Author Archive
Film Review – This Is 40
Billed as a “sort-of sequel” to 2007’s Knocked Up, Judd Apatow’s This Is 40 sees Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann (Apatow’s real-life wife) reprising their roles as Pete and Debbie. Now five years later, their marriage is in something of a rut. Complacency can be…
READ MOREFilm Review – Lay the Favorite
If you would, take a few moments to reflect on Stephen Frears’s varied career as a director. From The Grifters to High Fidelity to his Oscar-nominated The Queen, Frears has proven himself time and again to be a capable and effective storyteller. He has jumped…
READ MOREFilm Review – Silver Linings Playbook
Based on Matthew Quick’s 2008 novel of the same name, Silver Linings Playbook attempts to walk the fine line between comedy and tragedy. Both main characters are struggling to sort through their own forms of mental illness while coping with recent loss. Not exactly what…
READ MOREFilm Review – Skatopia: 88 Acres of Anarchy
“People don’t understand the problems of a 40-year-old skate park cult leader, ya know,” slurs man-child Brewce Martin as he sips from a tallboy of high gravity lager in the opening moments of the documentary Skatopia: 88 Acres of Anarchy. Brewce is a poster child…
READ MOREFilm Review – The Sessions
Mark O’Brien was a prolific poet and journalist. A long-time editor of Pacific News Service and an NPR contributor, O’Brien published essays, book reviews and news stories for The San Francisco Chronicle, The Examiner and other respected news sources. All this makes for a pretty…
READ MOREFilm Review – Fun Size
Take your favorite scene from Adventures in Babysitting, soften its edges considerably, and what’s left is likely similar to the overall tone of Nickelodeon’s Fun Size, a harmless and sometimes capable film from long-time Gossip Girl writer/producer Josh Schwartz.
READ MOREFilm Review – Alex Cross
Renowned playwright Tyler Perry has certainly carved out a Hollywood niche for himself these past few years. Between his incredibly successful turn in the Madea films (all of which he wrote and directed himself) and his myriad other movie and TV projects, he’s proven himself…
READ MOREFilm Review – How to Survive a Plague
While the documentary How to Survive a Plague is certainly not an easy watch (and is, in fact, often harrowing), it’s an important one and well worth your time. It’s composed mostly of archival footage, but interweaves that seamlessly with some of the most riveting…
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