Category Archives: All Movie Reviews

Creed (2015) Movie Review

Creed is essentially a re-boot of the Rocky franchise showcasing fresher, younger hands.

The film centers around the trials of son of legendary fighter Apollo Creed, Adonis Creed (Michael B. Jordan). Creed grows up in a juvenile corrections facility and in and out of group homes until Apollo Creed’s wife (but not Adonis’ biological mother) Mary Ann (Phylicia Rashad) takes him in.

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18 years later, Creed is following in his father’s footsteps as a pro boxer in Tijuana. By day, he is a desk jockey in Los Angeles, but he knows that it is not the life for him. We see him Continue reading Creed (2015) Movie Review

Cold Deck (2015) Movie Review

 

Cold Deck opens with a jazzy soundtrack and a warmly-lit montage of poker tables being played. The film zooms in on one particular table, where the players engage in emasculating ball-busting, each jab met with the same uproarious laughter.

 

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One player, Bobby (Stefano Gallo), loses out to the clubs owner, Chips (Paul Sorvino), who takes sympathy on him and lends him some cash.

 

Bobby works in a factory, but his conversations are all on gambling. It is his lifestyle. Strapped for cash, barely able to Continue reading Cold Deck (2015) Movie Review

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2016) Movie Review

 

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is adapted from the book of the same name, and it is exactly what you think. Jane Austen’s famous characters return to the big screen, only now they aren’t combating class and gender barriers, they are samurai fighting zombies.

 

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The film, understanding that the audience is likely already familiar with the Austen classic, begins with some heavy handed exposition revolving around the nature of the narrative’s zombie outbreak. This opening scene involves an interesting point of view shot that comes from a unique perspective, to say the least. Unfortunately, Continue reading Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2016) Movie Review

Brooklyn (2015) Movie Review

 

Brooklyn is a film starring Saoirse Ronan as a young Irish emigre, Eilis, who moves to New York in the early 1950s to find work, leaving behind a mother and sister as a result. In Brooklyn, she stays at a boarding house with four other women of differing personality, works at a department store (but takes night classes to become a bookkeeper), and falls for a young Italian man named Tony (Emory Cohen).

 

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The film makes a marked transition from Eilis’s process of immigration and settling into her new world to her Continue reading Brooklyn (2015) Movie Review

Goodnight Mommy (2015) Movie Review

 

The main diegesis of Goodnight Mommy begins with two twin brothers being children. They play tag in a corn field and frolic through the woods. They cautiously enter through a dark void of a passageway, referring back to the viewers themselves, who are choosing to do the same by watching this film.

 

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The film opens with an immediate sense of stillness. But there is Continue reading Goodnight Mommy (2015) Movie Review

Room (2015) Movie Review

 

In Room, a mother (Brie Larson) and son Jack (Jacob Tremblay) are held captive in a tool shed that they call Room. The mother has been there for seven years. Jack is five years old, and he has never set foot outside of Room in his entire life.

 

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Room is a story of resilience and undying familial love. It is about a woman coping with stress under extreme trauma while also having to successfully raise a child. It is also Continue reading Room (2015) Movie Review

People, Places, Things (2015) Movie Review

 

People, Places, Things opens on a birthday party for two twin girls. The father, Will (Jemaine Clement), searches for his wife Charlie (Stephanie Allynne), only to find her cheating on him with another man. After an awkwardly comical exchange, their relationship ends. A year later, the pair have split custody over the children.

 

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Will is a graphic novelist, an occupation which is revealed through a wonderful panning shot over a series of comics frames depicting a man in Continue reading People, Places, Things (2015) Movie Review

Crash Test (2015) Comedy Review

 

In Crash Test, the comedy special from Rob Huebel and Paul Scheer, a glass bus drives around Los Angeles picking up various comedians to do stand up performances.

 

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After some brief opening bits, Huebel and Scheer throw to the bus’s computer diagnostics system “Busey” (Andy Daly), who runs through to make sure everything is functioning properly. This list of equipment includes Continue reading Crash Test (2015) Comedy Review

Hackers (1995) Movie Review

 

18 year old Dade (Jonny Lee Miller), aka “Crash Override,” aka “Zero-Cool,” is on parole for a cyber-crime he committed when he was a pre-teen child. On his 18th birthday, he is given access to a computer for the first time since he crashed 1,500 plus computers, resulting in a stock market dip.

 

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Dade falls in with an underground subculture of computer hackers. This group is soon framed for creating a Continue reading Hackers (1995) Movie Review

Teen Wolf (1985) Movie Review

 

Teen Wolf is a comedy starring Michael J. Fox as a teenage boy going through changes, but not the changes you would expect. His ears start to have a point. Hair stems with miraculous speed. His eyes glow red when he’s angry.

 

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It’s hard to ignore the aspects of this film that don’t hold up. These moments have Continue reading Teen Wolf (1985) Movie Review