You know, you're kind of an asshole
Man, you know you've got an incredible catalog when they can make a 135-minute movie about the first five years of your career and it's basically all just songs.
Truly such little story here propelling the plot. The only thing keeping us going is figuring out which Bob Dylan classic is coming next. The narrative tension does pick up in the 1965 chapter for obvious reasons, though even the Newport framing is awkward…
Now I've asked you forty different ways and it's time you come up with a fresh answer.
There is a reason this movie is so achingly conventional. Because it still works.
The literal inspiration for WALK HARD, this is tragic and invigorating, often at the same time. It's not about Johnny Cash making the music, but about what is behind the music, allowing us to buy into that cliche childhood foundational trauma because it is exactly that, foundation for the…
Look upon me! I'll show you the life of the mind!
Man.
This starts so excitingly, with John Turturro's antic playwright sent to Hollywood to write for the pictures. Surely, hijinks must follow! And they do, but this specific brand of Coen Brothers abstraction (peeling wallpaper, mosquito buzzing, repeated identical hallway shots), never quite reaches the heights of their 90s classics.
Though, right when you start to feel that sense creeping in, they take this movie in such a shocking…
I am the Lord's humble servant. I am Allah's disciple. I am the Floaty Thing's go-for boy. There has been a miracle here.
Almost shies away a bit too much from delving into Timothy Treadwell's psyche. But it remains a fascinating portrait of a modern Icarus, with incredible access and footage. It's a testament to Werner Herzog's direction here that so much is left on the table and you still get a captivating documentary.
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things that I cannot change, the courage to change the things that I can and the wisdom to know the difference.
The spoilery tagline for this sounds like the stuff of pulp fiction. But what we actually get is a complex and harrowing story of a moral quandary. It's a story of violence that is not violent. It is a story of a maybe-good person who may have done a bad thing,…
I'll date his brains out! </em?
Has some of the funniest bits in recent comedic film history (not tough competition), including naked Jennifer Lawrence beating people on the beach, an accidental punch in the face at a high school party and about half a dozen other sight gags from JLa. This is a genre she belongs in, with her knack for physical comedy and pitch-perfect timing.
But when this movie swerves into dramatic stakes, and turns into a story about…
Because you let us
This is such an interesting remake. For 75%, it's almost shot by shot identical to the Danish version from just two years ago. And then it veers away from the source text and almost completely changes genres, from horror to thriller.
What made the original so thrilling was its abstraction, that we had little idea the motives of the host family. This, in classic Hollywood fashion, makes the unsaid explicit. And this gives us a final…
Ethan, today is a day you’re gonna remember for a very long time, but if you handle it right, you’ll have a chance to forget it.
A really taut thriller with true star power that strains credulity at times, as it should, and ends maybe unsurprising generally, but with a genuinely surprising method of finale.
The car crash sequence will instantly enter this film into the action canon, which is somewhat unfortunate because that happens in the least interesting strand…
Iris, if you were a melody, I used only the good notes
I don't care how long this is, it's getting cozier with each watch. And justice for Jack Black, who might be the most charming character in this stacked cast.
One of the better entries in the Netflix Christmasverse. Has some actual gags and a filled-out plot. What a concept.
You like John Wick?
Some of the best movie fights in recent memory.
It's got a sequence pulled straight from KILL BILL. Within that sequence is a shot ripped from OLDBOY. The middle interlude is similarly reminiscent of KILL BILL. And that flat interlude is also not unlike the kids commune stuff in BEYOND THUNDERDOME.
It leads to a rousing third act that is equal parts shocking moment to moment, even if where it leads is not surprising. The way…
Thank god you're weird
The original title was The Case for Reparations.
Just a great narrative conceit. Revelations of the origins of an ocean hamlet on the coast of California lead to a violent reckoning enveloped in a glowing fog. It mixes classic horror styling, with its focus on the obscure and the dark, with some commentary on the making of America, the pillaging of land with no recourse and how to recover from that fact. This juxtaposition between pulp…