If you walked into the movie The Kitchen not knowing anything about it you might think it is based on a true story. Starring Melissa McCarthy (Kathy), Tiffany Haddish (Ruby) and Elizabeth Moss (Claire) as newly minted mob wives, The Kitchen is an R-Rated descent into madness in 1978 and 1979 Hell’s Kitchen. For any […]
The movie The Art of Racing in the Rain is based on the 2008 novel of the same name by Garth Stein and is the most schmaltzy movie of the summer, maybe the year. But don’t let that deter you. Sometimes, and in this case, schmaltz is good. Here we have a story, that barely deals […]
Once Upon A Time in Hollywood is Quentin Tarantino’s 9th film and his best. It’s that good. And stay through the credits for a pleasant surprise. Pre-credits begin with a fictitious 1950s TV personality, Allen Kincaid (Spencer Garrett), doing an on camera interview with Leonardo DiCaprio’s Rick Dalton and his stuntman Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt), with Dalton […]
In 1993, before the internet, you had to watch movie trailers in theaters. There was no way for most people to watch them over and over again. I attended at least 5 press screenings per week at the time and walked into whichever auditorium was showing trailer for the 1994 The Lion King at least 50 times […]
Simply put, Toy Story 4 is a solid follow up to the best in the Toy Story franchise, Toy Story 3, which was released in 2010 and which went on to become the highest grossing film in the series, ($415 million U.S). Toy Story 3 was the only film in the franchise to earn the coveted […]
Men In Black International is the fourth film in the big screen franchise that all began in 1997 with Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones in the lead roles. For the uninitiated, the Men In Black are in charge of monitoring all aliens who visit or move to Earth, using lethal force when necessary to keep the peace. […]
The Secret Life of Pets was released in the summer of 2016 and has the distinction of being the highest grossing original film (opening weekend) of all time, with $104,352,905. Many stars of the original return to the 86 minute The Secret Life of Pets 2 to lend their voices to the pets, including Kevin Hart […]
By Tim Nasson In the movie Late Night, from the failing movie studio Amazon Studios, Oscar winner Emma Thompson plays, to put it mildly, a late night talk show host who just may be network TV’s nastiest bitch. She is such a bitch that she has never learned her writer’s names, and refers to them […]
When a movie studio knows that the live action remake they are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on can’t improve on the original, the logical question is why would they waste their time making it? Disney has fumbled more times than not when it comes to the quality of their live action remakes, compared […]
Blinded by the Light, a film that does more than just incorporate the songs of Bruce Springsteen into its docudrama screenplay, has more in common with last year’s musical smash Bohemian Rhapsody, based on the life of Freddie Mercury, than it does with this year’s fantasy docudrama Rocketman, which is based on the life of […]
Walt Disney’s 1941 animated classic, Dumbo, has the distinction of being the shortest feature length Disney film of all time, clocking in at a mere 64 minutes. Yes, audiences paid full price for admission to the one hour film up until its final theatrical rerelease in 1976, which I remember vividly, even though I was […]
Let’s face it; in this day and age it takes a lot to create a good scary movie. We have been so spoiled by the genius of Stephen King (think The Shining, Misery and It), Stanley Kubrick, and Alfred Hitchcock that a scary movie in today’s world really has to go above and beyond. Many […]
Believe it or not, Glass is a film that has taken nineteen years to complete. It is the film that connects the worlds of Unbreakable and Split in a two-hour epic finale (or beginning?), and brings the characters David Dunn (Bruce Willis), Elijah Price (Samuel L. Jackson), and “The Hoard” (James McAvoy’s many characters he […]
Academy Award nominee Bryan Cranston (Trumbo), Kevin Hart, and Academy Award Winner Nicole Kidman (The Hours) come together in the long delayed The Updside, a remake of the international blockbuster 2011 French film The Intouchables. Directed by Neil Burger (The Illusionist, Limitless), The Upside chronicles the unexpected friendship between Phillip Lacasse (Cranston), a Park Avenue […]
Ralph Breaks the Internet Mixes Family Fun With Social Satire In a world filled with wonder and knowledge at our fingertips, it’s arguably one of the greatest inventions ever known to man. It’s a vast wonderland of fun, shopping, personality and image enhancement, and even money making that we can’t seem to get enough of. […]
Viggo Mortensen and Mahershala Ali Achieve Onscreen Magic in Green Book The movie Green Book, which takes its title from the book of the same name, “a travel guide to safe lodging, dining and business options for the Negro,” during the era of segregation and Jim Crow laws, is set against the backdrop of a country […]
Rosamund Pike Brings Attention to the Frontlines in A Private War According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, 45 journalists have been killed delivering the news to the world. Before hearing about the film A Private War, I had never once heard the name Marie Colvin before. Now I’m an avid news follower, and a woman […]
J.K. Rowling’s Magical World Prevails in Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald On November 16, 2001, J.K. Rowling’s written masterpiece Harry Potter graced the big screen for the first time, opening the floodgate for a roughly $6.5 billion dollar on-screen franchise. Now, exactly seventeen years later, her magical world is still at large with the release of Fantastic […]
Halloween 2018 Review: Michael Meyers Is Back For More Blood It’s hard to believe that the movie H20, the 20th anniversary sequel to the seminal 1978 horror movie Halloween, is 20 years old. I interviewed its stars, Jamie Lee Curtis and Josh Hartnett (who played her son) and thought to myself, why did the studio […]
First Man is Dramatically Dull But Viscerally Stunning Let me make one thing clear, OK, two. First, Ryan Gosling is a great actor. I have found him to be one of the greatest living actors working since the movie The Notebook was released in 2004. Of course, he started out acting as a kid on […]
Bradley Cooper sings “Tell me something good…” and boy do I have something good to tell you about A Star Is Born. I’ll admit, I have not seen any of the previous three A Star Is Born films, so I do not have anything to compare this film to. A Star Is Born has been towards the top of my […]
Anna Kendrick and Blake Lively Steal A Simple Favor The movie A Simple Favor, directed by Paul Feig (Bridesmaids), isn’t as funny as you might imagine it would be given its impressive cast of comedic actors – Anna Kendrick, Blake Lively, Henry Golding (the breakout Eurasian star of Crazy Rich Asians), Andrew Rannels, Jean Smart […]
Lizzie Borden had an axe She gave her mother 40 whacks When she saw what she had done She gave her father 41 Do you remember that rhyme from childhood? I watched a screener of the new movie, Lizzie, courtesy of Roadside Attractions, at home. When the movie began, one of my friends whom I was […]
Searching Is One of This Year’s Best Films At first glance, especially taking a look at the poster and trailer of the movie Searching, you might think that it is just another low budget, B-movie thriller, reminiscent of the recent films Friend Request, Unfriended and Unfriended: Dark Web, which feature a bunch of unknown teens getting […]
The retirement of one’s childhood, and graduation into adolescence and ultimately adulthood, is one of life’s most unsettling events. Stuffed animals and other assorted toys and memories are boxed away and forgotten. First love takes precedence over everything else for many. And then work and family, but mostly work, occupies much of the brain, sometimes […]