The superhero sequel is a peculiar beast. It is the nature of the sequel to be a chancy proposition, artistically at least: most stories really actually don’t need the extra space to be told, and cinema history is littered with sequels that can’t do better than feebly retread the same plot and conflicts as the […]
I feel like ten years is about the shortest amount of time you need in order for a statement like this to come off as well-considered and lofty, rather than fannish hyperbole: the 2002 Spider-Man is, to me, the best comic book movie of the 21st Century. I mean something fairly specific by that statement: […]
The biggest problem with Seeking a Friend for the End of the World is how fantastically misrepresented it’s been in marketing: it came in looking like a snarky black comedy about the end of the world, and it is not that, to a startling degree. Instead, it is a delicately romantic character drama about the […]
Every Sunday this summer, we’ll be taking an historical tour of the Hollywood blockbuster by examining an older film that is in some way a spiritual precursor to one of the weekend’s wide releases. This week: the new Pixar film Brave is, above and beyond any other considerations, a blow-your-brains-out gorgeous CGI depiction of the […]
A previous review of this film can be found here. A guide to all things Bond at Alternate Ending. Directed by John Huston, Ken Hughes, Val Guest, Joseph McGrath, and Robert Parrish Written by Wolf Mankowitz & John Law & Michael Sayers with uncredited contributions by Woody Allen, Val Guest, Ben Hecht, Joseph Heller, Peter […]
Poor Brave. It could have survived, and thrived, as just an animated family-friendly adventure movie. Instead, it has to be a Pixar movie, and not just a Pixar movie, but the Pixar movie that had to come out right after Cars 2 and prove one of two things, according to your tastes: either that Pixar […]
Once again, I must beg your pardon: my Father’s Day entry in the Year of Blood is behind schedule, because sometimes you get the DVD when you need it, and sometimes you do not. Regardless, here we are with a tribute to all that makes dads what they are: psychotic authoritarians whose desire to wreak […]
Every Sunday this summer, we’ll be taking an historical tour of the Hollywood blockbuster by examining an older film that is in some way a spiritual precursor to one of the weekend’s wide releases. This week: the jukebox musical Rock of Ages turns the nihilism and filthiness of the ’80s hair metal lifestyle into a […]
A guide to all things Bond at Alternate Ending. Directed by Terence Young Written by Richard Maibaum and John Hopkins, from a story by Kevin McClory & Jack Whittingham and Ian Fleming Premiered 9 December, 1965 PRE-TITLE SEQUENCEThere are so many firsts involved with this film, but here’s one that matters right now: in the […]
High school graduation! A time for stepping out into the world, for proclaiming one’s burgeoning adulthood and independence, for redressing past slights in a fountain of blood and viscera! Incidentally, as graduation is a season rather than an exact date, I have chosen to tie this Year of Blood essay to the 2012 commencement ceremonies […]
Film critics are not meant to talk about their own experience of watching a movie in terms of specifics – the venue, the dinner they had before, the phone call they had immediately after, the lumpy spot in the seat cushion. This is because film critics like to pretend to be oracles, whose opinion applies […]
The easy, perhaps even the smart thing to do would be to use Moonrise Kingdom as a yardstick for judging everything Wes Anderson has been up to in the last decade and a half: but that is a line of argument that just makes everybody sad, and I will attempt to limit myself on that […]
