Out in Theaters: ‘BABY DRIVER’

June 26, 2017 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Ansel Egort, Baby Driver, Edgar Wright, Eliza González, Jaime Foxx, Jon Bernthal, Jon Hamm, Kevin Spacey, Out in Theaters, Reviews, SXSW '17 Leave a comment

It’s been a hot minute since Edgar Wright has graced us with his genius. The man responsible for such perfect fare as Shaun of the Dead andHot Fuzz, Wright has long been a pioneer of the Trojan horse comedy, trafficking highbrow laughs in with genre trappings. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Wright is known for his masterful command of visual language, finding laugh-out loud moments in sharp editing, frame composition, camera operation and a great ear for music that amplifies the deadpan, pun-happy, tongue-in-cheek writing gushing from the page. As the mainstream moves more and more toward studio comedies disemboweled by flat visual palettes that fail to embolden jokes with any discernible directorial decisions, Wright has further articulated and championed his particular filmmaking flavour and the world of cinephiles has been the more fortunate for it. Which takes us to Baby Driver. Read More

SXSW ’17 Review: ‘TRAGEDY GIRLS’

March 16, 2017 by Matt Oakes Posted in Festival Reviews Tagged Alexandra Shipp, Brianna Hildebrand, Craig Robinson, Horror, Josh Hutchinson, Kevin Durant, Nicky Whelan, SXSW '17, SXSW 2015, Tragedy Girls, Tyler MacIntyre Leave a comment

Mean Girls meets Scream in Tyler MacIntyre’s trendy satirical midnight horror-comedy Tragedy Girls. Like Heathers for the social media age, MacIntyre’s coming-of-age serial killer misadventure satirizes iPhone-obsessed culture as two popular girls go on a killing spree in order to gain followers, accrue likes and establish a brand. A fucked-up ode to friendship first and foremost, Tragedy Girls’ kill-happy mentality is demented no doubt but the relationship at its center sincerely (and gruesomely) cuts to the core of high school woes and the trials of BFF-dom. Not to mention, it’s bloody good fun.
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SXSW ’17 Review: ‘WIN IT ALL’

March 16, 2017 by Matt Oakes Posted in Festival Reviews Tagged Aisling Derbez, Jake Johnson, Joe Lo Truglio, Joe Swanberg, Keegan-Michael Key, Pixar, Reviews, SXSW '17, Win It All 2 Comments

A more lovable loser there may not be than Jake Johnson’s Eddie Garrett in Win It All. The 18th (!!!) feature from mumblecore originator Joe Swanberg, Win It All is the second “official” collaboration between Swanberg and Johnson, who paired up last year to middling success with Digging for Fire after previously working in a director-actor capacity on festival favorite Drinking Buddies. Swanberg’s brand of low-key, grounded comedy-drama has rarely been better than in Win It All as he and Johnson create an emotionally involving character study of a man whose addiction to gambling (and losing) has come back to bite him, just when life has started looking up. Read More

SXSW ’17 Review: ‘THE DISASTER ARTIST’

March 14, 2017 by Matt Oakes Posted in Festival Reviews, Most Popular Tagged Dave Franco, James Franco, Michael H. Weber, Reviews, Scott Neudstadter, Seth Rogen, SXSW '17, The Disaster Artist 1 Comment

There in perhaps no film in existence that better exemplifies “cult” status than Tommy Wiseau’s The Room. A titanic miff on every level imaginable, Wiseau’s self-produced “romantic drama” is often called the worst movie ever made. And rightfully so. Anyone who’s had the privilege of witnessing this filmic trainwreck is treated to a level of incompetence that is almost endearing in its epic failure. If you however are among the many uninitiated, I would suggest you stop reading and run to your nearest video store (assuming it still exists) to grab a copy The Room. I guarantee they have one. Read More

SXSW ’17 Review: ‘GAME OF DEATH’

March 13, 2017 by Matt Oakes Posted in Festival Reviews Tagged Catherine Saindon, Emelia Hellman, Erniel Baez Duenas, Game of Death, Horror, Laurence “Baz” Morais, Nick Serino, Reviews, Sam Earle, Sebastien Landry, SXSW '17, Thomas Vallieres, Victoria Diamond 1 Comment

Upon reading that Game of Death was an amalgam of a web series stitched together into a feature, I feared the worst. The formats, though not incongruous, ostensibly serve different ends – one drives towards a rollercoaster of micro-climaxes, the other tells a rounded whole narrative arc. It’s a case of a dozen acts versus the traditional three act structure and trying to cram the one into the other is risky business. Though there’s some glaringly funky transfer hiccups reformatting the series as a feature film – most notably aspect ratios that shift scene to scene – the product overcomes what should be insurmountable odds at every turn through pure force of blood-stained will. Read More

SXSW ’17 Review: ‘BABY DRIVER’

March 13, 2017 by Matt Oakes Posted in Festival Reviews, Most Popular Tagged Ansel Egort, Baby Driver, Edgar Wright, Eliza González, Jaime Foxx, Jon Bernthal, Jon Hamm, Kevin Spacey, Reviews, SXSW '17 3 Comments

It’s been a hot minute since Edgar Wright has graced us with his genius. The man responsible for such perfect fare as Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, Wright has long been a pioneer of the Trojan horse comedy, trafficking highbrow laughs in with genre trappings. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Wright is known for his masterful command of visual language, finding laugh-out loud moments in sharp editing, frame composition, camera operation and a great ear for music that amplifies the deadpan, pun-happy, tongue-in-cheek writing gushing from the page. As the mainstream moves more and more toward studio comedies disemboweled by flat visual palettes that fail to embolden jokes with any discernible directorial decisions, Wright has further articulated and championed his particular filmmaking flavour and the world of cinephiles has been the more fortunate for it. Which takes us to Baby Driver. Read More

SXSW ’17 Review: ‘THE ARCHER ’

March 11, 2017 by Matt Oakes Posted in Festival Reviews Tagged Ana Markova, Bailey Noble, Bill Sage, Casey Schroen, Jeanine Mason, Michael Grant Terry, Reviews, SXSW '17, The Archer, Valerie Weiss Leave a comment

Robin Hood. Legolas. Katniss Everdeen. That dead-eyed kid from We Need to Talk About Kevin. Archers all. The Archer’s Lauren Pierce is not a name you’ll need add to that list. Bailey Noble does a fine job as the cocksure protagonist, a going-places high school competitor with a sharp eye and a short fuse who winds up in a correctional facility for minors, but Casey Schroen’s undeveloped script and an entirely underwhelming edit doesn’t allow Lauren to flourish into anything beyond a hodgepodge of kick-ass chick cliches trapped in a humdrum teen thriller. Read More

SXSW ’17 Review: ‘COLOSSAL’

March 11, 2017 by Matt Oakes Posted in Festival Reviews, Uncategorized Tagged Anne Hathaway, Austin Stowell, Dan Stevens, Jason Sudeikis, Nacho Vigalondo, Out in Theaters, Reviews, SXSW '17, Tim Blake Nelson Leave a comment

Colossal, about a drunken dead-ender who discovers she has become an unwitting remote control for a massive horned monstrosity, is a film at war with itself. On the one hand, the spectacularly strange conceit prompts a delicious revision of the monster movie genre. Still, the potential novelty fails to take flight, making Colossal both too strange for mainstream audiences who typically buy tickets for monsters bashing each other movies and not really strange enough to satisfy audiences hoping for something truly nutty. Read More

SXSW ’17 Review: ‘PREVENGE’

March 10, 2017 by Matt Oakes Posted in Festival Reviews Tagged Alice Lowe, Horror, Kate Dickie, Prevenge, Reviews, SXSW '17, Tom Davis Leave a comment

A case of in utero homicide, Prevenge comes born of triple-threat Alice Lowe’s fertile but twisted mind. Taking duties as writer, director and star in this slop-rock ballad of killer prepartum impulses, Lowe weaves her story of a knocked up avenging angel in the strangest of circumstances. Pregnant at 37, art found itself mimicking reality (to a degree) as Lowe put pen to paper to stitch together a one-page pitch early in her first trimester. Read More