Tag Archives: 2014

Faults (2014) Movie Review

 

Faults begins with a cold open in a diner, where Ansel Roth (Leland Orser), a washed up expert on de-programming former cult members, is furiously eating a meal that he is unable to pay for. After a sparsely attended seminar in a hotel, a couple approaches Ansel about their daughter Claire’s (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) involvement in a cult called Faults. Ansel, struggling with financial problems, agrees to kidnap Claire in order to counteract the brainwashing Faults has placed on her.

 

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Claire responds to her kidnapping in a partly normal, partly eccentric way. She doesn’t sleep, opting instead to stare at a television set of static through the first night of her capture. She holds back threats of Continue reading Faults (2014) Movie Review

As Above, So Below (2014) Movie Review

 

And now, a dramatic interpretation of a how a hypothetical pitch meeting for the As Above, So Below script might have started:

 

“It’s The Descent meets [REC] meets Grave Encounters meets Buried meets National Treasure.”

“Love it. I bet we can get that guy from Cloverfield for the male lead.”

“But we can still terrorize the sole black character by putting him in the most danger early on, right?”

“Of course! What else are horror movies for!?”

“Huzzah! Let’s make movies!”

 

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All right, so I have no idea how pitch meetings actually work. Nonetheless, that’s a fairly accurate description of As Above, So Below. The movie wraps a plot largely reminiscent of Continue reading As Above, So Below (2014) Movie Review

Bad Words (2014) Movie Review

In comedian/actor Jason Bateman’s feature length directorial debut Bad Words, Guy Trilby (Bateman), a grumpy competitive adult, takes on a room full of children in the national spelling bee, having found a loophole in which anyone who has not completed 8th grade by the cut-off date can compete. Meanwhile, Jenny (Kathryn Hahn), Guy’s journalist sponsor, tries to get his story out of him for her online newspaper. Guy is a tough shell to crack, telling us that Jenny will get her scoop once the climax comes.

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Guy and Jenny also engage in an unnecessarily strained and awkward sexual relationship, a Continue reading Bad Words (2014) Movie Review

The Guest (2014) Movie Review

The Guest is a film by director Adam Wingard. In it, a man named David (Dan Stevens) approaches a family claiming to be a close friend of the family’s eldest son, who died in Afghanistan during the war. The stoic, smooth-talking David says that he has just been discharged from the military, and Continue reading The Guest (2014) Movie Review

The Rover (2014) Movie Review

The Rover is a film from Australian director David Michod (Animal Kingdom, writer: Hesher). Ten years after a worldwide collapse of civilization, the Australian outback is a dystopian landscape dominated by crime and poverty. Following a botched robbery, three thieves (Scoot McNairy, David Field, and Tawanda Manyimo) crash their car Continue reading The Rover (2014) Movie Review

Whiplash (2014) Movie Review

Damien Chazelle’s jazz drama (who would’ve thought those two words would ever be put together?) stars Miles Teller and J.K. Simmons. It centers on jazz drummer Andrew (Teller). Andrew studies at Shaffer Conservatory and aspires to be one of the greatest drummers of all time. One day, Andrew is confronted in a practice room by intimidating Conductor Terrence Fletcher Continue reading Whiplash (2014) Movie Review

(Some of) My Favorite Films of 2014

At the time I am writing this, my watchlist of movies from last year that I still haven’t seen but want to stands at a bold 21.This list includes documentaries such as Life Itself and Citizenfour, as well as foreign language films like Leviathan and Deux Jours, une Nuit (2 Days, One Night), and wide-release features like Continue reading (Some of) My Favorite Films of 2014