Hello everyone! 🙂

Welcome to ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog and I’m Tim Bradley!

It’s that time again for me to share my thoughts on three movies I saw on Disney+ lately. For this Disney+ Roundup, I’ve seen a Tom Hanks film and I’ve seen two Ben Stiller films. All three films have been amusing and entertaining in their own measure. But is one of these films the best out of three?

The Tom Hanks film is a 1989 film called ‘Turner & Hooch’. It’s a buddy cop comedy film where Tom Hanks as Detective Scott Turner teams up with Beasley the Dog as Hooch. The film turned out to be a box office success in 1989, despite earning mixed reviews, and it ended up spawning a franchise. 😮

‘Turner & Hooch’ is about Scott Turner who has 3 days left in his local police department before he moves on to a bigger city to get some ‘real’ cases done. Then his longtime friend Amos Reed gets killed and Scott takes the case for himself. He ends up teaming with Amos Reed’s dog named Hooch.

This is an amusing film where Scott’s routine is ruined by the presence of Hooch, who he has to take care of following the death of the dog’s previous owner. Hooch is a troublesome dog and makes a mess of Scott’s house. But as the film progresses, Scott grows in his bond with Hooch with looking after him.

As well as Tom Hanks and Beasley the Dog, the film also features Mare Winningham as Dr. Emily Carson, a vet and Scott’s love interest, Craig T. Nelson as Chief Howard Hyde, Reginald VelJohnson (who has been in ‘Die Hard’ and ‘Die Hard 2’) as Detective David Sutton and John McIntire as Amos Reed.

It was a surprise by the film’s end when Hooch ended up being killed, which is depressing. Fortunately, Hooch made love to Camille, Emily’s dog. Camille ended up having a littler of puppies and apparently, one of them looked and acted exactly like Hooch. 😮 What are the chances of that? 😀

The first Ben Miller film I saw recently is the 2009 film ‘Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian’. This is of course the sequel to the 2006 film ‘Night at the Museum’. To be fair, at least this sequel film take places during the course of one night at a museum as opposed to several nights.

Ben Stiller returns to play security guard Larry Daley, who infiltrates the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C. in an attempt to rescue the museum exhibits Jedediah and Octavius, who have been shipped to the museum by mistake. Larry Daley also meets Amelia Earhart throughout the film.

Amy Adams plays Amelia Earhart in the film. It was fun to see Amy Adams in this film, as this was before she played Lois Lane in the ‘D.C. Extended Universe’ films. Her version of Amelia Earhart is so different to the one in the ‘Star Trek: Voyager’ episode ‘The 37s’. And Larry falls in love with Amelia. 🙂

The film’s cast also includes the return of Ricky Gervais as Dr. McPhee and Jake Cherry as Nick, Larry’s son. There’s Robin Williams as Theodore Roosevelt, Owen Wilson as Jedediah, Steve Coogan as Octavius, Hank Azaria as Kahmunrah, Rami Malek as Ahkmenrah and Christopher Guest as Ivan the Terrible. 🙂

There’s Alain Chabat as Napoleon Bonaparte and Jon Bernthal as Al Capone. In my opinion, ‘Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian’ is a better film than the first ‘Night at the Museum’ film, especially as I’m able to connect with Ben Stiller’s character and his romance with Amelia Earhart. 🙂

The second Ben Stiller film I saw recently is the 2013 film adaptation of ‘The Secret Life of Walter Mitty’. I did see this film when it was released at cinemas in the UK in December 2013. Apparently, this happens to be the second film adaptation of James Thurber’s 1939 short story of the same name.

The first film adaptation was the 1947 film, starring Danny Kaye, which I’ve not seen yet. ‘The Secret Life of Walter Mitty’ is about a daydreamer who goes on a quest to find a missing negative print and its elusive photojournalist for ‘Life’ magazine’s final print issue. He ventures off on many adventures.

I like how this film depicts Walter Mitty as someone who has dreams and ambitions and he overcomes his insecurities when daydreaming. The humour is very well-balanced and I like how Ben Stiller plays Walter Mitty through his interactions with his friends, enemies and possible love interest.

The film features Kristen Wiig (who later did 2016’s ‘Ghostbusters’ and ‘Wonder Woman 1984’) as Cheryl Melhoff, Walter’s love interest and co-worker. There’s also Shirley MacLaine (who’s been in 1960’s ‘The Apartment’, ‘Noelle’ and episodes of ‘Downton Abbey’) as Edna Mitty, Walter’s mother.

There’s Adam Scott as Ted Hendricks, Managing Director of the transition to ‘Life Online’, Kathryn Hahn as Odessa Mitty, Walter’s sister, and Sean Penn as Sean O’Connell, a photojournalist. The performances of the cast are very well-done and the balance of comedy and drama is pretty excellent.

The three latest films I’ve seen on Disney+ have been pretty enjoyable. ‘Turner & Hooch’ is another good film with Tom Hanks, ‘Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian’ is a good follow-up film to the 2006 film, and it’s been so nice to revisit 2013’s ‘The Secret Life of Walter Mitty’ on Disney+. 🙂

Stay tuned for another Disney+ Roundup on ‘Bradley’s Basement’ soon. 🙂

Thanks for reading!

Bye for now!

Tim 🙂