When I was handed yet another found footage movie to review I judged it before I even pressed play. So many of these found footage movies play like replicas of one another with no emotional connection to the character. The films get so dull and tedious you try to guess what kind of camera’s they’re…
Boobs, beach and Baywatch. The movie adaptation of the 1990’s TV series certainly brings home a modern comedic touch, cheesy over the top (heavy on the CGI) action scenes and bromance comedy between our leads Mitch (Dwayne Johnson) and Brody (Zac Efron). These guys have great chemistry on-screen and help the plot to drive along…
When Las Vegas cop Vincent Downs (Foxx) and his crooked partner steal a cocaine shipment bound for a drug dealing casino boss. The desperate businessman retaliates by kidnapping Vincent’s son. Pursued by an idealistic fellow cop and a drug kingpin, Vincent must rely on his street smarts and sheer force of will as he tries…
The charming, offbeat indie Dave Made a Maze is one of those efforts that truly feels hand-made and the product of a filmmaker who had a very specific vision and a very specific way of realizing that vision. Directed by Bill Watterson from a script he co-wrote with Steven Sears, this quirky and unconventional piece…
File this one under “IT WOULD NEVER BE MADE TODAY.” Totally awesome and completely irresponsible, the 1984 children’s fantasy action film Cloak & Dagger was a staple item of my HBO-watching youth, and I can remember literally exhausting the family VHS copy after my mom taped it off the movie channel. Directed by Richard Franklin…
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…
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…
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…
This short Chinese love story takes the emotional impact of a feature and crams it into nine minutes of brilliance. 90 coins takes you through emotions of happyness, sadness, joy. A film that revives your own personal memories and experiences all in nine minutes. It’s not just a film, it’s an experience of self…
French short film Vesper tells the story of Marge Ofenbey. A woman who isolates herself in her own home after fleeing her sinister and manipulative husband. She asks her nephew Christian for help but there is more than meets the eye. What is Marge hiding and why is she so afraid of the stars? Agnes…
I’m a fan of all of the works from writer/director Spike Jonze (Being John Malkovich, Her, Where the Wild Things Are), but the 2002 meta-comedy Adaptation is probably my favorite piece from idiosyncratic and deeply thought provoking cinematic voice. Written with his singular brand of existential dread and tack-sharp satire by Charlie Kaufman (Synecdoche, NY,…
1984’s The Last Starfighter, energetically directed by Nick Castle from a script written by Jonathan Betuel (MY SCIENCE PROJECT POWER!!!), was one of my favorite films as a little kid, and much to my surprise, it still holds up as an example of a solid, low-budget Star Wars/Star Trek rip off that knew how to…
Tonight’s major motion picture is Ron Shelton’s Tin Cup, which is one of my absolute favorite romantic films ever made. But it’s more than a great romance – it’s a great sports movie, it’s a terrific buddy film, and most importantly, it’s a wonderful piece about human beings and all their persistent foibles and inconsistencies,…
When the credits rolled it all made perfect sense. The film had six screenwriters. Six. Spider-Man: Homecoming is two films. The first story is an incredibly engaging story of class warfare; an examination of how the assembly of the Avengers created an even greater economic divide between the ruling class and the common people….
