REVIEW: Driveways [2020]

Who has more fun than us, huh? Taking care of her estranged sister’s estate was supposed to be a means to an end for Kathy (Hong Chau). Drive down to a house she never visited (April was twelve years her senior and the two had a falling out when she refused to help care for their mother), clean things out with her eight-year old son Cody (Lucas Jaye), put it on the market, and use the money to help get things back on track and perhaps pay for nursing school.…

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REVIEW: Tag [2018]

Our friend is a psychopath and this is scary. The most memorable moment throughout Jeff Tomsic‘s Tag is the introduction of one of the five grown men engaged in a thirty-year game of trading who’s “it.” The player is “Chilli” (Jake Johnson) and he’s loudly smoking a bong while talking to his father, an aging man covered in tattoos readying for a turn. It’s not about what, but whom: Brian Dennehy. The venerable Brian Dennehy inexplicably came onboard a zany high concept comedy for less than five minutes of screen…

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REVIEW: Knight of Cups [2016]

“You’re still the love of my life. Should I tell you that?” The evolution of Terrence Malick is a fascinating one. From regular narrative structure to voiceover-driven epics to visual poems, his style has been stripped down to beautiful imagery and pithily obtuse dialogue sending us on journeys as much about ourselves as they are about the characters onscreen. Many believed his last film To the Wonder was a sign of decline—hours of improvised footage cobbled together during post-production into something wholly different than how it began—but I still held…

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REVIEW: The Next Three Days [2010]

“Someone’s belief in virtue is more important than virtue itself” Director Paul Haggis is somewhat of an enigma with me. I like the guy, I’m not sure why, I just do. I was one of the ten fans who enjoyed “The Black Donnellys” and the first time I saw his Oscar-winning Crash at the theatres, I thought it was a masterpiece. He soon wrote two fantastic films in Million Dollar Baby and Casino Royale, but that success began to wane once time passed and I realized just how pandering and…

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REVIEW: First Blood [1982]

“We’re not hunting him, he’s hunting us” If I’m going to see the fourth installment of a film franchise, I should at least check out the one that started it all. That fact brings me to finally seeing the 80’s classic First Blood. It wears its decade on its sleeve with the acting, broad humor at times, and cheesy credit song “It’s a Long Road.” Despite all that, though, the movie lives up to the hype and fires on all cylinders. I had no clue that the story pitted one…

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