A bunch of random movie reviews that have nothing in common except I watched them all recently. Hey, I’ve got to post two months worth of movie reviews in a day, so things might get a little condensed… Cargo…An atypically low-key, emotional zombie film in which Martin Freeman (recently bitten) has to find someone to…
Category: Monday Morning Movie Reviewer
Movie Reviews: “7 Days in Entebbe,” “Set it Up,” “Truth or Dare,” “Peter Rabbit,” “Midnight Sun,” “Love, Simon,” “Pacific Rim 2,” “I Can Only Imagine,” “Extinction,” “Sherlock Gnomes”
Sometimes a movie (or 8) falls through the cracks, here now to pick it up… 7 Days in Entebbe…Home viewing is probably ideal for this smart hostage drama about Israel’s real-life attempt to rescue a plane that had been seized (by Palestinians and two German leftist-radicals who are a little too oblivious to their own…
Movie Review: “Sicario 2: Day of the Soldado” is Worthy of Your 4th of July Dollars
Another winner from screenwriter Taylor Sheridan (writer of not only the first “Sicario” but the best film of 2016 “Hell or High Water,” and writer-director of last year’s great “Wind River”) who at this point seems to do no wrong. While critics have been surprisingly harsh on this worthy sequel, fans will likely enjoy it–and…
Movie Review: “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?” aka the Mr. Rogers Documentary
“The Mr. Rogers Documentary” might’ve been a better–albeit more artless–title for this stirring, roundly-acclaimed film since that’s pretty much how I have to describe it to people. [Just try telling people you’ve seen “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?” and after a few seconds of taking in their confusion, you’ll see the awareness flood onto their…
Movie Reviews: “Hearts Beat Loud,” “Tag,” “American Animals”
Three films that pretty much have nothing in common except they’re all about different men assembling a team for an unusual project–whether it’s making a CD with your daughter, playing the same game of tag for thirty years, or stealing rare books from a college campus… Hearts Beat Loud…Nick Offerman plays an ex-musician and struggling…
HBO Documentaries: “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” “The Final Year”
Two great documentaries that most political junkies will probably love. Although the subject matter is fairly different (for political docs), there are some overlaps in that both are about honorable civil servants trying–and mostly failing–to do the right thing in the face of a rising wave of political ignorance and hostility. The Final Year…This documentary…
Movie Reviews: “The Incredibles 2,” “Ocean’s 8,” “Adrift,” “Life of the Party”
Four films that don’t really have a lot in common except that they feature women in prominent roles and that I don’t really love or loathe any of them enough to want to write a several-paragraph full review… The Incredibles 2…Really, truly, completely nowhere near as good as the original. I’ve probably watched the first…
Movie Reviews: “Solo,” “The Titan,” “Hotel Artemis,” “Upgrade”
Sci-Fi fans have no shortage of options these days, so you might have to be pretty hard up to see these mostly so-so offerings. We’ll move from worst to first… Hotel Artemis…A great example of a movie that shouldn’t exist. This movie isn’t clever, it isn’t original, it isn’t particularly well-constructed nor well-directed nor well-written,…
Movie Reviews: “The Tale” vs. “Paterno”
HBO has had two TV movies deal with the difficult subject of child sexual abuse but in very different ways. “The Tale” is more experimental (and much more personal), zeroing in on the abused in a shockingly intimate way, while “Paterno” takes a broader, docu-drama approach to covering the after-effects of abuse and the real…
Movie Reviews: “Book Club” Vs. “Deadpool 2,” Vs. “I Feel Pretty” Vs. “Avengers 3”
For no real reason other than I was kind-of bored, I decided to just review all four of these movies against each other. Who will come out on top? It’s surprisingly difficult since they’re all pretty close in quality… Book Club…Judging by “50 Shades Freed,” a movie about 70-year-old women reading “50 Shades of Grey”…
Movie Review: “First Reformed” is Terrific
For those lucky enough to see Paul Schrader’s “First Reformed” this past weekend (and it’s only in 4 theaters currently so it might take a while to reach you) you’ve seen the type of film Alabama Liberal might make if he stumbled onto a financier with lots of money and no immediate need to see…
Movie/TV Review: “Fahrenheit 451” (the Book) is More Relevant Today than Ever
Coming out only 4 years after George Orwell’s more famous “1984” was published, Ray Bradbury’s “Fahrenheit 451” isn’t given nearly as much credit as it deserves for predicting the future. Although a debate has raged about whether Huxley’s “Brave New World” or Orwell’s “1984” is the more prescient work, I actually think “Farenheit” deserves to be (at…
Movie Review: “Tully”
“Tully” is a movie that almost hit too close to home for me. The Charlize Theron character may be a little more similar to myself than I’d like to admit, and I can’t say that about the vast majority of parenting movies. What Works: For the majority of “Tully,” we watch quietly realistic scenes building towards…