Reviews JOHN WICK: CHAPTER 3 – PARABELLUM. As we struggle for footing on the shifting sands of national leadership in constant cartoon crisis, a broader geopolitical landscape tilting toward global conflict and socioeconomic dissolution, and increasingly centralized popular entertainment defined by literal and figurative monsters, there is hope in John Wick. Everything else can continue […]
Fortuna Theatre
Posted inArts + Scene
She Should Run
Reviews LONG SHOT. My wife has harbored a celebrity crush on Seth Rogen since long before he started showing up in good suits; this confounds and troubles me. But to each her own. We can at least agree that Rogen is a writer and performer of substantial comedic gifts. For my part, well, I have […]
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Adrift in the Marvel Universe
Reviews AVENGERS: ENDGAME. Chemically unassisted sleep is, as a rule, challenging for me. It is the healthy, more reliable path by which to arrive at REM sleep (which everyone assures me is very important) but that sleeping state is frequently defined by vivid dreams of depravity and inadequacy. And the long stretches between filled with […]
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Horse Power
Reviews THE MUSTANG. Hope isn’t the word for it, really, but then one should hardly go looking for hope in a prison movie. (Sorry, Shawshank fans). But The Mustang, the feature debut from Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre, contains notes of such delicacy and authenticity, setting connection and kindness against the cruelty and debasement of captivity, that […]
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Little Devils
Reviews HELLBOY. Sometimes one wants simply to be entertained: to sit in a dark room and be distracted — transported, ideally, but that’s asking a lot — by a fantastical world of someone else’s imagining. I found myself in that mood this past weekend and thought Hellboy might do the job. Now I’ll roll out […]
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The Ups and Downs of Supernatural Pet Ownership
Reviews PET SEMATARY. I started reading Stephen King, well, probably too young. The phase receded in early-mid adolescence, although I have, as recently as this year, begun to revisit his books at this late stage. I continue to enjoy the force of his imagination, the breadth (perhaps more than the depth) of his storytelling, his […]
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Life On the Road
Reviews THE DIRT. Mötley Crüe has never been my thing; never been a “thing” at all for me, really. There’s a bit of a generational discrepancy and by the time I was selecting my own records to play, I was already well down a path that didn’t lead to hair-metal. (I’ll admit to a brief […]
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Us Doubles Down
Reviews US. With the din of the unmitigated success of Get Out (2017) — including multiple Academy Award nominations and a win for best original screenplay — barely receding, talk must turn to writer/director Jordan Peele’s follow-up. He has been credited, not unfairly, with redefining the horror genre. How will he do it again? A […]
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The F-Words
Reviews SHRILL. Hulu’s recent fun-size six-episode series Shrill, which loosely fictionalizes Lindy West’s autobiographical essay collection of the same name, is a collage of fun, brave and smart things that are ultimately hard to adore as a package. I say that with real regret because there’s no doubt that I’m in the bulls-eye of this […]
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Captain Marvel Overcomes the Hero Complex
Reviews CAPTAIN MARVEL. When the post-credits Easter egg rolled at the end of Avengers: Infinity War (spoiler alert for the dozen people alive who don’t know how the ensemble blockbuster ended) and a swearing, dissolving Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) scrambled to send a message on a pager, of all things, Captain Marvel’s red, gold […]
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Lonely Hunters
Reviews GRETA. Back, back into the distant, dusty past, the long ago of the 1990s, when the second wave of New Hollywood cinema was peaking, Neil Jordan rose to prominence — notoriety? — for revealing (26-year-old spoiler alert) a penis where people weren’t expecting it in The Crying Game (1992). Jordan had been making movies […]
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Wheels Up
Reviews UNITED SKATES. Following several skating families from across the U.S., HBO’s documentary United Skates looks at the role of roller rinks in black communities, framing them not only as fun places to hang out but as spaces that foster growth and a sense of belonging. United Skates is a compelling snapshot of a subculture […]