Review – Bottle Rocket (1996)

by Armando Vanegas

Sometimes, I get bored reviewing new movies so for some reason, I wanted to go through all the Wes Anderson movies in chronological order in the meantime. It’s just something that gives me a challenge to do and maybe there will be unexpected feelings and unique thoughts I never saw coming. So, without further delay, let’s begin with his 1996 debut, Bottle Rocket. I remember this being a movie that got a lot of play on Comedy Central back in the day and it was always the kind of movie that I never felt compelled to watch when it’s on. Honestly, I was never impressed with the bits I’d seen, but there were always interesting sequences that made the rest of the movie worth it. So, in subsequent years, I would watch bits and pieces because there was sometimes nothing to watch on cable. When I last watched this movie, I rated this movie rather highly back when I was more of a snob when it came to movies. But as anyone who has read my Phantom Thread review, I’ve decided to just to watch movies as their own individual self, judge them as their own thing no matter who’s involved in terms of the directors, the writers, or the actors. Watching this again was interesting. As a movie directed by someone who would be later become one of the most idiosyncratic and quirky filmmakers of our time, younger middle school me who watched this on cable was right. Outside of a few well directed sequences, it’s fine.

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Review – High Flying Bird (2019)

by Armando Vanegas

Director Steven Soderbergh is nothing if not unconventional or unique. I may not always be crazy about the final product he might provide, but he’s at least playful with the medium. With High Flying Bird, he continues the trend of making unconventional choices by filming his second movie on an iPhone. It’s not an ideal choice, but I was willing to see what he was going to do with it. This unusual decision ends up working out in the end as it effectively fits with the narrative of the protagonist’s DIY plan to bring the game of basketball back to its players. High Flying Bird may not fully coalesce from a narrative standpoint, but the actors and the snappy screenplay by Moonlight writer Tarell Alvin McCraney help to make it a breezy watch.

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Review – Pacific Rim: Uprising (2018)

by Old King Clancy

Despite not having revisited it since my initial viewing I have good memories of the first Pacific Rim, it managed to capture the awe-inspiring nature of watching giant robots fight giant monsters. The less than stellar reviews for the sequel had me disheartened, but enough goodwill had carried over and I was willing to give Uprising a shot.

Turns out I probably shouldn’t have.

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Review – Mayhem (2017)

by Old King Clancy

With the over-reliance on Rotten Tomatoes in recent years and everything being picked apart for its political standing (or lack thereof) it seems a lot of people have forgotten that not every film needs a message, some can just be an escape from reality to live out your dreams. Those dreams can be of being the strongest man in the world, or of visiting the furthest reaches of space, or in the case of Mayhem, of watching white-collar assholes get brutally murdered. And honestly, that’s all it needed to be.

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L.A. Premiere of TNT’s ‘I Am The Night’

Gal Gadot showed support for her Wonder Woman co-star Chris Pine and Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins at the Los Angeles premiere of I Am The Night. The series is directed by Jenkins and produced by Pine. The TNT television miniseries is a murder mystery that takes inspiration from such cases and stories as The Black Dahlia. In this video, Nile Fortner shares Gal Gadot’s highlights with Pine and Jenkins at the January 24, 2019 event.

#IAmTheNight #PattyJenkins #GalGadot #ChrisPine

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Review – Widows (2018)

by Armando Vanegas

Steve McQueen’s Widows is a very entertaining time as it feels like a throwback to the older dramas that used to be a big deal before superhero movies and franchises were a thing. If you want to see great actors doing their thing while a great director does his best job at being artful while being contained in a mainstream bubble, then this is the movie for you. A lot of the ads made this look like a big action-packed heist movie and just know that it’s not that. If you’ve seen any of McQueen’s other movies, you know what to expect from him here. It’s more of a slow burn character study about how three women are forced to break out of their shells created by their now deceased husbands through their crimes by way of financial stability. While that might seem heavy, it’s engrossing from beginning to end thanks to great performances and McQueen’s directing.

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Review – All These Small Moments (2019)

Molly Ringwald & More Deliver Big Performances & Heart in the Film ‘All These Small Moments’

by Nile Fortner

Molly Ringwald is back with a talented cast that includes 2014’s The Guest star Brendan Meyer, Girls TV show star Jemima Kirke, and director Kevin Smith’s daughter Harley Quinn Smith, in Melissa Miller Costanzo’s directorial debut.  Costanzo, who has worked in the art department for such films as The Fighter and Precious, gives us a look at young Howie who has had a rough year. He broke his arm, he along with his brother have to deal with their parents unraveling marriage, and the only thing that keeps Howie going is his love for a mysterious woman.

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Review – Widows (2018)

by Old King Clancy

Given Steve McQueen’s (no not that one) previous works being far more dramatic affairs touching on protests, sex addiction, and slavery, having him helm a heist movie sounds strange on paper. Even more so when you realize the heist film is an adaptation of a British TV Series from the 80’s and co-written by Gone Girl’s Gillian Flynn. But as fans of both Flynn and McQueen’s works and a solid cast backing them up, Widows looked to be a thrilling change of pace.

What we got was a thrilling change of pace, but still carrying McQueen’s dramatic flair.

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