“Corporations Triumph Over Cars in Ford v Ferrari”

Vroom vroom zoom zoom beep beep screech crash bang boom man emotions vroooooom manly slap fight zip zip zap Continue reading →

12 Most Memorable Movie Characters of 2015

“Another year, another slate of movie releases in the history books, and with it a bevy of new characters gracing the big screen. Just like making the movies themselves, though, making a truly memorable character is a major challenge. You have to get them right on the page before you can cast them, for one … Continue reading →

The United States of Film: Massachusetts

“When people think of Massachusetts’ burgeoning movie industry, they probably think first of gritty, unforgiving gangster films, of severe accents, of reluctant geniuses, of Ben Affleck. But the Bay State has offered more to cinema than just chronicles of working class stiffs, real crime allegory, or some combination of Matt and Ben: this is the … Continue reading →

Go, See, Talk! Review: The Bourne Legacy, 2012, dir. Tony Gilroy

The big question The Bourne Legacy must answer: does it successfully restart the franchise and pick up where Matt Damon and Paul Greengrass left off? In a word, no. Tony Gilroy, assuming the role of director for the first time in the series, bungles story, character, and action here in big, unforgivable ways while poor Jeremy Renner struggles gamely against the film’s weaknesses. Continue reading →

Review: Contagion, 2011, dir. Steven Soderbergh

I’ve said before that Steven Soderbergh is a genre chameleon; if this year’s Haywire doesn’t unequivocally prove that, then last year’s Contagion should, and soundly at that. Contagion may not be a straight genre film in the way that the multi-faceted filmmaker’s bone-snapping arthouse action film is, but it nonetheless exists as a synthesis of numerous filmmaking categories– essentially, … Continue reading →

Review: We Bought a Zoo, 2011, dir. Cameron Crowe

(Cross-posted over at GoSeeTalk.) In an early scene in Cameron Crowe’s We Bought a Zoo, Scarlet Johansson’s beleaguered zookeeper whirls around on Matt Damon’s optimistic single father turned zoo owner and demonstrates the film’s greatest hindrance in one ham-handed chunk of dialogue. Neither Crowe nor the film has any faith in its audience to pick up … Continue reading →

Review: True Grit, 2010, dir. the Coen Brothers

True Grit— via the Coen brothers– represents a landmark in the oeuvre of Ethan and Larry as the first pure genre movie they’ve attempted together. Even Blood Simple only dabbles in genre cinema; True Grit on the other hand can (and arguably should) be treated and appreciated as an uncomplicated and honest contemporary Western movie. … Continue reading →

Review: The Adjustment Bureau, 2011, dir. George Nolfi

Nothing can bring down a good film like a weak, flimsy ending. If anything can make a person question their enjoyment of the two hours or so of movie they’ve watched up to the finale, it’s a bad denouement. Not even a bad one, even, just one that doesn’t do the rest of the story– … Continue reading →

2011 Rising: My Films to Watch (pt.2)

Part 2 of my 2011 preview commences…now! (Part 1 can be perused here, at your leisure.) X-Men: First Class— By happy coincidence, the first trailer for Matthew Vaughn’s period prequel to the X-Men franchise hit just last week, and guess what? It looks really good. Focusing specifically on the relationship between Erik Lehnsherr, the man … Continue reading →

The Home Stretch: Fall and Winter 2010’s Films to Watch

2010 dwindles down to its final hour with the passing of each day. It’s been a pretty mixed year, filled with movies worth watching but not necessarily worth getting excited about; only a handful here and there, for my taste, have really been exceptional and stood out amongst the crowd of good-but-unmemorable releases. But what … Continue reading →

Review: The Green Zone, 2010, dir. Paul Greengrass

“Democracy is messy.” After 2009’s critical darling (and one of my top ten of the year) The Hurt Locker made such a splash at the Oscars, Paul Greengrass sends us back to the Middle East with Green Zone, his adaptation of Rajiv Chandrasekaran’s non-fiction novel Imperial Life in the Emerald City. Traveling along with him, … Continue reading →