Taken for what its title represents, Wish maintains what has become the comprehensive theme and guiding principle throughout the history of the Walt Disney Company. Proudly continuing a century now after its founding, each new creative effort proves the Disney well of artistic storytelling striving for wish fulfillment remains bouyant and bottomless. Wish is a sparkling and meaningful new entry that genuflects to its history and stamps a little piece of its own.
Read MoreFor better or worse, “higher, further, faster” is exactly what you get with The Marvels. The sequel triples the space-faring swashbuckling beyond Earth, the weird and wacky possibilities of its galactic conundrum, and the character development pace of having three headlining leads. In an attempt to steer all the “higher, further, faster” going on, The Marvels adds “together” to the mantra (and soundtrack) and branches to a new one with “stand tall without standing alone.” The outcome is an electric blast of welcome, pure, and multiplied girl power.
Read MoreMatching the legend status branding and first-name-only titling of Baz Luhrmann, Coppola’s aim was to present the little-known side of the Presley story that happened under domestic lamplights instead of the flashbulbs of the public eye. The writer-director had to do so with a certain degree of difficulty similar to Ava DuVernay’s challenge on Selma nine years ago where the estate of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. had granted licenses for King’s speeches to another studio and film project. Thanks to approval given to Luhrmann already, no Elvis Presley music is used in Priscilla.
Read MoreSaturday Night Inside Out follows a 26-year-old Chicagoan as he navigates an emotionally arduous 24-hour span that may or may not become a turning point for the next five or ten years of his life. Step back from that one-sentence summary and ask yourself what kind of events, especially for an individual at that age, could possibly construct a defining moment on that level. If you’re thinking about friends, family, career and a love life, you would be right because all four of those–and then some– come into play in Saturday Night Inside Out.
Read MoreOutlaw Johnny Black is a unique genre experiment that knows damn well what cookie cutter it’s using. Led by star Michael Jai White stepping into the director’s chair, these are the people that made the hilarious blaxploitation cult classic Black Dynamite 14 years ago. Yes! Go ahead and drop a Jules Winfield reply to that news. With a clenched fist and a tongue in its cheek, White and company are here to emulate and embellish the best and worst qualities of westerns by making a cool one of their own.
Read MoreAny murder, at its garden variety face value, should be frightening enough, but A Haunting in Venice twists the knife further. Narrative and cinematic infusions of supernatural elements and implications not found in Hallowe’en Party are the film’s largest dramatic improvement from the source text. They turn what would merely be posh and intriguing in an ordeal far scarier in design and risk. Starting with that munched bird cold open and developing later with hallucinations of ghostly imagery, there is an unmistakable level of extra bite and edge.
Read MoreInstead of tail-spinning into potential wickedness and thornier debates, The Pod Generation remains focused on the fluid drama held by its two extremely solid actors. In lesser talented hands, the idea of watching a pair of performers like Emilia Clarke and Chiwetel Ejiofor trying to lug around a strapped prop, emote parental feelings to a big egg-shaped device, or explain themselves to narrating AI would be ludicrous and even laughable. Instead, these two are up to the task.
Read MoreMany romantic comedies skew heavily to presenting the female perspective. Most of those movies are built to follow a woman’s plight to get away from the wrong partner and find the right one. We side with her, cheer on her actions, and sneer at the suitors. In a unique way, Shortcomings is different. This one stays on the bad partner and, for that, it has a little extra engrossment going for it.
Read MoreEven with all of its impressive pomp and noise, nothing dramatically radioactive is going to ping your internal Geiger counter higher than a nominal level. And that, like Dunkirk and Tenet before this, is another missed opportunity from one of the best filmmakers in the industry. There’s a pair of lines offered to our main character in Oppenheimer that mirror some of the pushback analysis to Nolan’s good standing. They read, “Don’t alienate the only people in the world who understand what you do. You may need them.” The Brit has his hardcore devotees, but he might be losing more of the rest with each exhausting effort.
Read MoreBelle is a striking new interpretation of Beauty and the Beast that presents that type of barren simplicity to a tale as old as time. With a rustic storytelling scythe, Silicon Beach writer-director Max Gold chops down the tall grass of finery and strips away the usual imperial accouterments. Melding the intimations of fantasy and horror, Belle gets down to the nitty-gritty of the classic saga’s dramatic center and its truthfully terrifying undercurrents.
Read MoreThis isn’t a movie presenting one day of nice gestures from a well-meaning old man to an off-course kid where all is better. Tiger Within spans several months where even Samuel’s greatest efforts are not a mystical salve for Casey’s personal fractures. Unlike some of the popular mentoring movies, Tiger Within promises no complete transformation because it knows full well no such automatic correction exists. What it can promise is its own best foot forward, and that’s happily plenty.
Read MorePutting my school teacher hat on to match the spirit of this website, The Little Mermaid, like every movie really, is, for better or worse, a series of tests. It has become nearly impossible during this current cycle of Disney “re-imaginings” not to have questions of comparison arise between the original animated classics and their newfangled remakes. Depending on a person’s fandom or scruples (or both), that list can be long, short, casual, or petty.
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