It appears director J.A. Bayona is on his way to a second straight week at the top of the box office. To a large degree, that’s attributable to being handed the keys to the right ongoing cinematic venture. I can’t … Continue reading From the Archive — The Orphanage
Since I’ve been on a little bit of a thirty-years-ago kick lately, why not take unearth a movie review of a film released in June 1988. I wish I could report I wrote about Big when it hit theaters, but … Continue reading From the Archive — Big
Incredibles 2 essentially begins at the precise point its exemplary predecessor ends. The Parr family, super-powered individuals who have largely refrained from costumed heroism because of legal prohibitions, spring into action against the villainous Underminer (voiced by John Ratzenberger), who … Continue reading Now Playing — Incredibles 2
These posts celebrate the movie trailers, movie posters, commercials, print ads, and other promotional material that stand as their own works of art. In the early nineteen-nineties, movie poster design was increasingly dominated by incredibly dull images. As movie star … Continue reading The Art of the Sell — “The Player” movie poster
Although I’m optimistic about Incredibles 2, I long for the days that Pixar evinced nothing but the barest interest in sequels. With rare exceptions, the studio consistently strove for vivid inventiveness with each new effort, as if the especially lengthy … Continue reading From the Archive — WALL-E
Sometimes comedy illuminates hard truths with a pointed urgency that other means can’t quite achieve. Sometimes comedy is just funny. This series of posts is mostly about the former instances, but the latter is valuable, too. Lately I’ve been reading … Continue reading Laughing Matters — Robin Williams, “Come Inside My Mind”
There are plenty of gruesome elements to go around in Hereditary, the feature film debut of writer-director Ari Aster. As the title implies, though, the most unsettling portions of the film center on the way family can weigh on a … Continue reading Now Playing — Hereditary
#37 — Kelly Marie Tran as Rose Tico in Star Wars: The Last Jedi (Rian Johnson, 2017) It’s tough being a newcomer to a lengthy tale eight parts deep in the telling, with each prior installment adding convolutions to the … Continue reading Greatish Performances #37
Back when I first started penning movie reviews — not just as a personal hobby, but to foist upon Central Wisconsin radio listeners — I made an effort to approach each cinematic offering purely as its own entity, doing the … Continue reading Now Playing — Solo: A Star Wars Story
A Quiet Place (John Krasinski, 2018). Writer-director John Krasinski’s horror film about sonically-attuned, carnivorous creatures is a splendid analogy for the anxieties of child-rearing. It’s also wildly implausible within the confines of its own fictional world, largely because the threats … Continue reading Playing Catch-Up — A Quiet Place; All Fall Down; New Wave: Dare to Be Different
