MOVIE REVIEW: Get Out

To come right to the point, “Get Out” is an 104-minute living embodiment of a slow-burning WTF moment that just keeps growing with every new detail. And it’s glorious for being that very thing. More psychological thriller than the spattered horror it’s being billed to be, Jordan Peele’s directorial debut is subversively edgy and devilishly clever.

COLUMN: 16 hidden gem films from 2016

Even with my access to more-than-most with festival coverage and press credentials, I can’t see everything. What I can do is prop up some hidden gems that I was lucky enough to see and review. Here are 16 under-seen winners from 2016. The qualifier for the list was title earning less than $1 million at the box office. They are ranked from highest-scoring review to least.

COLUMN: The 10 Best Films of 2016

I’ll have you know that this is the latest this website has ever posted a “10 Best” list in its six-plus year history. I want to say that 2016 exhausted me, but it didn’t. “Every Movie Has a Lesson” published a personal-best 114 film reviews in 2016. Even after a record year, there is part of me that sits here and knows there was room for more. The to-do list of recommended films and overdue titles is never empty.

EDITORIAL: The Best of 2016 (so far)

Many of my personal most-anticipated picks and my crystal ball Oscar prognostications are still coming, but I have been lucky enough to see over 50 film films in the first half of 2016. Since it's only been a half-year, I'll split a year-end "10 Best" list into a Top 5. True to this website's theme, I present you my picks for the "Best of 2016 (so far)" coupled with their best life lesson from my full reviews.

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MOVIE REVIEW: The Invitation

Adorned with the weights of divorce, loss, and tested friendship, “The Invitation” wears those issues like a cloak to hide its real menacing intent and implications underneath. Karyn Kusama’s film holds a marvelous poker face that siphons your piqued curiosity and unraveling attention. “The Invitation” might be labeled as a horror film, but it far better fits the prodigious “mindfuck film” subgenre. Enjoy the steady increased heart rate and spinning cerebrum this film has to offer.

COLUMN: 2016 Spring Movie Preview

The spring movie season is meant to bring promise coming out of winter, the slowest annual season of the year. The awards seasons is done and gone and new movies can make their mark on 2016. Most of the blockbusters we've been drooling over are still looming for when summer hits in May. However, for several years now, more tentpole movies are starting to stake their claim and populate the spring season where the competition is much less than the summer gauntlet which presents a new slugger every week from May until August.

2016, Column, EditorialDon ShanahanMarch 2, 20162016, 2016 Spring Movies, 2016 Spring Movie Preview, Spring Movies, 2016 Spring Movie Calendar, 2016 Spring Movie Checklist, March film releases, March movie releases, April film releases, April movie releases, London Has Fallen, Zootopia, Knight of Cups, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, 10 Cloverfield Lane, The Brothers Grimsby, The Perfect Match, Eye in the Sky, The Young Messiah, Hello My Name is Doris, The Lobster, Lolo, Allegiant, Midnight Special, Miracles from Heaven, The Program, The Little Prince, The Bounce Back, The Bronze, Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice, My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2, I Saw the Light, The Invitation, Mia Madre, Miles Ahead, Rings, God's Not Dead 2, Collide, Amityville: The Awakening, The Boss, Demolition, Before I Wake, Hardcore Henry, Louder than Bombs, The Jungle Book, Barbershop: The Next Cut, Everybody Wants Some, Criminal, The Huntsman: Winter's War, Keanu, The Meddler, Mother's Day, Ratchet and Clank, Same Kind of Different as Me, Donald Shanahan, Don Shanahan, Every Movie Has a LessonComment

CHECKLIST: 2016 Spring Movie Calendar

Here is your lineup of upcoming films for the ever-warming spring movie season that aims to put winter behind us. Pick through this list for March and April and find a few winners. Add these to your calendar or print and slip this list on the fridge.