Wind River is masterful, utterly immaculate filmmaking, almost suffocating in its greatness by the time its powerful conclusion unfolds. Written and directed by the extremely talented storyteller Taylor Sheridan, who in the past few years has scripted the one-two punch of Sicario (for Denis Villeneuve) and Hell or High Water (for David Mackenzie); I’m happy…
Steven Soderbergh is back to directing feature films with the recently released Southern-fried heist-comedy Logan Lucky. This is an enjoyable late-summer offering with a busy plot, featuring one narrative strand that could’ve been jettisoned with no overall harm being done to the movie. I’m surprised that this little pisser of a film wasn’t a tad…
James Cameron’s epic sci-fi film The Abyss is absolutely incredible, a film that has gained in reputation over the years, and one that I really wish I could see on the big-screen some day. The recent news that Cameron is finally beginning to prep this film (not to mention True Lies…) for Blu-ray makes me…
While I was scrolling through the various movie channels and setting my weekly recordings, I noticed that on Tuesday at 3am this week, the EPIX HD movie channel is airing the long-lost cult item The Pursuit of D.B. Cooper. Being a child of the 1980’s, there are more than a few under the radar gems…
1987 was a big year at the movies for me as a seven-year-old. Harry and the Hendersons, The Monster Squad, Three Men and a Baby, The Princess Bride, Adventures in Babysitting, Innerspace, Benji: The Hunted, Empire of the Sun, Project X, Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, The Garbage Pail Kids Movie and Hope &…
The To Do List is the funniest film that I have seen in many moons. No other film in the last five years has made me laugh more or as hard as this one did. How this little comedic diamond in the rough isn’t more well-known and widely loved I’ll never understand. Oh wait, I…
Colossal is a cute and clever “monster movie” where the CGI is kept to a minimum and done on a cool scale with a unique looking monster and some game performances from Anne Hathaway (long haired Anne POWER!), Jason Sudeikis, and everyone else in the cast, who all signed up for an inherently asinine little…
I’m a huge fan of erotic thrillers, and Jane Campion’s absurdly sexy and nearly overwhelmingly stylish neo-noir In the Cut is a film that I watch nearly once a year, so as to be reminded of that filmmaker’s intense sense of craft, mood, and tone, and because, well, Meg Ryan absolutely steams up the screen…
The Destructors, aka The Marseilles Contract, is a 1974 British thriller from director Robert Parrish (Journey to the Far Side of the Sun, A Town Called Hell) and producer/screenwriter Judd Bernard (writer of Inside Out, producer of Point Blank), and features a very solid cast including Michael Caine, Maureen Kerwin, Anthony Quinn, Marcel Bozzuffi, Maurice…
Close Encounters of the Third Kind is my favorite film by Steven Spielberg. This movie makes me smile during every single second of its running time. It simultaneously scared the crap out of me as a kid and filled me with an overwhelming sense of wonder, and it has never left my imagination since the…
Candy, released in 1968, is a completely crazy little film that offers up so many odd-ball surprises that it’s nearly impossible to describe the bizarre culmination of all of its psychedelic pieces. Directed by prolific actor Christian Marquand and adapted by the brilliant Buck Henry from the 1958 novel of the same name by Terry…
I was so ready for a hug and to see some smiles from my 20 month old son after viewing Kathryn Bigelow’s devastating and purposefully harrowing docudrama Detroit. Working again with screenwriter Mark Boal (they previously created the one-two punch of The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty, which are two of the best topical…
The Savages is one of those dark comedies which nails a perfect balance between sad and funny, but make no mistake, at times, this is a painful movie to view, as it examines the loss of a parent’s faculties in an upfront and explicit manner. Why has it taken writer/director Tamara Jenkins (Slums of Beverly…
Ridley Scott’s iconic sci-fi classic Blade Runner is one of those motion pictures where its legacy and lore nearly outweigh the finished product itself. Notice I said nearly. This is an all-consuming piece of cinematic art, a film that blew my mind open as a kid, and has continued to haunt and fascinate me as…
Not many films instilled as much wide-eyed wonder in me as a youthful movie-lover as The Flight of the Navigator, which was released in the summer of 1986, and while not attaining the runaway big-screen blockbuster status that it truly deserved, has lived on throughout the years as an all-time cult favorite for many children…
Macon Blair’s directorial debut I Don’t Feel at Home in This World Anymore, which he also wrote, is a black comedy with serious balls, and as such, this film won’t be for everyone. I love subversive and unexpected material, and this nasty little Netflix acquisition goes to some truly bizarre, and often times (for me…
