8 years ago
All posts by Dan Schindel
“Harmontown”
On paper, Harmontown seems like the very definition of a documentary discerning viewers should approach with caution. Its main character is one of the executive producers, and its website is a subpage of the site for the podcast that gives the doc its name. T...
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“Pride”
The best thing that can be said about Pride, and this really is a compliment, is that it’s one of the least offensive mainstream movies about queer people and issues that’s yet been made. While most of the cast and above-the-line crew is straight, it probably ...
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“Keep On Keepin’ On” Review
Keep On Keepin’ On is one of those documentaries with a story that would cause most viewers to roll their eyes if it were put into a fiction film. A legendary jazz musician mentors a young musical prodigy, all while he suffers from failing health and the stude...
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“The Guest” Review
A low-budget groove. A synthy soundtrack. Garish purple titling in a splattery font. A love of just-as-splattery violence. The Guest is, from head to toe, a throwback to cult ‘80s cinema. You can practically picture writer Simon Barrett and director Adam Winga...
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“The Drop” Features Stock Human Performances And An Exuberant Pit Bull
I have to suppress the urge to simply state that The Drop features copious material of Tom Hardy interacting with a puppy and then drop the mic. I feel like this should be enough of a draw for any prospective moviegoer. In a movie that features Hardy, the late...
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“The Green Prince” A Slickly Made But Simplistic Israel/Palestine Documentary
The Green Prince has arrived in theaters at a spectacularly bad time. Israeli/Palestinian relations are always a touchy subject, but this documentary is coming out just a few weeks after the latest Israeli bombing campaign in the Gaza Strip wrapped up. More th...
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“Rocks in My Pockets” An Encouraging, Delightfully Morbid Animated Memoir
Since the turn of the millennium, cartooning has exploded as a medium for autobiography. The acceptance of comic books as an art form and the possibilities offered by the Internet have made it possible for anyone halfway decent with a drawing tablet to become ...
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“God Help The Girl” An Earnest, Trilling Songbird of a Movie
I’ll give God Help the Girl this much: while I can’t give it any love, it was at least able to make me feel bad for feeling that way. This is an adorable little trilling songbird of a movie, pretty and sweet. And it’s so, so earnest, sincerity radiating in wav...
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“Dinosaur 13” A Middle-of-the-Pack Doc That Could’ve Been So Much Better
Usually, when a mainstream documentary focuses on a subject that's less-than-uplifting, the filmmakers are able to find some angle through which they can put an optimistic stamp on the story. At the very least, they might toss up some title cards with links to...
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“The Giver” Gives Us Nothing New
When Lois Lowry's The Giver came out in 1993, its story of a repressive post-apocalyptic dystopia in the context of the setting for a young-adult novel was a fresh idea. But now, in a media landscape dominated by such stories (seriously, half of all YA books n...
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