Out in Theaters: ‘KEANU’

April 28, 2016 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Jordan Peele, Keanu, Keegan-Michael Key, Method Man, Out in Theaters, Peter Atencio, Reviews, SXSW 2016, Will Forte Leave a comment

When Key & Peele premiered in 2012 on Comedy Central, it was as close to an overnight success as any sober TV producer could hope for. The sketch comedy show that covered anything from pop-culture fandom to racial relationships, all with unprecedentedly competent production value, found even more love on YouTube where many of their brief sketches ratcheted up views in the millions. From their jocular takedown of the Obama administration to nonsensical athlete names to 80s aerobic videos, there were few rocks left unturned and a remarkable percentage of hits to misses. When the show took its bow in September of 2015, fans were predictably heartbroken to see the righteous comic duo come to an end. If Keanu is proof of one thing and one thing only, it’s at the very essence of Key & Peele will live on so long as Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele continue to collaborate in any way shape or form. And that my friends is a fact worth celebrating. Read More

Out in Theaters: ‘SING STREET’

April 27, 2016 by Matt Oakes Posted in Most Popular, Out in Theaters Tagged Aidan Gillen, Don Wycherley, Ferdia Walsh-Peelo, Ian Kenny, Jack Reynor, John Carney, Lucy Boynton, Maria Doyle Kennedy, Mark McKenna, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Sing Street 1 Comment

Sing Street is that rare film that manages to be good to its core. Like Ward Cleaver teaching Wally and Beaver an important life lesson good. Or finding someone’s billfold on the beach and mailing it to them good. Neil Young crooning “Heart of Gold” good. Snuggling a 6-week old puppy good. Pure dictionary definition good. Omnibenevolence bleeds from the very pores of John Carney’s latest singing sensation to create a sharp-tongued crowdpleaser positively dripping with wit and charm that results in an unimpeachably winning film sure to elicit tears and laughs in equal measure. That it’s also a whipsmart, droll and overwhelmingly heartfelt coming-of-age film brimming with 80s nostalgia and upbeat tuneage drives it the extra mile. Read More

Blu-Ray Review: ‘JANE’S GOT A GUN’

April 26, 2016 by Matt Oakes Posted in Blu-Ray/DVD Reviews Tagged Ewan McGregor, Gavin O’Connor, Joel Edgerton, Natalie Portman, Noah Emmerich Leave a comment

Synopsis: “Natalie Portman is Jane Hammond, a frontierwoman who enlists the aid of a disgruntled former flame (Joel Edgerton) when a rowdy gang led by a ruthless but charismatic killer named John Bishop (Ewan McGregor) plots to axe her outlaw husband (Noah Emmerich). Using a combination of her feminine guile and a sudden disposition for weapons and explosives, Jane must fight off the clan of invading Bishop Boys while also coming to terms with the losses in her past that have made her the woman she is today.” Read More

Out in Theaters: ‘A HOLOGRAM FOR THE KING’

April 22, 2016 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged A Hologram for the King, Alexander Black, Dave Eggers, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Sarita Choudhury, Sidse Babett Knudsen, Tom Hank, Tom Tyker 1 Comment

Tom Hank’s everyman charisma can’t save Tom Tyker’s laborious fish out of water romantic drama A Hologram for the King. That the plot doesn’t extent far beyond a man waiting for a meeting – an uphill battle of a dramatic thrust if there ever was one – isn’t necessary narrative nightshade though Tyker’s lackadaisical Tilt-A-Whirl approach to storytelling may just be. With a backbone that lacks pizazz, and often settles on a cursory examination of midlife existential crisis through the lens of cultural alienation, and a directorial style that tends towards unfocused arcs and uneven pacing, Tom Hanks proves a saving grace as a down-on-his-luck moral guide. With Hanks, we are admittedly in good hands but Tyker fails to make the frame swirling around him pop to any degree worth remaking upon. Read More

Out in Theaters: ‘GREEN ROOM’

April 21, 2016 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Alia Shawkat, Anton Yelchin, Callum Turner, Green Room, Imogen Poots, Jeremy Saulnier, Joe Cole, Mark Webber, Patrick Stewart, Reviews, Sundance 2016, Sundance Reviews 2 Comments

Hot from the critical heralding of Blue Ruin, Jeremy Saulnier returns to the world of white trash and movies with colors in their title with Green Room. An ultraviolet fantasy of viscus and vengeance, Green Room is as unapologetic as a Misfits album, as dead-serious as a KKK rally and as boastfully savage as a scalping. Characters find themselves torn to kibble by attack dogs, slashed to crimson ropes by box cutters and blasted in the face at point blank range with shotguns. Read More

Out in Theaters: ‘THE HUNSTMAN: WINTER’S WAR’

April 20, 2016 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Alexandra Roach, Cedric Nicolas-Troyan, Charlize Theron, Chris Hemsworth, Craig Mazin, Emily Blunt, Evan Spiliotopoulos, Jessica Chastain, Liam Neeson, Nick Frost, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Rob Brydon, Scary Movie 4, Sheridan Smith, The Huntsman: Winter’s War Leave a comment

The Huntsman: Winter’s War suffers from colon-movie spina bifida. Its curvy backbone veers near and far to collect the disparate parts necessary in making this part of a larger cinematic universe. In this case, that universe is Universal Picture’s Snow White, a bleak fairy tale retold with undeniable visual style and largely charmless aplomb in 2012 with an aggressively apathetic Kristen Stewart at the forefront and a scenery-smacking, mean-mugging Chris Hemsworth as her side piece. Putting his considerable beef to good use as the movie’s romantic tine/battle-weary whetting stone to slide K-Stew’s frosty edge against, Hemsworth proved a fleeting flash of joy in an otherwise grim and grimly serious saga. His burly Eric however hardly seemed an intriguing (or popular) enough character to stage a spin-off upon but if The Huntsman is proof of anything, it’s that adding a hefty scoop of Jessica Chastain, a dollop of dwarves and a much more tongue-in-cheek approach to this whole fairy tale thing may be just the spoonful of medicine the script doctor called for. Read More

Out in Theaters: ‘THE BOSS’

April 7, 2016 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Ben Falcone, Ella Anderson, Kristen Bell, Melissa McCarthy, Out in Theaters, Peter Dinklage, Reviews, The Boss Leave a comment

Melissa McCarthy extols virtues of bullying as hardball go-getter in The Boss. McCarthy’s latest, a rags to riches to rags to brownie empress saga, is a decidedly un-PC yet still paint-by-numbers comedy-cum-drama, written and directed by husband Ben Falcone. Falcone and McCarthy last collaborated as writer/director and star/writer on the critically reviled Tammy and if anything can be said of The Boss, it’s that the duo has still not perfected the formula. A gaffe-a-minute affair puckered with sequin turtlenecks, trite physical gags and the occasional guffaw-worthy ribbing, The Boss continues Hollywood’s trend of planting the theoretically funny McCarthy in mostly lame-brained, decidedly derivative and narratively bankrupt outings. If not entirely without laughs, The Boss is still poor enough in them to qualify for unemployment. Read More

Out in Theaters: ‘DEMOLITION’

April 6, 2016 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Bryan Sipe, Chris Cooper, Demolition, Heather Hind, Jake Gyllenhaal, Jay M. Glen, Jean-Marc Vallee, Naomi Watts, Out in Theaters, Reviews Leave a comment

Life has a tendency to zip forward on a single, amusement ride track until something or someone comes barreling out of the shadows of entropy to buck your stated momentum and set you serendipitously down a new path. 17th century physicist Isaac Newton described the phenomenon in which colliding forces impress upon one another an equal and opposite reaction in his famous Third Law, which describes both why someone struck by a moving vehicle would find their chest caved in and someone catching a bad edge going a cool 30 mph on decade old skis would find their wrist contorted in all kinds of wrong directions. Read More

Out in Theaters: ‘EVERYBODY WANTS SOME!!’

April 6, 2016 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Austin Amelio, Blake Jenner, Everybody Wants Some, J. Quinton Johnson, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Richard Linklater, Temple Baker, Wyatt Russell 1 Comment

There’s a moment in Richard Linklater’s Everybody Wants Some where four collegiate athletes hover around an overstuffed bong, listening to the psychedelic crackle of Led Zeppelin, competing to see who can take the biggest bong rip. It’s an indisputably Linklater moment, one that speaks to the essence of the Austin filmmaker’s disco baseball comedy that forces one to meditate on what friendship and camaraderie meant before the advent of cell phones. There is an enviable sense of authentic connection found in this communal stoned passage, one that finds itself increasingly diluted by distraction in modern day conversation, that’s undercut by an overarching spirit of competition. Community and competition – two forces that rally to make Linklater’s latest film a low key, nostalgiacore home run. Read More

Out in Theaters: ‘MIDNIGHT SPECIAL’

March 30, 2016 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Adam Driver, Bill Camp, Jaeden Liebeher, Jeff Nichols, Joel Edgerton, Kirsten Dunst, Michael Shannon, Midnight Special, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Sam Shepard 1 Comment

Jeff Nichols is very quickly solidifying himself as a distinct and essential American voice. The 37-year old Arkansas native blends the mystic nostalgia of Steven Spielberg’s great wonders with the romanticized bayou lyricism of a Mark Twain novel. The result is often staggering, the heavy, heady crossroads of lock stock ultra violence and meaningfully sentimental morality plays. In 2012, Nichols’ snaggle-toothed fable Mud sounded the starting gun for the McConaissance, just as he basically introduced the world to Michael Shannon as a leading man in 2011’s Take Shelter. More than just a emcee for introducing (or reintroducing) us to new or reinvigorated talent, Nichols has emerged as a bold writer/director willing to take big risks and reap big rewards and Midnight Special, a work of great wonder and beauty, is blinding evidence of this fact. Read More