Category: CPE
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The Boy (**) ain’t right
The Boy – 2016 Director William Brent Bell Screenplay Stacey Menear Starring Lauren Cohan, Rupert Evans, Jim Norton, Diana Hardcastle, Ben Robson Everyone needs a friend like Binage. Someone who is as eager to see awesomely bad horror films and is just as disappointed as you when the film is a little better than expected. I have been…
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Spectre (***1/2) is unfinished business, all the time
Spectre – 2015 Director Sam Mendes Starring Daniel Craig, Christoph Waltz, Léa Seydoux, Ben Whishaw, Naomie Harris, Dave Bautista, Andrew Scott, Monica Bellucci, Ralph Fiennes, Rory Kinnear Screenplay John Logan, Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, Jez Butterworth The Daniel Craig era of James Bond films have been marked with a higher personal stake, more viciousness and aside from Dame Judy Dench’s M, an entirely different cast…
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Joy (****) – Norma Rae can stuff it
Joy – 2015 Written and Directed by David O. Russell Starring Jennifer Lawrence, Robert De Niro, Edgar Ramirez, Diane Ladd, Virginia Madsen, Isabella Rossellini, Bradley Cooper, Elisabeth Röhm, Dascha Polanco If there is a special ability portrayed by the actors and director of Joy, it’s that none of this feels that much like a movie. This half-fiction portrayal of the life of the creator…
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Sicario (****1/2): The depth of darkness
Villeneuve is one of the best directors alive. He his streak is 3 near-classics and counting. His sensibility is one of quiet observation. He allows the viewer to draw his own conclusions on what they are seeing, without pushing even subtly in any direction.
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The Revenant (***1/2): It’s mostly true…mostly
It would be one thing if the story played a little closer to Hang ‘Em High and a bit less artificially constructed as A Beautiful Mind. The Academy never gave any awards to the first movie, though. The original Glass just wanted his gun back from Fitzgerald. DiCaprio’s Glass has to have a victim-class son…
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The Hateful Eight (Roadshow Edition) ****1/2 is a study of balance
The Hateful Eight – 2015 Written and Directed by Quentin Tarantino Starring Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Walton Goggins, Demián Bichir, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern, Lee Horsley, Zoë Bell, James Park, Gene Jones, Dana Gourrier That actors save their best performances for Quentin Tarantino is certainly not a surprise. That he continues to pull new good actors from the fringes…
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Star Wars: The Force Awakens (***1/2) There’s always another weapon
Star Wars: The Force Awakens Director J.J. Abrams Starring Harrison Ford, Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Adam Driver, Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Oscar Isaac, Lupita Nyong’o, Andy Serkis, Domhnall Gleeson, Anthony Daniels, Peter Mayhew, Max von Sydow, Gwendoline Christie Screenplay by Abrams, Lawrence Kasdan, Michael Arndt Everyone wants Star Wars to succeed. Heck if I had never seen the first film (Episode IV) at age 7, this blog wouldn’t…
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Vacation (**) is not fun for anyone
Vacation – 2015 Written and Directed by Jonathan Goldstein, John Francis Daley Starring Ed Helms, Christina Applegate, Skyler Gisondo, Steele Stebbins, Leslie Mann, Beverly D’Angelo, Chris Hemsworth, Chevy Chase The original Vacation was a work of the upwardly mobile talent of Harold Ramis and John Hughes. It also featured perhaps the last performance of Chevy Chase before it all started going downhill. It’s a…
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Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation (***1/2) Needs desperate times…
Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation – 2015 Written and Directed by Christopher McQuarrie Starring Tom Cruise, Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Ving Rhames, Sean Harris, Alec Baldwin One of the funniest scenes in the entire M:I series takes place during the 3rd act. As the principal protagonists surround a person of interest, one of the good guys, Benji (Pegg) is kidnapped by…
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Chappie (***) So the guy that invents A.I. lives in track housing…
Chappie – 2015 Director Neill Blomkamp Starring Sharlto Copley (voice and stop motion), Dev Patel, Watkin Tudor Jones, Yolandi Visser, Jose Pablo Cantillo, Sigourney Weaver, Hugh Jackman Screenplay by Neill Blomkamp, Terri Tatchell It’s beginning to feel like Neill Blomkamp may be the next M, Night Shyamalan. He has several distinctive qualities that are unlike other filmmakers. He also has the emotional and political range…
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