Reviews and comments on movies & television
I had some really great media experiences in 2017, though as usual some of the works I list below were released in earlier years. My comments are mostly spoiler-free, but since I don’t really care about spoilers, I might not have noticed if I revealed anything important. If you are a spoiler-phobe, tread lightly… MOVIES Moonlight This film is a masterpiece, and I do not say that...
When the new Star Wars movie came out, I was a bit taken aback at how it now seems to be the conventional wisdom that the first Star Wars movie (I won’t call it “A New Hope”; to me, it’s just “Star Wars”, which was the name of the movie when it came out in 1977) was a true classic, and that everything with the new movie would be OK if it could capture some of...
I’ve seen some pretty interesting and good genre television in the past couple of months. Here’s the list! As always, beware of potential spoilers. The Expanse — Someone said recently that they were missing a good outer space show – something with hard vacuum, stars and planets, the big black. Something along the lines of Battlestar Galactica or Firefly. And I realized I felt...
I did not hate most of these — some had quite a bit going for them! — but none quite made the cut for inclusion in the “best of 2015” list. MOVIES Avengers: Age of Ultron — An empty spectacle. It seemed like it was almost about something — Tony’s hubris, maybe? — but in the end… nope. I mostly blamed Marvel Studios and their tie-in...
Wow, it’s been a while since the ole blog has seen any action! Consider this LONG post covering my favorite artistic creations of the past year a partial remedy. It’s broken up into sections by medium, but is otherwise fairly disordered — no rankings, and no rules about dates of release or publication. They are all things I experienced for the first time in 2015, though. MOVIES...
2013 was an outstanding year for cinema, and I say that having missed quite a few films I wanted to see. Here’s a rundown of my favorites of those I did manage to catch — including a few from previous years that I belatedly saw on Netflix or DVD. A couple of notes: I haven’t bothered to rank these in order of preference, though I did like some better than others. They’re...
Something happened to me this summer after I saw The Bourne Legacy: a fascination with Jeremy Renner took hold and wouldn’t let go. I had seen him in other movies (most notably The Hurt Locker) and was intrigued by his intense energy and expressiveness, but something about his starring role in this film pushed the rest of the buttons needed to fully engage my obsessionator. Not sure of all...
S.W.A.T. 2003. Rated PG-13. Director: Clark Johnson. Renner plays Brian Gamble, the former partner of Colin Farrell’s character A motley crew of Los Angeles police officers have to make their way through a gauntlet of mercenaries while transporting a dangerous criminal to prison. You can guess what sort of movie this will be from the following facts: their leader is played by Samuel L...
North Country 2005. Rated R. Director: Niki Caro. Renner plays Bobby Sharp, supervisor of “the powder room” at the iron mine. A dramatization of the first class action lawsuit filed against a company for sexual discrimination in the workplace (Jenson vs. Eveleth Mines). Renner’s character is introduced twenty minutes in, and his first line is, “So Harlan, which one of...
Neo Ned 2005. Not Rated. Director: Van Fischer. Renner plays Ned, a neo-Nazi criminal who has been committed to a mental institution The concept is eyebrow-raising: a white supremacist falls in love with a black woman who claims she’s the reincarnation of Adolph Hitler. How can they pull this off without offending the majority of the audience and/or trivializing the subject matter? The...