Month: October 2018

REVIEW: Trust Machine: The Story of Blockchain [2018]

Jared Mobarak

The old stuff is just weird stuff you got used to. Documentarian Alex Winter is really solidifying his place within the tech world as a storyteller willing to look at modern systems stymying the old guard and exciting the new before helping to disseminate what they mean for the world at-large. He looked back at how Napster disrupted the music scene in Downloaded (something the movie and television industry faces today to the point where a sequel in the next five to ten years wouldn’t be far-fetched) and took us…

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REVIEW: The Old Man and the Gun [2018]

Jared Mobarak

I know what I’m doing. Finding an occupation you love is rare when familial and financial responsibilities often dictate a path towards compromise. It’s therefore hard to let one go. Just ask Forrest Tucker, a career criminal in and out of prison since age fifteen whose life consisted of planning his next bank robbery or jailbreak depending on his mailing address at the time. The guy broke out of San Quentin at the age of 70 and then went right back at it for the sheer joy of the act…

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REVIEW: Game Night [2018]

Jared Mobarak

It worked for Hitler. I never watched a trailer for Game Night because the posters looked lame and it came out at a time when I couldn’t watch it in a theater. So when the almost universal praise landed to hail it a dark comedy must-see of 2018 … I still didn’t watch the trailer. This wasn’t some premeditated act, though. I simply knew I’d eventually catch it and therefore didn’t need to be oversold or conversely given any undue reason to question the acclaim. As a result I was…

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REVIEW: Jinn [2018]

Jared Mobarak

I don’t know what it means to be a believer. Religion is sacrifice. I don’t think there’s another way to truly describe what it means to give yourself to faith so completely that you’ll allow it to control your life. It’s always fascinated me that so many ascribe to a God in this way. Whether it’s tithing, hijabs, prayer, diet, etc., worshippers grab hold of the comfort and community religion provides and willingly change (or ensure not to change depending on when their faith was chosen) to earn its sense…

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REVIEW: Gräns [Border] [2018]

Jared Mobarak

You shouldn’t listen to what humans say. Customs officer Tina (Eva Melander) stands at attention while a line of passengers exiting an international flight walk by, her nostrils perpetually flaring. She’s sniffing them as a means of discerning which might have illegally undeclared possessions on their person. An “Excuse me” later and her partner is taking three bottles of alcohol out of a minor’s duffel bag, sending him on his way with a warning along the lines of “Our confiscating it is better than you going to jail on a…

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REVIEW: Free Solo [2018]

Jared Mobarak

I realize my body would just explode on impact. Free climbing a mountain wall at any height is insane to me. So watching Alex Honnold gaze upon El Capitan with the simultaneous declarations that it scares the crap out of him and that conquering it without rope would be his ultimate goal makes me shudder. I’m all for hiking mountains like Whiteface in the Adirondacks or Mount Adams in New Hampshire because its fun to strap on a backpack with friends and embark on an adventure. Hand-over-hand gymnastics up sheer…

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REVIEW: Monster Party [2018]

Jared Mobarak

Simple as a pimple. I have to think writer/director Chris von Hoffmann saw The Purge and wondered what could be born from reversing the good guy and bad guy roles. Those are generic terms of course since both movies ultimately contain bad guys and worse guys, but for the sake of argument we’ll say that the characters we’re supposed to hope survive are “good.” Rather than fear an impending invasion, however, the “good” guys in Monster Party are the infiltrators. A trio of two-bit thieves, Casper (Sam Strike) talks accomplices…

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REVIEW: Bullitt County [2018]

Jared Mobarak

You don’t always have to shoot the rooster. Repression is wild insofar as our minds pushing trauma down to the depths of our soul without a second thought. While guilt will ravage some to the point where certain actions become inescapable no matter what is used to numb the pain, others can completely detach themselves from the same memory. They will justify that they weren’t involved—innocent bystanders helping a friend who got in too far over his head. They fashion themselves as heroes whose karmic stockpile is cleansed from wrongdoing…

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REVIEW: The Sisters Brothers [2018]

Jared Mobarak

Are you going to watch? Many assumptions can be made during the opening scene of Jacques Audiard‘s The Sisters Brothers. It’s here where we meet the titular siblings (John C. Reilly‘s Eli and Joaquin Phoenix‘s Charlie Sisters) approaching a ranch with a clear warning of only wanting the man they’ve come to kill. A firefight ensues with gun blasts and light flashes in the distance until the camera pushes in on the two men storming the door to take care of those still struggling to breathe inside. They hear someone…

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REVIEW: The Hate U Give [2018]

Jared Mobarak

Know your worth. The progression of The Hate U Give‘s genesis reveals its message’s importance. Angie Thomas began its short story precursor back in college as a response to Oscar Grant’s 2009 death by police. She would push it aside soon after in hopes to revisit the subject matter once her rage subsided. Her impulse was to instead find the love necessary to put everything she wanted to say down correctly—something the film adaptation (in theaters less than two years after the novel’s publication) possesses to create an authentic balance…

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REVIEW: Tito e os Pássaros [Tito and the Birds] [2018]

Jared Mobarak

You catch fear from ideas. The “outbreak” started years ago when the twenty-four hour news cycle broke onto the scene by stoking fear for ratings out of a necessity for content. We used to only get an hour of local news every night—itself needing to be bolstered by a public interest story or two—with a few national programs enlightening us on world events. Information dispersal became editorializing. Editorializing became for-profit politicization wherein truth was filtered through a partisan prism pre-packaged for Election Day rather than relevancy. News became entertainment, snuff…

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