Review: Thor: Love and Thunder, it's hammerin' time!

Review: Thor: Love and Thunder, it’s hammerin’ time!

Back in 2011, Kenneth Branagh set out to make Shakespeare out of Thor. By 2017, Taika Waititi took over directing duties and understood it’s best not to take the Norse god too seriously. With Thor: Love and Thunder, Taika literally strips Thor of his seriousness and puts his signature brand of humor on full display. That’s not to say Love and Thunder is all jokes. There are serious elements at…

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Review: 'Nope' Takes An Otherworldly Approach to Tell a Story of Virality, Legacy, and the Unknown

Review: ‘Nope’ Takes An Otherworldly Approach to Tell a Story of Virality, Legacy, and the Unknown

A cell phone glitches and metal falls from the sky. A phenomenon that should make one duck for cover instead sends a man on a race to save his father. Ultimately, OJ (Daniel Kaluuya) cannot save his father (Keith David) from a coin plunged through his eye. In Nope, director Jordan Peele makes a metaphorical dream into a nightmare. While cinema has long pushed its heroes to look to the horizons…

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Review: 'Spiderhead' Allows Chris Hemsworth to Shine in an Imperfect 'Twilight Zone' Thriller

Review: ‘Spiderhead’ Allows Chris Hemsworth to Shine in an Imperfect ‘Twilight Zone’ Thriller

For decades, sci-fi has helped send warning signs to mass audiences. The genre lends itself to exploring the natural conclusion of emerging phenomena in our world. This allegorical approach helped The Twilight Zone become a sensation while paving the way for generations of stories to follow in its footsteps. Director Joseph Kosinski looks to recreate a warning sign in Spiderhead, a new film…

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Review: 'Mad God' Delivers as a Madman's Primal Scream

Review: ‘Mad God’ Delivers as a Madman’s Primal Scream

There are some films so odd they defy explanation. Many movies seek to throw you off their scent. Others find themselves incoherent enough that you’ll need an explainer. However, director and special effects artist Phil Tippett refuses to let his latest film be defined in this light. Instead, he takes the obscenity and chaos to levels few have dared. Tippett’s film, Mad God represents the most…

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Review: 'Cha Cha Real Smooth' Signals the Arrival of Cooper Raiff

The Sundance indie drama starring white guys working out their problems became a joke over the last 20 years. With pseudo-hit after pseudo-hit landing with critical acclaim, the market quickly oversaturated. Whether we can blame this on the Duplass brothers, or the dozens of other filmmakers who attempted to cash in, is still a mystery. However, when Cha Cha Real Smooth arrived at Sundance this…

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Review: 'Obi-Wan Kenobi' Builds Bridges Between Two Pasts, Missing the Chance to Innovate

Review: ‘Obi-Wan Kenobi’ Builds Bridges Between Two Pasts, Missing the Chance to Innovate

As LucasFilm continues to thwart its name to produce television series, the ideas continue to get smaller. The Star Wars experiment on Disney+ once felt like a genuine way to expand the surprisingly tiny narrative from a galaxy far, far away. A universe beholden to one family’s destiny was shaken off within the first season of The Mandalorian, resulting in new characters that boomed in…

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Review: 'Downton Abbey: A New Age' Creates Laughs and Movie Magic

Review: ‘Downton Abbey: A New Age’ Creates Laughs and Movie Magic

Returning to a lush family estate in the countryside of England sounds like a fairy tale. Yet for six seasons and a movie, Downton Abbey became a reliable place for intrigue and drama in the world of television. The Julian Fellowes series became something of a cultural phenomenon and returned to theaters for the second time earlier this year. The latest film, Downton Abbey: A New Age paves a path…

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Review: 'Lightyear' Barely Makes Orbit Despite a Gorgeous Takeoff

For months, jokes came in from every corner of the internet. Disney and Pixar made one of the safest bets imaginable, spinning off Toy Story star Buzz Lightyear into his own film. With a new cast, headlined by Chris Evans, there was no doubt a future hit was in store for the animation powerhouse. Shortly after the announcement, Evans tweeted out one of the most bizarre messages imaginable. Evans…

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Review: 'Ambulance' or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Michael Bay

Review: ‘Ambulance’ or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Michael Bay

When one thinks of Michael Bay, explosions are sure to follow. The blockbuster director remains one of the few maximalist filmmakers in the industry, with a filmmaking style that many write off as tacky. Yet to know Bay’s filmography is to know the pleasures and tribulations of excess. While the films themselves create a salad of jingoistic libertarian ideals, he also has the ability to craft…

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Review: Adam Sandler Shines in 'Hustle,' Netflix's Latest Great NBA Film

While Netflix continues to struggle in many areas, they’ve also created some surprising partnerships. For the past few years, the films and shows related the National Basketball Association (NBA) have been stellar. They co-financed and developed The Last Dance documentary series about Michael Jordan, and landed Steven Soderbergh’s High Flying Bird in 2019. Their latest film, Hustle combines their…

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Review: 'Fire Island' Delivers Bowen Yang and Joel Kim Booster a Worthy Star-Making Vehicle

Review: ‘Fire Island’ Delivers Bowen Yang and Joel Kim Booster a Worthy Star-Making Vehicle

Diving into a subculture can be challenging. Using a modern-day place to tell a centuries-old tale can be even trickier. Yet Fire Island, released on Hulu via Fox Searchlight last weekend, lands a Jane Austen-sized plane on Long Island. Using the actual Fire Island and the yearly LBGBTQ+ party as the background, screenwriter and actor Joel Kim Booster tells a new-age version of Pride and…

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Franchise Rewind: A Second Look at Style Over Substance of 'Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom'

Coming off the revitalization can be tricky for any filmmaker. Working off another’s script can be even more difficult. Yet the task assigned to J.A. Bayona appeared to be a strong match on paper. During my initial viewings, I quickly soured on the film. In the name of fairness, I revisited Bayona’s dino adventure, scripted by Colin Trevorrow as the second part of his Jurassic trilogy. Sadly,…

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Review: 'Jurassic World Dominion' Brings Back Visual Wonder, While Struggling with Story

The Jurassic Park franchise deserves most of the credit for making me love the movies. Steven Spielberg’s masterful sci-fi monster movie is my favorite film and remains a technical marvel. It works as an all-around masterpiece of action, adventure, sci-fi, and drama. For everything it gave to the world, it also opened Pandora’s Box when it came to its special effects and spectacle cinema. Fans of…

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Review: Move Aside Peter Parker, 'Ms. Marvel' is Taking Over the MCU

Review: Move Aside Peter Parker, ‘Ms. Marvel’ is Taking Over the MCU

There are rare moments in geek culture that create the lightning bolt moment. Ironically, this one wears one on her torso. The Marvel Cinematic Universe’s latest series lands on Disney+ today, and for the second straight series, we’ve been introduced to a brand new character. While Ms. Marvel bears the namesake of Captain Marvel, Kamala Khan and actress Iman Vellani instantly create the most…

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Franchise Rewind: 'Jurassic World' Thrives as a B-Movie But Stumbles When Reaches For a Point

Franchise Rewind: ‘Jurassic World’ Thrives as a B-Movie But Stumbles When Reaches For a Point

Seven years after Jurassic World revived the franchise, we are approaching the end of Colin Trevorrow’s trilogy. With that in mind, we’re rewinding the tape to look back over the franchise. The new trilogy has introduced dozens of new characters of questionable quality, but the undeniable success of Jurassic World brought audiences back to Isla Nublar. The action-adventure comedy still has its…

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Review: Dear God, Put Us Out of 'Morbius' Misery

Review: Dear God, Put Us Out of ‘Morbius’ Misery

To say the Morbius joke has gone on too long is an understatement. After all, the movie was released on April 1st, more than two months ago. It struggled at the box office and became a punchline on the internet. The subject of many memes, Morbius did not find its audience. So it was a surprise when Sony/Columbia announced the film would return to 1000 theaters in the first weekend of June. How…

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Review: 'Watcher' Lives Up to Its Voyeuristic Name Thanks to Excellent Monroe & Gorman

Review: ‘Watcher’ Lives Up to Its Voyeuristic Name Thanks to Excellent Monroe & Gorman

In 1954, Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window took the world by storm. It was not the first voyeuristic film in Hitchcock’s filmography (nor would it be the last), but the thriller in an urban center opened the doors for similar movies. The trope, watching your neighbors until they commit murder, became something of a trope for setting up thrillers. The latest film to join this esteemed sub-genre comes…

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