A swing and a miss this boring noir drama is brimming with quality visuals and A list talent. Bradley Cooper, Rooney Mara, and Cate Blanchett put the story through its paces and make it watchable to a point, but it is a hard watch.
Movie Reviews
Don’t Look Up (2021)
A hilariously satirical disaster epic that pokes fun at the media, government incompetence, and capitalist excess. Don’t Look Up is a satirical, science-fiction disaster movie where two scientists discover a comet, a “planet killer”, that will directly hit Earth and destroy all of human civilization. Their efforts to warn and save humanity are hindered by politics, […]
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Dear Jane Campion,
Benedict Cumberbatch has an excellent shot at an Oscar nomination/win. I wanted to thank you for adapting Thomas Savage’s 1967 novel and directing The Power of the Dog (2021). Your films feel like good books that beg to be analyzed. Take The Piano (1993), for instance, your signature film for the past thirty years. I […]
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Is The Lighthouse For You?
The Lighthouse is going to be a movie you’ll either love or hate. You’ll either love it for its surreal imagery, strange story, isolating setting, all over the place tone, eerie filmmaking, crazy acting, or all of the above. Or you’ll hate it for these exact reasons. It’s one of the strangest […]
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Encounter
There’s few things more annoying than the cinematic bait and switch; setting up the idea of one movie in the minds of an audience, then delivering something else. Sometimes it’s because film-makers or studios change their minds, or sometimes the product doesn’t fit the marketplace; delivering a trailer for Sweeney Todd that provided no hint…
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THE UNFORGIVABLE (2021): The Things I Liked…
I’m glad that Sandra Bullock said yes to The Unforgivable, a well-executed tale of one woman’s journey to reconnect with her sister after finishing a twenty-year prison sentence. Directed by Nora Fingscheidt, what stood out immediately, in addition to the excellent performances, is how engaging the story is. I cared about Bullock’s character and couldn’t wait for […]
THE UNFORGIVABLE (2021): The Things I Liked…
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Bye Bye Bye – Red Rocket (2021)
Tough homecoming. So this is about out-of-work porn star Mikey Saber (Simon Rex). He is out of options, so he is forced to return to his small Texas hometown. He has a résumé that makes him unemployable in the world of standard jobs, so how can he possibly get his life together? Now I would […]
Bye Bye Bye – Red Rocket (2021)
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Duck, You Sucker! (1971) – The False Facades of Heroism and Revolution
“When I was young I believed in three things: Marxism, the redemptive power of cinema and dynamite. Now I just believe in dynamite.” – Sergio Leone The great Italian director Sergio Leone was and remains one of the titans of international cinema. Despite such a meager output of only seven films (eight if one were […]
Duck, You Sucker! (1971) – The False Facades of Heroism and Revolution
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10 Favorite Films in 2021
It’s been a long year for a lot of us. Instead of boring you with a bunch of $1M words about what I liked, here is a list of my 10 Favorite Films of 2021. In no particular order… Wrath of Man Spider-Man: No Way Home The Night House The Green Knight Encanto King Richard […]
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The Best Movies of 2021
2021 it’s finally over! And what’s the best way to start off the new year if not talking about our favorite movies of 2021? Last year, movies were my biggest companion. After almost two years locked up inside, I was finally able to return to the cinemas to watch 30 movies on the big screen […]
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Reely Bernie’s Top Ten of 2021
For me, 2021 was all about raising a wonderful baby daughter and being a goofball dad and supportive husband. Movies were far and few between, but they continued to be dependable coping devices during the ongoing pandemic (and rare evening off). More theatres were opened and maintained safely, the promised releases of 2020 played catchup, […]
Reely Bernie’s Top Ten of 2021
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WEST SIDE STORY
Hollywood loves a remake. Sometimes it’s a successful foreign film recast with English-speaking celebrities. Sometimes it’s a decent story that just didn’t work the first time around. Most of the time, it’s a hollow-minded cash-grab by a studio rejiggering its intellectual property. But now and then, it’s a filmmaker of regard taking a bonafide classic […]
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My Year on Screen: 2021
2021. I have missed, as always, missed a lot of amazing cinema this year. But it’s not just my fault this time, it’s down to the pandemic we have all been, and still are, living in. The cinema is my safe space but it took a while for me to feel safe going back. My […]
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Film review: C’mon C’mon
Inspired by early interactions with his infant son, writer and director Mike Mills tells a contemplative tale with latest feature C’mon C’mon. The tender drama centres around Johnny (Joaquin Phoenix), a journalist of sorts travelling state to state conducting philosophical interviews with the youth of today about their future. When his sister Viv (Gaby Hoffman) […]
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Don’t Look Up (2021) An even disaster comedy
Adam McKay’s new film “Don’t Look Up”, which was released on Netflix on Christmas Eve after being released at theaters early in this month, attempts to laugh about how absurd and incorrigible we can be in front of one big global disaster, but it comes to resort to a series of cheap and superficial laughs […]
Don’t Look Up (2021) ☆☆1/2(2.5/4): An uneven disaster comedy
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The Forever Prisoner (2021): It was torture indeed
HBO documentary “The Forever Prisoner” is often sobering and chilling in its calm but blistering presentation on what the US government allowed to happen in the name of War on Terror. While it did not surprise or shock you much if you are familiar with its main subjects, the documentary is still captivating as providing […]
The Forever Prisoner (2021) ☆☆☆1/2(3.5/4): It was torture indeed
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The French Dispatch (2021)
Title – The French Dispatch (2021) Director – Wes Anderson (Bottle Rocket) Cast – Bill Murray, Benicio Del Toro, Adrien Brody, Tilda Swinton, Jeffrey Wright, Timothee Chalamet, Owen Wilson Plot – A collection of stories that form integral parts of an American newspaper set in a French city. “All great beauties withhold their deepest secrets” Review […]
Film Review – The French Dispatch (2021)
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DRIVE MY CAR: Sublime and Powerful
Drive My Car is director and co-writer Ryûsuke Hamaguchi’s engrossing masterpiece about dealing with loss – and it’s the best movie of 2021. Layered with character-driven stories that could each justify their own movie, this is a mesmerizing film […]
DRIVE MY CAR: sublime and powerful
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Spider-Man: No Way Home – Review
Spider-Man: No Way Home effortlessly combines high-stakes, incredible action sequences, and a darker, emotional core to become the best movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The following review is spoiler-free. Spider-Man: Way Home is third and final film of Marvel’s “Home” trilogy, directly following the events of Spider-Man: Far From Home and continuing the […]
Spider-Man: No Way Home – Review | The Best MCU Movie
