The Upside is a remake of the 2011 French film Intouchables, a facile yet hugely crowd-pleasing story about a white wealthy quadriplegic who hires a black ex-con to be his live-in caregiver. In the American iteration, the two roles are fulfilled by Bryan Cranston and Kevin Hart, with the role of Philip Lacasse’s (Cranston) uptight executive Yvonne being played by Nicole Kidman.
Neil Burger’s film is just as facile, and likely just as crowd-pleasing, as Intouchables.
While On the Basis of Sex illustrates the obstacle-laden road Ruth Bader Ginsburg (Felicity Jones) had becoming a lawyer, it pauses for a moment of attachment. A place where we understand the to-be U.S. Supreme Court Justice on a deeper level than we can by simply following her real-life legacy.
“Try doing one thing that scares you over break,” says a college professor to Zoey (Taylor Russell) after completing one of those let’s-open-our-movie-with-a-class-scene lectures. You know the ones I’m talking about. The ones where the teacher is somehow talking about the exact thing the movie is about, or otherwise is planting a piece of crucial information in the student’s head. The ones that never actually feel like they are real classroom discussions.
This is the start of EscapeRoom, a film about the trendy entertainment exhibits where groups of people are trapped inside a room and must find clues and solve puzzles to get out. But the danger of Continue reading Escape Room (2019) Movie Review→
The 2019 Oscar nominations will be announced on January 23, 2019. But the Academy has already narrowed down its candidates in many categories. For Best Animated Short Film, that list is down to 10. Of those 10 shortlisted short films, I have reviews for nine.
There are 30 short films which are shortlisted for Academy Awards across the three shorts categories—Best Live Action Short, Best Animated Short, and Best Documentary Short Subject. This will be cut in half come January 22nd. Before that happens, let’s take a look at a few of the shorts vying for nomination.
As he moves further from straight comedy and more toward a dark comedy examination of political America, McKay’s showy style becomes more apparent. In a way, it is more permissible to have a broad comedy film be brash and in-your-face. While such a style is not destined to fail in a more dramatic setting, it is harder to grapple with tone in that setting.
McKay’s The Big Short shows some signs of this tonal problem. Largely a depressing subject, the comedy flourishes in that retelling of the housing crisis don’t translate well. The non sequitur cutaways to celebrities are jarring and ineffective. What shines in that film are the performances, showing that the director understands the import of Continue reading Vice (2018) Movie Review→
Once again, I am too back-logged with movies to watch to write proper reviews for every one. So here are a handful of capsule reviews of some of the latest films.
Those unfamiliar with the work of Yorgos Lanthimos may be surprised to hear that The Favourite is the man’s most accessible film to date. A court drama about the shifting power dynamics between three women—Queen Anne (Olivia Colman), her long-time confidant Lady Sarah (Rachel Weisz), and new arrival Abigail (Emma Stone)—this feverish portrayal of high society at its lowest states of depravity is Continue reading The Favourite (2018) Movie Review→
Rather inexplicably, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is the best Spider-Man film made to date. It is hard to imagine that an animated film about multiverse theory and multiple incarnations of a single comic book character coming together to fight a rogue’s gallery that is only recognizable to fans would not only be an inspired origin story for Spider-Man, but also be an entirely accessible experience.
CineFiles Movie Reviews 