Batman Returns is undeniably defined by the influence of its director, Tim Burton. This is both a positive and a negative for the film’s overall success as a big-screen depiction of the Batman legend. On one hand Batman has never been given a more arresting aesthetic treatment. The production design by Bo Welch and the…Read more Film Review: Batman Returns (1992)
“Do You Want Me to Wear Your Face?” – On Gratuity, Manipulation and Mathew McConaughey in Killer Joe
William Friedkin rediscovers his electric and pulpy 70′s roots in Killer Joe – which stands as one of the best American films so far produced this year. Joe’s success as a film revolves around one of its few scenes of actual violence, the infamous fellatio/deep-fried chicken scene which easily takes the prize as one of the…Read more “Do You Want Me to Wear Your Face?” – On Gratuity, Manipulation and Mathew McConaughey in Killer Joe
The Search, and The Finding?
I know that I had it, perhaps not even really that long ago. Ultimately elusive, yet its power is unmistakable. On its promise the world turns; we chase it like the holy grail. It's a lifelong search; we look in our personal relationships and our professional endeavors, in our higher callings and primordial impulses. Why…Read more The Search, and The Finding?
Film Review: The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006)
Thematically complex, emotionally powerful and brutally un-romanticized, Ken Loach‘s The Wind That Shakes the Barely is a towering portrait of the Irish War of Independence and is one of the prolific director’s best films. While hardly objective in its treatment of history (all of the British figures are defined only by their anonymity or their…Read more Film Review: The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006)
Film Review: Pocahontas (1995)
In the 1990′s Walt Disney Studios owned animation. It defined a generation and produced a string of classic films unfaithful to their source material yet artistically pretty great. Affectionately titled "The Disney Renaissance" by The Walt Disney Corporation stockholders, the animation studio gave audiences the one-two-three-four punch of The Little Mermaid (1989), Beauty and the Beast…Read more Film Review: Pocahontas (1995)
Film Review: Iron Man 3 (2013)
In the third Iron Man film, the adage, "A hero is only as good as his villain," certainly applies. Iron Man 3's baddie easily eclipses such forgettable foes as Whiplash and Obadiah Stane in terms of banality. However, what's worse is that the film's eponymous hero, portrayed once more with a snarky playfulness by Robert…Read more Film Review: Iron Man 3 (2013)
Film Review: Super Fly (1972)
Stagnant plotting and glacial-speed editing define this 1972 Blaxploitation feature from director Gordon Parks Jr. Starring Ron O’Neal as the ridiculously named central character, Priest Youngblood, Super Fly is a movie where nothing much happens and adds very little to the conversation regarding the socio-economic status of African-Americans that was so eloquently expressed through other…Read more Film Review: Super Fly (1972)
Film Review: Looks and Smiles (1981)
Some films are made solely for entertainment value and require only a passive level of involvement. Ken Loach does not make those kind of movies. It would be difficult to find someone ready to describe any of Ken Loach’s films as rip-roaring entertainment. Many of his films are stark, minimalistic affairs, shot either in tight, unforgiving interior locations or out…Read more Film Review: Looks and Smiles (1981)
Film Review: No Country for Old Men (2007)
There is very little that hasn’t already been said about The Coen Brothers' brilliant adaptation of Cormac McCarthy‘s apocalyptic novel, No Country for Old Men. The film offers a set-up that couldn’t be any simpler. Good ol’ boy Texan, Llewelyn Moss (played with tactful and effective gruffness by Josh Brolin) blunders into the aftermath of a…Read more Film Review: No Country for Old Men (2007)
Adam Mohrbacher 