Dir. Isao Takahata. Starring Tsutomu Tatsumi, Ayano Shiraishi, Akemo Yamaguchi When I heard that Ender’s Game was going to be adapted to film, I was hurt. This was not a, “Man, they’re not going to make it how I imagined it!” or a “Jeez, they’re going to really mess up Bean” or anything like that.… Read More Grave of the Fireflies (1988)
Monsters University was greeted the same way that Brave was by critics and moviegoers alike: “It was cute. It would’ve been really good for a Disney movie, but it wasn’t what we expected from a Pixar movie.” The statement is, of course, doubly patronizing, and rather more unfair to one than the other. As hard as it is… Read More The Sorrows of Aging Pixar
Once upon a time, I didn’t feel like doing schoolwork, so I read Fifty Shades of Grey instead. My girlfriend’s roommate had a copy which I borrowed, and I finished the book in an evening. This was not a terribly difficult enterprise, as you can imagine: E.L. James is not going to become James Joyce any time… Read More Fifty Shades of Grey: A Chance for Bravery
Here goes another one of my full-movie commentaries. Today, it’s Disney’s Hercules, which was perhaps my favorite movie in elementary school and is certainly responsible for the interest in mythologies which weirded the heck out of my neighbors when I was a seven-year-old. Consider, for example, this paraphrasing of my Halloween experience in 1998: Me: Trick… Read More Hercules (1997)
Dir. Nicholas Meyer. Starring William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, Ricardo Montalban We’re going to try something which I used to do for my Glee reviews…I’m streaming this movie on Netflix instant. I’m going to write down reactions I have to what’s going on as the movie occurs. This used to take me about 150 minutes with a forty-five… Read More Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982)
I like to think that an omniscient God has a master list of every science-fiction film that has ever been made or will ever be made, and this list is ordered from 2001: A Space Odyssey to Plan 9 from Outer Space. While sci-fi is particularly fecund ground for bad film, Star Trek Into Darkness has to be a… Read More Star Trek Into Darkness (2013)
Dir. Baz Luhrmann. Starring Nicole Kidman, Ewan McGregor, Jim Broadbent 2010’s American Idiot, 2009’s Rock of Ages, 2006’s Jersey Boys, 2003’s Movin’ Out. 2003’s The Boy from Oz. All Best Musical nominees at the Tony Awards in the past ten years. One winner in the bunch (Jersey Boys). All jukebox musicals. On television, Glee and… Read More Moulin Rouge! (2001)
Dir. Gary Ross. Starring Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Donald Sutherland Textuality is a difficult concept to handle. In my experience, limited as it obviously is, it’s very hard to get people to separate two different texts when they are purposely similar. Think about a music video that goes with a song. Or a movie based… Read More The Hunger Games (2012)
Dir. Peter Jackson. Starring Melanie Lynskey, Kate Winslet, Clive Merrison Heavenly Creatures is Jackson’s breakout movie. In many ways, it’s like watching his own home movies, back when he relied not on New Line but the government of New Zealand to fund his work. In terms of chronology, at least, Jackson was closing in on… Read More Heavenly Creatures (1994)
Seeing Things Secondhand 