Stuntmen do very impressive work on movies, and the better they are, the less likely you are even to notice them. While rumblings about an Oscar for stunts finally being given out have led nowhere, the best boost to this particular section of the industry is the big-budget blockbuster The Fall …
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a British movie set at the seaside will be incredibly depressing, and on the surface, Silver Haze is another one of them. It’s done in the usual no-budget British style saved for working-class stories – handheld cameras following screaming families of dubious income smoking endless …
It’s hard to discuss the nature of One-Percent Warrior without discussing the elephant in the room: Tak Sakaguchi. The film, directed by Yamaguchi Yudai, not only examines the nature of action films but also serves as a self-reflexive examination of Sakaguchi’s own career in the realm of Japanese action cinema, with turns in Ryuhei Kitamura’s Versus, Sion Sono’s Why Don’t …
Documentaries hold a unique position in the realm of storytelling, possessing an unparalleled ability to captivate and inspire audiences. They have the power of offering an in-depth look into real-life experiences and issues. However, creating a documentary is one of the toughest tasks to do in the entertainment world. Moreover, …
Everyone expects that the end of the world – or at least of civilization as we know it – will come about in a big, transformative way. An extinction event or an apocalyptic end to all we know and love has been predicted by many science fiction stories and zombie …
Michael Keaton has been considered one of the generation’s best (and most popular) actors. Besides his oozing on-screen charisma, he is arguably one of the most likable people in Hollywood. This includes his starring roles in iconic films including but not limited to Batman, Batman Returns, and Beetlejuice. Those films made him a household name that …
Enter the film community, and you’ll see jeers of derision at new movies; “They don’t make ‘em like they used to,” scream those factions of the internet. There’s merit to the anecdote; practical effects taking backseat to digital, a rubbery grey aesthetic taking precedence over vibrancy and such, but ultimately …
Mark Wahlberg, the star of Arthur The King, had numerous peaks and valleys throughout his career. These include highlight performances in films like The Departed (for which he was nominated for an Academy Award) and The Fighter. On the flip side, he has also had many cinematic misfires like Max Payne, The Happening, and some films in the Transformers franchise. In the …
Fish out of water comedies are fun because it’s inherently interesting, and often quite funny, to watch people try to adjust to a life they’ve never known. In some cases, it’s the chance for someone to experience unprecedented luxury and comfort without ever having been able to fathom that kind …
What would happen if you tried to make contact with the devil on live television? Well, Late Night with the Devil has a staggering answer to this question. Helmed by the directing duo of Cameron and Colin Cairnes, the movie chronicles the journey of a late-night talk show host Jack Delroy (David Dastmalchian), …
The Scottish comedian Janey Godley is from Glasgow, so of course a new documentary about her life would be the closing gala of the Glasgow Film Festival. But when a person’s life has been as troubled as Ms. Godley’s, a documentary needs to address those troubles directly instead of letting circumstances do the …
The Indigo Girls are having a bit of a moment right now. I don’t know if there has ever been a time when they weren’t having a moment, but between “Closer to Fine” appearing in Barbie and the documentary It’s Only Life After All that also released last year, the pair has been in the …
Anyone who was alive on New Year’s Eve in 1999 remembers that the world was supposed to end, and there was a lot of panic about it. Obviously, that didn’t happen, but there’s a universe in which things could have played out differently, which is vividly imagined in the directorial …
Specific true-life stories demand the big-screen cinematic treatment. In some cases, those true stories can go on to earn Academy awards (Braveheart, Schindlers List). In other cases, some films can dishonor those stories’ legacies. Adapting those stories can be some of the most challenging films to make. The story of the …
The G, from writer-director Karl R. Hearne, is an unusual crime thriller in that its central character is a woman in her sixties and the insults of aging are central to the crimes at its core. But the unusual intelligence of The G is that it knows that physical weakness means little if …
Punctuation can speak volumes. The latest feature from writer-director duo Austin Stark and Joseph Schuman – Coup! – joins the ranks of Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge! and Richard Linklater’s Everybody Wants Some!! in adding an exclamation point to a punch title, immediately suggesting a zany, irreverent take on social paranoia during the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic. As the world recovers from war …
oudCryptocurrency has been on the rise in the past few years. With the introduction of Bitcoin and Ethereum, many people are turning to this interesting new currency to get rich quickly. However, with the latest trends and technology, whether AI or cryptocurrency, there’s always a gray area regarding moral standards …
Twenty-four hours in one lawyer’s chaotic personal and professional life comes to a head in Selman Nacar’s sophomore feature. Hesitation Wound (Tereddüt Çizgisi) clocks in under 90 minutes, but the fullness of its action and the richness of its moral dilemmas, characterizations, and performances gives it the weight of many longer features. Canan …
Avatar: The Last Airbender is the latest animated property to get the live-action treatment from Netflix. There has been some success with this trend, such as Netflix’s adaptation of the anime One Piece, but reimaginings such as this have to work hard to justify their existence, as their animated counterparts are already …
Animated sequels can be a challenge; sometimes, the sequel isn’t as good as the original (Shrek the Third is a perfect example). Other times, the sequels can be better than the original (Shrek 2). In DreamWorks Animation’s case, they now have two franchises that have maintained their quality throughout their sequels …