Despite The Presence of Danny Boyle and Lily James, Yesterday Is Let Down By A Lackluster Script

You know Summer 2019 is coming up short on quality cinema when even Danny Boyle is delivering average fare. Whereas fusing Danny Boyle’s direction with the writing of Aaron Sorkin turned out to be a match made in heaven in 2015s Steve Jobs, merging his directorial skills with the writing of Richard Curtis (of Love, Actually fame) in the new feature Yesterday turns out to be a match made in…certainly not Hell, but somewhere in between (Milwaukee, maybe?) Though Yesterday has one of the more unique premises for a mainstream movie in a blue moon, the execution of that premise leaves much to be desired.

Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again Exceedingly Delivers On What It Needed To Get Right: Eccentric And Fun Musical Numbers

The most important question one must ask when making a follow-up to 2008's musical movie Mamma Mia! is simply this: will it have enough nuttiness and fun, frequently at the same time? A huge part of what made that original movie work was how often it just swung for the fences in terms of bringing to life eccentric musical fun, such as in sequences where men in scuba gear belted out ABBA tunes or Pierce Brosnan trying to harmonize his way through a rendition of S.O.S. By the time Mamma Mia!: Here We Go Again was concluding one of its very first musical numbers with a crowd of people in graduation caps and gowns on bicycles crooning I Kissed The Teacher, well, I knew this follow-up was keeping its predecessors gonzo sense of entertainment alive and well.