Reviews BLADE RUNNER 2049. Lukewarm reception of an arguably perfect thing, based entirely on one’s own predilections rather than on the qualities of said thing, can carry with it some share of guilt or wrongdoing; a sense of having failed the thing more than it has failed you. Such is my quandary with Blade Runner […]
Broadway Cinema
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Smooth Landing
Reviews AMERICAN MADE. Some of the same criticisms could be levied (not unfairly) against both Tom Cruise and director Doug Liman, particularly at this rather advanced stage in their careers. Tending toward grand gesture, seeking the widest possible audience, creating a spectacle — some might say they’ve left behind the vulnerability and risk that launched […]
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Dressed to Kill
Reviews KINGSMAN: THE GOLDEN CIRCLE. Matthew Vaughn first came to prominence, at least in my narrow little world, producing Guy Ritchie’s Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998) and Snatch (2000). Having gone down the rabbit hole of British crime cinema at the time, and being a sucker for quick, slangy dialogue, clever editing and […]
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Aiming High and Low
Reviews AMERICAN ASSASSIN. Solid, straight-ahead action pictures seem ever rarer in a field dominated by costumed heroes, horror and animation. It may well be that their day has passed, that the genre has been relegated to the digital equivalent of “straight-to-video,” where Nicolas Cage can reign, in ridiculous repose, as the king of the dusty, […]
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Losers Rejoice
Reviews IT. Stephen King has a hard time relinquishing creative control of his body of work. He famously hated Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of The Shining, saying it left out the moral overtones of its source material. In 1997, King tried to rectify this by collaborating on a television miniseries that starred goofy-haired Steven Weber (’90s […]
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Dark Turns
Reviews INGRID GOES WEST. As a person mistrustful of social media and the vast, false fabric it represents, one might guess I would enjoy a prickly, misanthropic movie about lives both at the hot center and the colder fringes of swipe/like/love/#AMAZING. One would guess correctly and Ingrid Goes West is just such a thing. After […]
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Lonely Terrain
Reviews WIND RIVER. Taylor Sheridan would be most recognizable to many for his arc as Deputy Chief David Hale on the first couple of seasons of the TV series Sons of Anarchy. While he’s been plying his trade as a working actor for over two decades, he’s also been at the desk, grinding it out […]
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The Boys are Back
Reviews THE HITMAN’S BODYGUARD. For those who would have assumed — not unreasonably — that the buddy action comedy had become a relic, a memory of two and half decades past, here is this. It’s doubtful it will spur a resurgence of that erstwhile genre, enjoyable and disposable as it may have been. But The […]
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Welcome to the Dollhouse
Reviews ANNABELLE: CREATION. Promotional materials reference this as “The next chapter in The Conjuring universe,” which comes across as aspirational and grandiose. That known universe now includes: The Conjuring (2013), wherein the new film’s malevolent, titular doll was introduced; The Conjuring 2 (2016); Annabelle (2014). And of course our current subject, which presents said doll’s […]
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Fight and Flight
Reviews THE DARK TOWER. It’s never surprising when a Stephen King novel series is adapted for film, but an eight-book series? In 95 minutes? The Dark Tower turns out to be a later chunk of that series, with a prequel TV show on the horizon. One hopes that project fares better and makes the most […]
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Trailer vs. Movie
Reviews ATOMIC BLONDE. So we return to the conundrum of The Good Trailer. On one hand, good trailers can surprise us like beautiful gifts. Because so many movies register as just above unwatchable these days, a lively little glimpse of something promising can be just the thing to get us through the long, dark night […]
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All at Sea
Reviews DUNKIRK. Christopher Nolan is something of a professional dinosaur. He broke out with Memento (2000), a challenging, compelling and unlikely low-budget surprise, just as the era of the Big Independents seemed to be hobbling to its dusty, desperate end. As the climate of moviemaking and distribution grew ever less hospitable, Nolan flourished. He remained […]