REVIEW: Spring Breakers [2013]

“He’s going to give you a way out” Writer/director Harmony Korine has created an anthem for the hedonistic American Dream of hustling, fucking, and giving the middle finger to the consequences. It only feels this good when the stakes are high enough to barely make it out alive, after all. This is the balls-to-the-wall atmosphere cultivated when sex-crazed co-eds leave the real world behind for a week of unadulterated fun in the sun at interchangeable Pleasure Islands—churches to sin the titular Spring Breakers have visited for decades in pure electric…

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REVIEW: Hocus Pocus [1993]

“Winnie, do you want to hit me? Will that cheer you up?” What began as a script for a made-for-TV Disney Channel movie, Hocus Pocus found its way onto the right desk at the right time for the increased level of support necessary to transition it into a bona fide theatrical release. Sadly for all involved, though, the critics more or less hated it and the box office barely squeaked by its production budget. Yet somehow everyone I knew who had seen it as a child possessed a strange affinity…

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REVIEW: Prom [2011]

“What are you, his peer counselor or something?” Please Disney, give me overwrought angst, earnest adolescents, and a stereotypical high school melting pot of checked sexuality within a PG world. Moviegoers have been clamoring for it, haven’t they? Why give us gimmicks like High School Musical when you can lay it all out in an overly dramatic rendition worthy of after school special timeslots? Please help make stressed out seniors everywhere stop biting their nails over lame music and a disco ball. Thank you Joe Nussbaum and Katie Wech for…

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TIFF08 REVIEW: Me and Orson Welles [2008]

“Quadruple space” I am a huge fan of Tim Robbins’ film Cradle Will Rock. The cast is amazing, the story epic in scope, and the behind the scenes setting of the theatre and arts world is something I enjoy. So, when I saw that Richard Linklater had a new film at the Toronto International Film Festival and that it took place during Orson Welles’ run at the Mercury Theatre, I was very interested. Me and Orson Welles is based off a novel which creates a fictional character to be our…

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