If you had told me that John Travolta would comeback from his recent Academy Award persona butchery (2014’s “Adele Dazeem”, 2015’s repulsively awkward Scar-Jo sneak-a-kiss) by playing a sand-blasted moral compass in a Ti West Western (a Western, it must be noted, that is of the genre through and through, absent of the horror flair that has, up to this point, characterized the filmmaker’s oeuvre), I woulda spit my cud. But Travolta is as present for In a Valley of Violence as it is a corn-fed, all-American, organically certified Western. Consider my head scratched. Read More
Out in Theaters: ‘THE BIRTH OF A NATION’
Nate Parker‘s The Birth of a Nation is an urgent primal scream from American history’s darkest hour. Parker produces, writes, directs and stars in this much needed telling of the trials and tribulations of slave-turned-revolutionary Nat Turner. The relatively well-to-do preacher’s eyes are open to a new interpretation of the good book when his master shops out his sermons, profiteering off Turner’s calming demeanor to quell rebellion amongst more brutalized slaves. He’s soon in high demand from the most vicious slave owners across the land, all who want less sass and more backbreaking for their neglected and enslaved laborers. Read More
Out in Theaters: ‘THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN’
It certainly won’t work to The Girl on the Train’s advantage to be compared to David Fincher’s Gone Girl but the proximity of the two properties – both feature strong female leads, are based on best selling novels and center on soapy surburian murder mysteries – make such comparisons as unavoidable as they may be unfavorable for director Tate Taylor. Read More
Out in Theaters: ‘AMERICAN HONEY’
There comes a time in every person’s life where they fracture from the life they once knew. For many people, that demarcation arrives in the form of college but for Star (Sasha Lane) such privileges are but a pipe dream, never once considered. Rather, her life veers from its turbulent tracks with the arrival of Jake (Shia LaBeouf) a charismatic snake oil salesman-type traveling with a band of misfit teens, drinking, smoking and jamming out to Ciara, Mazzy Star and Madeintyo their way across the poverty belt of the U.S.A. Read More
Out in Theaters: ‘DEEPWATER HORIZON’
Oil. We use it every day. It fills our gas tanks. Warms our homes. Even makes up the roads we drive. In Deepwater Horizon, the coveted resource turns on man 40 miles off the coast of Louisiana, becoming a nightmarish force that ends the life of 11 crew members onboard the fated vessel and torments the slurry of survivors racing to escape its scarlet abyss. With all the fury of a possessed malevolent entity, the routine drill site turns to fire and brimstone one fated evening, Dante’s inferno is brought roaring to life, and a brave few must do all they can to save as many as they can. Read More
Out in Theaters: ‘MISS PEREGRINE’S HOME FOR PECULIAR CHILDREN’
There’s this odd duality that percolates throughout Tim Burton’s latest filmic venture Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. At almost any given time, it is either extremely lively or extremely dull. Look no further than its charisma-hole of a lead, Asa Butterfield (Hugo) for the dullness. He slums through scenes; a wet blanket personified. Flat as a rock, he delivers each goopy line with monotonous apathy, casting a sleeping spell on the enchantment Burton tries (and is sometimes able) to conjure. Moving as if yanked by an invisible chain, he is a blight on an otherwise solidly entertaining feature courtesy of a director who himself has recently unchained himself from his greatest liability (*cough, Johnny Depp, cough*.) Read More
Out in Theaters: ‘MY BLIND BROTHER’
In Sophie Goodhart‘s intentionally lackadaisical comedy My Blind Brother, Nick Kroll sharpens his post-television presence as unambitious deadbeat Bill whose doomed purpose in life is to be a seeing-eye underdog for his egotistical handicapable brother Robbie (Adam Scott). Complications arise when Bill and Robbie have eyes, er feelings, for the same girl, the spirited, wanna-be-do-gooder Rose (Jenny Slate). The result is a well-meaning, socially awkward meditation on the comedy of disability. Following the sacred rule book of Matt and Trey, either everything is fair game or nothing is and this mentality leads My Blind Brothers down some delightfully uncouth corridors. Read More
Out in Theaters: ‘GOAT’
Goat harrowingly explores the hypocrisy of fraternal brotherhood, bearing witness to the ugly rights of passage that men must submit to into order to earn their badge of masculinity. In Andrew Neel‘s testosterone-fueled melodrama, ideas of modern masculinity are examined through the lens of the Phi Sigma Mu fraternity of the fictitious Brookman University as new arriving “goats” (that’s pledges to those who don’t speak frat) are victim to a brutal “hell week”. Read More
Out in Theaters: ‘BLAIR WITCH’
When Adam Wingard’s newest feature was simply called The Woods, it was one of my most anticipated features of the season. A minimalist poster and bone-chilling trailer only intensified my desire to take in the latest offering from the director responsible for such horror knockouts as You’re Next and The Guest. On more than one occasion, a band horror-loving critics sat huddled in the dusk of the theater, waiting for our latest press screening to gear up, pining for the coming collaboration between Wingard and penman cohort Simon Barrett. And then one night, like a nuclear bomb, it hit. The news that shook the horror community to their bones. We had all been bamboozled. The Woods was indeed Blair Witch. Read More
Out in Theaters: ‘SNOWDEN’
Snowden is a biopic about a man of great courage with none of its own. Opting to tell the story of the globally-recognized NSA agent turned whistleblower, writer-director Oliver Stone and co-writer Kieran Fitzgerald craft a narrative akin to a fan fiction version of Snowden’s Wikipedia page – except one should expect more nuance and knowledge from the latter – complete with unnecessary sex scenes, dramatically empty melodrama and, per Stone’s contract, loose-lipped partisan pandering. Read More