REVIEW: Mr. Church [2016]

“I learned to turn away from the sun and face the moon” If you didn’t know what you were getting into upon sitting down for Bruce Beresford‘s Mr. Church, you will following this onscreen text: “Inspired by a True Friendship.” The vagueness of this statement notwithstanding, the words ooze enough schmaltz to prepare you for the melodrama of death and miracles screenwriter Susan McMartin has concocted. Maybe she based it on a friendship she had with an adult male who become her father figure in a time of need or…

Read More

REVIEW: Love & Friendship [2016]

“We don’t live. We visit.” We should all be thanking whomever recommended Jane Austen‘s Northanger Abbey to Whit Stillman because the edition he read just happened to include the author’s novella “Lady Susan”—a short epistolary romance subverted to conjure the filmmaker’s own specific tone. If we didn’t know the Austen connection we’d think Stillman created this period comedy alone, that’s how perfectly suited to his oeuvre it proves. His trademarked acerbic wit is already present atop haughty characters deluded by their own egos with dialogue colored by an almost lyrical…

Read More

REVIEW: The Twilight Saga: Eclipse [2010]

“I’d rather you be really dead than one of them” I’m not saying Twilight was a masterpiece, but it did hold promise—promise that its successors have done little to uphold. An overly melodramatic adolescent romance, the first film knew what it was and had enough exposition and story to hold things together through the schmaltzy eye-rolling of a smitten teen finding trouble and supernatural heroes to save her. Rather than build on that premise, the sequel became an overblown epilogue to try and introduce a love triangle we already know…

Read More

REVIEW: The Loved Ones [2010]

“I’m ready to draw on him now” Writer/director Sean Byrne is one Australian unafraid to go for broke. Had his horror film The Loved Ones been made in America, I can think of multiple instances of places where things would have been toned down or stopped altogether. There must have been something every five minutes or so after the halfway point that made me think, “okay, this is where the victim gets saved”. And then out comes a knife in the foot, a drillbit to the skull, and how about…

Read More