“‘The Grey’: The Alpha of Old Man Action Movies”

Once more into the fray, writing about a movie for the second time in *ten years*. Continue reading →

When a Disposable Action Flick Is Like Comfort Food

Happy The Commuter day, aka “the day Andy finally remembered to post his The Commuter pieces from last week”! In my second article about Jaume Collet-Serra’s new Liam Neeson action movie, I go all in on my frustrations over how fucking disposable Liam Neeson action movies tend to be. It’s true: They can’t all be The Grey. But … Continue reading →

Review: The Commuter, 2017, dir. Jaume Collet-Serra

I never realized how incomplete my life was without a Liam Neeson actioner where he beats up a man with a guitar, that is until I saw The Commuter. The Commuter is the latest in Neeson’s mini-filmography of big, dumb action movies where he plays either regular dudes or super badass dudes (some of whom live their … Continue reading →

Interview: Patrick Ness, “A Monster Calls”

Last October, I was given the opportunity to have a sit-down with Patrick Ness, author (ish) of the low fantasy, young adult novel A Monster Calls, and to talk with him about the experience of adapting his own novel (ish) from page to screen. (“Ish” meaning: Ness was contracted to write it, but author Siobhan Dowd, who … Continue reading →

Review: Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet, 2015, dir. Roger Allers

“Should we consider Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet kids’ fare? The default categorization for any animated movie with a child protagonist is “children’s film,” but if it’s easy to picture a theater full of tykes getting swept up in this movie’s gorgeous imagery, it’s equally as difficult to imagine them nodding along with its philosophical apothegms. … Continue reading →

Review: Taken 3, 2015, dir. Olivier Megaton

“Like 2008’s Taken and 2012’s Taken 2 before it, Taken 3’s meat-and-potatoes approach to filming action is about as basic as action filmmaking can be: no fancy pants martial arts tussles, no daring stunts, no gimmicks. There’s only growling, punching, and shooting, served upon a bed of collateral damage and suffused with car chases. Thus, … Continue reading →

Review: A Walk Among the Tombstones, 2014, dir. Scott Frank

“From a distance, A Walk Among the Tombstones looks an awful lot like “generic Liam Neeson actioner #1,075″, but that’s only a half-accurate first impression. Oh, Neeson grumbles and sneers, dispassionate to the world around him and ambivalent about his mortality, a stereotypical hard-boiled badass; he’s seen it all, and he cares little about anything that doesn’t tie into the storm … Continue reading →

Go, See, Talk! Review: Battleship

Peter Berg’s latest offering is irredeemably terrible. Continue reading →

Go, See, Talk! Review: Wrath of the Titans, 2012, Jonathan Liebesman

For fans of FX spectacles, monster mashes, Roman mythology, and the God of War video game series, you’re in luck– the sequel to 2010’s Clash of the Titans remake hits theaters today. While I don’t think it’s a total loss,  I found Wrath of the Titans to be lacking in a firm direction, never really fitting into a … Continue reading →

Go, See, Talk! Review: The Grey, 2012, dir. Joe Carnahan

Today marks the release of survival-action film/Liam Neeson vehicle The Grey, the latest film from director Joe Carnahan (Narc, The-A Team).  I unequivocally loved it; it’s an immensely effective pulse-pounding thriller on the surface, but it’s characterized much more strongly by its more metaphysical and emotional traits, something that took me off-guard in the best … Continue reading →