Well it was pretty great, and I hope we don't see Logan on the big screen again for a long time, and definitely not in the body of Hugh Jackman.
Logan could be what fans may call "the quintessential superhero movie" in the near future, I think. So many things point to it, the overwhelmingly positive reception, the final chapter in the book of a beloved character (and characters) and the dark, gritty, unforgiving nature of its tone that seems to work well with superhero movies if done well (see The Dark Knight and/or The Winter Soldier).
I'd like this to be the case for sure, because this film gets it.

The subtle theming of this film really accentuates that bottomless feeling of 'this is the end, isn't it?' through hints at a larger part of the story many years ago that lead to the downfall of many characters, literally and metaphorically.
The constant references to western movies (a genre that died because of over-saturation.. sound familiar?) adds to this feeling too. And by using settings that once were cowboy shoot out zones, that are now shopping malls and gas stations is another clever hint at what the director is trying to say about this genre ("Out with the old and in with the new, but is old still better?").

While I really admire the fresher themes in this film, I do miss the idea of Mutants being used as walking metaphors for oppression and rights, but seeing as there's hardly any "Mutes" left, I guess that wouldn't fit the film.

I had a few problems with the child performances, it seems hollywood still cannot get their own child actors to behave like real actors. But every other performance was pretty great and meaningful, Hugh and Sir Patrick the most, of course.

But really, this is one of the best superhero movies ever, and I'm very glad to see such a violent one too, with really seamless special effects to cement that into place.
Hopefully we get more movies like this and less like Deadpool.

Logan gets a gritty 8/10

Micro Review- Letting The World Know Why They Should Leave Alien3 Alone.

The most underrated movie (ever?) in a franchise.
I love the intro to this film mainly because it gets rid of the annoying characters from the equally annoying 'Aliens'.
There, I said it.
Not only that, it creates some instant conflict for Ripley, who's been completely heartbroken and this amplifies the drama tenfold.
We empathise with her immediately, and this is GOOD SCREENWRITING.

The intro, to me, is the best part of the entire film, as the rest is very slow and plodding and full of darkly lit rooms with not much going on inside them other than talking.
It's obvious this was early Fincher (the earliest in fact), as we get quite a few amateurish problems in the production and development of characters.

That being said, the themes and ideas expressed throughout the film are reason enough to keep watching, there's no overly- silly action and "comedy" scenes in this film, unlike a certain other movie in this franchise that may or may not have come before this one.

This feels like a franchise going back to its roots, ditching the silliness of Aliens and going back to what made Alien so great to begin with; tension, characters and horror.
And since this IS David Fincher, we definitely get some great building tension and creeping horror, along with some of the most haunting visuals from any of the six (so far) Alien movies.

It really is a shame that the whining fanboys can't recognise how great the first scene really is, and of course, how good the rest of the film is compared to what they think it is.
This is a well made thriller/drama and a mediocre horror movie at best, but signs of the growing Fincher's talents are there for everyone to see.