7 years ago
Reviews (10 posts found)
“Cartel Land”
The drug war in Mexico has raged for nearly a decade and claimed more than 100,000 lives, but America media has been contemptibly reticent to give it much significant coverage. Even documentarians, generally on the forefront on social issues, have been relucta...
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“Amy”
A sad air of familiarity and a creeping sense of ghoulishness conspire to sink Asif Kapadia’s Amy, an otherwise well-intentioned look at a tragic pop star that’s as frustrating as it is curious. Struggling to strike the balance between life celebration and dow...
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“Stung”
In the vast and varied catalog of horror film villains, giant bugs have historically been paid little respect. Big damn insects tend to be B-movie fodder for Mystery Science Theater 3000 or drive-ins. If Benni Diez’s Stung proves anything, it’s that relegation...
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“Terminator: Genisys”
To watch James Cameron’s 1984 The Terminator again is to marvel at its ruthless narrative efficiency and the craft of making a great deal out of very little. It’s such a tightly scripted, self-contained little B-movie masterpiece that the film demanded a serie...
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Blu-ray Review: “Valerie and Her Week of Wonders”
Released just before the Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia signaled the end of the country’s cinematic revolution, Jaromil Jires’s 1970 film Valerie and Her Week of Wonders has long been more known than seen. Residing in reputation somewhere between softcore ...
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“Jimmy’s Hall”
In Jimmy’s Hall, Irish politics circa the 1930s have set the stage for something like Footloose, though with brogues instead of Kevin Bacon. Based on the real-life tribulations of communist rouser of rabbles Jimmy Gralton (played by Barry Ward), the film follo...
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“Mala Mala”
We live in an interesting time for transgender visibility. Laverne Cox’s stint on the Netflix series "Orange is the New Black" has allowed her to catapult into an arena where she can call attention to trans rights and the oppression trans people face, particul...
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“Fresh Dressed”
When I began reviewing movies online by watching a documentary every day, I strongly believed that every doc, even not-too-great ones, still had intrinsic, significant worth. “Even if it didn’t move me too much,” I thought, “at least I learned something new." ...
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“Ted 2”
Asking whether we really needed a sequel to 2012’s Ted is almost unfair to Ted 2. Sequels, follow-ups, and part twos (and threes and fours) make up an ever-increasing percentage of our moviegoing diet these days. Questioning their necessity has nearly become r...
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“Big Game”
With nostalgia currently holding the box office in a raptor claw, it's amusing to discover that this summer's most purely enjoyable throwback to those 1980s Steven Spielberg-produced Amblin entertainments is not, in fact, the Steven Spielberg-produced Amblin e...
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