In thinking about Carey Williams' "Emergency" in theaters for a week before premiering on Amazon Prime, I didn't realize how ironic and prophetic “May you live in interesting times” would be in describing the film. As an “English expression claimed to be a translation of a traditional Chinese curse,” “Emergency” paints an intelligent story of [...]
Robert Eggers has a unique gift for storytelling, an uncommon trait in common land. Eggers is uncommon in that there are few modern directors working today who can keep an audience captivated with a sublime heady story while paying attention to the innate details behind crucial details of a movie: performances, set decorations, cinematography, music; [...]
They say everything comes better in pairs, and never have I ever seen a film like Daniels' wonderous experience that is "Everything Everywhere All at Once." Experience is a keyword, and while I'll get gruff for suggesting that not every film is an experience rather than an event, "Everything Everywhere All at Once" is both [...]
Werewolf movies have been a part of the cinematic lexicon for as long as I can remember. Sean Ellis’ “The Cursed,” which hits theaters this weekend, doesn’t add to the mythological nature of this type of story. That’s not necessarily a bad thing either. "The Cursed" manages to elevate itself above its station through inventive [...]
Liam Neeson has made a name for himself in smaller action flicks. The actor fills the screen in his films with a relentless scowl; experience his currency. In his latest action-thriller, Blacklight, Neeson teams up with writer-director Mark Williams once again. As Travis Block, Neeson is, quite literally a Swiss army knife, trying to make [...]
Consider that the romantic comedy I Want You Back is a strategic look at love and all the crazy things it makes us do. First, Jason Orley's film is released on Amazon Prime today. It will go against Universal's Marry Me with its day-and-date release in theaters and on Peacock. Second, its romantic theme is [...]
Let's forget, for the moment, that Roland Emmerich films tend to be surface-level event pictures, typically geared toward disaster-style epics, usually grounded in science fiction themes, are heavy on special effects, and have razor-thin dialogue, characters, and settings. We could apply this logic toward his latest film, "Moonfall,” descending on theaters today. I’ll be one [...]
Alma (Molly Kunz) is a twenty-something with a bright future. She is musically gifted, and when we first meet her in Gilles de Maistre’s "The Wolf and the Lion," we sense she is seeking something else, something not currently a part of her present. Despite the beautiful music, de Maistre’s opening feels hurried, rushed. There [...]
Walking out of the fifth iteration of the Scream series, now in theaters, my gut had an “uh-oh” feeling. No, it wasn’t the scares that upset my stomach. It certainly wasn’t the characters either. I can’t blame the popcorn because I didn’t have any, nor the fact that I actively avoided the genre until about [...]
Writer-director Asghar Farhadi came to my attention a few years ago with his intense dramas, The Salesman and Everybody Knows. A fascination developed with the director's eye toward the respective film's subjects and their environments. In his latest film, A Hero, Farhadi’s lens expertly captures anxious chaos in historic Shiraz, Iran, and in his character, [...]
