THE DEVIL MADE HIM DO IT: Movie reviews of Horns and St. Vincent by Howard Casner
Posted: November 7, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Alexandre Aja, Bill Murray, Chris O’Dowd, Daniel Radcliffe, Horns, Jaeden Lieberher, Joe Hill, Keith Bunin, Melissa McCarthy, Naomi Watts, St. Vincent, Theodore Melfi | 8 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
Horns, the new supernatural, fantasy, horror, neo-noir written by Keith Bunin and directed by Alexandre Aja, has a clever, if not neat, little concept.
A young man, Ig Perrish, universally hated in the small town he lives in (for good reason, in many ways, since he’s accused of killing his long time girlfriend Merrin), grows a pair of devil’s horns which causes everyone he meets to confess their deepest desires and even fulfill them, no matter how awful they may be, if the young man gives them permission.
And there are some clever scenes here and there as these normal on the outside, white picket fence, Sunday go to meeting citizens suddenly revel in their cravings to carry out their secret, if often perverse, yearnings.
But in the end, the movie never really comes together and gets bogged down in what may seem an extraneous through line concerning the rape and murder of said girlfriend.
I’m not sure why everyone felt the need to make the story a murder mystery. It’s that way in the novel by Joe Hill (son of Stephen King), so I can’t really blame Bunin and Aja. But this aspect of the story only seems to get in the way of what really works here, this look into the hearts of darkness of people you originally thought were just a few steps up from pod people. Read the rest of this entry »
MAN ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN: Movie review of Birdman (or the Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)
Posted: November 6, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Alejandro Gonazalez Iñárrritu, Alexander Dinelaris, Antonio Sanchez, Armando Bo, Benjamin Kanes, Birdman, Edward Norton, Emma Stone, Emmanuel Lubezki, Lindsay Duncan, Michael Keaton, Naomi Watts, Nicolás Giacobone, Zach Galifianakis | 2 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
Michael Keaton’s career has been what I would call somewhat unusual. He hit his stride early with the movie Beetlejuice and Clean and Sober and then was cast as Batman (and today is still many people’s favorite wing man). He looked like an actor on the rise.
Then after that? Well, I’m not sure how to describe it, but he seemed to do whatever he could to not go the way of fellow thespians like Jim Carrey and Adam Sandler, constantly required to star in the same kind of over the top, often obnoxious comedies that made fortunes at the box office (at least for a time) while trying to make more “meaningful” films on the side.
Instead, Keaton seemed to flee iconic roles and try to define himself as a more serious performer. But in the years since those early parts, it felt more like he was trying to find characters to play that would define him as an actor, rather than succeeding in actually reinventing himself.
The results generally fell into two categories: leads in such films as The Paper, Desperate Measures and Speechless, movies that either flopped or no one remembers; and supporting parts in such movies as Much Ado About Nothing, Jackie Brown and Out of Sight, where, for me, he never felt quite comfortable. Read the rest of this entry »
WOMEN GONE WILD: Movie reviews of The Homesman, Wild and Miss Julie by Howard Casner
Posted: November 3, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: August Strindberg, Cheryl Strayed, Colin Farrell, Hilary Swank, James Spader, Jean-Marc Vallee, Jessica Chastain as Julie, John Lithgow, Kieran Fitzgerald, Laura Dern, Liv Ullman, Meryl Streep, Miss Julie, Nick Hornby, Reese Witherspoon, Samantha Morton, The Homesman, Thomas Sadoski, Wesley A. Oliver and Tommy Lee, Wild | 127 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
It’s November, which means it’s that time of year: Oscar season is officially open. Ducks are now safe, but theater goers? Not so much maybe.
The season is especially serious for actresses since it is generally agreed that this has been one of those incredibly weak years for female leads in movies—or at least the types of leads that could receive a statuette—in America (overseas, the number of quality roles for women is still going strong, or at least much stronger than stateside).
I have recently seen three movies with actresses who have all been mentioned as possibilities for this year’s highest middle-brow prize in thespianic activity.
I was not particularly impressed, sorry to say. Read the rest of this entry »
AND THE RHYTHM OF LIFE IS A POWERFUL BEAT: Movie review of Whiplash by Howard Casner
Posted: October 29, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Chris Mulkey, Damien Chazelle, J.K. Simmons, Miles Teller, Paul Reiser, Whiplash | 3 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
Jerome Robbins was one of the greatest choreographers and director in theater. But he was almost universally hated and it’s hard to find anyone who had a nice thing to say about him. There is one story, probably apocryphal, which sums up this feeling about the grand master: during West Side Story, he was slowly backing up toward the apron; everyone was so angry at him, they didn’t try to stop him and just watched him go off the edge of the stage.
On the other hand, Bob Fosse, at least equally as brilliant (possibly more), though a tough taskmaster, was universally loved. Even his ex-wives and lovers tended not to wax rapturously about the negative aspects of his personality.
Yet both, through different approaches, achieved wondrous things with their actors and dancers.
I thought of this as I was watching the new film Whiplash, written and directed by Damien Chazelle, a story about Fletcher, a tyrannical conductor and teacher of jazz at what the story contends is the greatest music school in the U.S. (Julliard is chopped liver, I suppose) and his new victim, I mean, pupil/discovery, Andrew, someone Fletcher thinks, through his Stalinesque methods, can be turned into a drummer on the level of Charlie Parker. Read the rest of this entry »
MOVIE MURDER MOST FOUL: Movie Reviews of The Judge and The Blue Room by Howard Casner
Posted: October 20, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Balthazar Getty, Billy Bob Thornton, David Dobkin, David Kromholtz, Dax Shephard, Georges Simenon, Jeremy Strong, Jr., Lea Drucker, Mathieu Almaric, Nick Schenk and Bill Dubuque, Robert Downey, Robert Duvall, Stephanie Cleau, The Blue Room, The Judge, Vera Farmiga, Vincent D’Onofrio | Leave a comment »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
How can I cliché thee? Let me count the ways.
In the opening scene of The Judge, the new courtroom cum father/son we hate each other so much we love each other drama, defense attorney Hank Palmer (the kind of attorney who’ll defend anybody for anything as long as the price is right) is confronted by the prosecuting attorney Mike Kattan (the type of character that believes in truth, justice and the American way, so the filmmakers chose an actor, David Kromholtz, whose mere appearance would elicit laughter, to play the part next to the Ironman, alpha male, washboard stomach Robert Downey, Jr., who plays Hank) and they have one of those scene thingies where they debate the morality of it all.
At the end of the discussion (accompanied by mature goings on like Hank peeing on Mike’s pants), Hank sums up all the clichés that have taken place in that one encounter (and using the word “cliché” to describe it).
If the writers, Nick Schenk and Bill Dubuque, were attempting to get away with the use of overdone platitudes, familiar formula and trite tropes by calling attention to what they were doing—well, okay, in their defense one can at least one can say they knew what they were doing when they were doing it and were trying to do something about it. Read the rest of this entry »
IT TAKES A VILLAGE PEOPLE: Movie reviews of Pride and Lilting by Howard Casner
Posted: October 17, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Andrew Leung, Andrew Scott, Ben Schnetzer, Ben Whishaw, Bill Nighy, Dominic West, George Mckay, Hong Khaou, Imelda Staunton, Lilting, Matthew Marchus, Naomi Christie, Paddy Considine, Pei-pei Cheng, Peter Bowles, Pride, Russell Tovey, Stephen Beresford | 2,305 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
Pride, or as I call it, the next working class movie from England that will be adapted into a Broadway musical (following in the proud footsteps—and in one case, high heeled shoes—of The Full Monty, Billy Elliot and Kinky Boots—in fact, one of the movies major faults is that you keep expecting everyone to suddenly break out into song and dance and are constantly disappointed when they don’t), is the new film from writer Stephen Beresford and director Matthew Marchus.
It’s one of those based on a true story stories and is about a group of gay activists who decide to help striking miners in Wales in 1984. Why? Well, why the hell not, is what I say.
BITCH, BITCH, BITCH: Movie review of Gone Girl by Howard Casner
Posted: October 12, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Ben Affleck, Carrie Coon, David Fincher, Gillian Flynn, Gone Girl, Kim Dickens, Neil Patrick Harris, Patrick Fugit, Rosamund Pike, Scoot McNairy, Tyler Perry | 1,545 Comments »
First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
Amy Dunne, the heroine of the new Gillian Flynn/David Fincher thriller Gone Girl, is the latest in a long line of movie heroines.
Well, that’s not true. I don’t think the line is that long. It sort of vaguely dates from around the 1970’s.
It began somewhere around the mid of that decade with Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and continued on with Diana Christensen in Network; Alex Forrest in Fatal Attraction; Annie Wilkes in Misery; Carolyn Burnham in American Beauty; Debbie in Knocked Up (and similar comedies); and many, many, many, many others. Many.
Yes, Amy Dunne comes from a long line of cinematic bitches. However, we may have now reached a new peak in Hollywoodland. Ms. Dunne has the dubious distinction of possibly being the Queen Bitch of all filmdom.
No, I’m going to correct that. Using the language of the movie, she is not the Queen Bitch of all Queen Bitches. She is the Queen Cunt of all Queen Bitches. She is one step up from bitch. Read the rest of this entry »
THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING, THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING: Movie review of The Equalizer by Howard Casner
Posted: October 11, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Antoine Fuqua, Bill Pullman, Chloȅ Grace Moretz, David Harbour, Denzel Washington, Edward Woodward, Marton Czokas, Melissa Leo, Michael Sloan, Richard Lindheim, Richard Wenk, The Equalizer | 1 Comment »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
As I was viewing The Equalizer, the new origin film (because that is what it is; it’s not an Equalizer movie, but how the central character becomes the who you gonna call, or in this case, contact via craigslist.com, crime fighter) written by Richard Wenk (from the 1980’s television series starring Edward Woodward and created by Michael Sloan and Richard Lindheim) and directed by Antoine Fuqua and starring Denzel Washington who won the Oscar when Fuqua directed him in Training Day and…
Anyway, as I was saying, while I was watching the film, the same thought kept occurring to me:
The more things change, the more things stay the same. Read the rest of this entry »
STRANGER DANGER: Movie Reviews of The Guest, The Two Faces of January and Copenhagen by Howard Casner
Posted: October 9, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: (Maika Monroe, Adam Wingard, Baard Owe, Chase Williamson, Copenhagen, Dan Stevens, David Warshofsky, Frederikke Dahl Hansen, Gethin Anthony, Hossein Amini, Kirsten Dunst, Mark Raso, Oscar Isaac, Patricia Highsmith, Simon Barrett, The Guest, The Two Faces of January, Viggo Mortenson | 3,357 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
Have you ever been in a room full of people and someone tells a joke and you’re the only one who doesn’t get it?
Well, okay, I never have, I’m not usually that obtuse (it’s been touch and go sometimes, but usually I manage to roll my eyes in at least a smattering of understanding, though there was that one about the elephant and the oversize wedding ring…anyway).
But still, that’s what I felt like as I was watching The Guest, the new thriller about a stranger who shows up on a family’s doorstep claiming to know their late son. Read the rest of this entry »
DADDY’S DEAD, YOU KNOW…AND WON’T LET US FORGET IT: Movie reviews of This Is Where I Leave You, My Old Lady and The Skeleton Twins by Howard Casner
Posted: September 30, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Adam Driver, Bill Hader, Connie Britton, Corey Stoll, Craig Johnson, Dax Shepard, Debra Monk, Dennis Tripper, Dominique Pinon, Israel Horovitz, Jason Bateman, Joanna Gleason, Katherine Hahn, Kevin Kline, Kristen Wiig, Kristin Scott Thomas, Luke Wilson, Maggie Smith, Mark Heyman, My Old Lady, Rose Byrne, The Skeleton Twins, This Is Where I Leave You, Timothy Olyphant, Tina Fey | 7,434 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
Gosh darn, daddy’s seem to be dropping like flies this month. Three movies have opened lately in which the pater familias is no longer in the picture. Not only that, it’s these fathers that often seem to be getting the brunt of the blame for the way their kids have turned out.
I guess it’s kind of convenient for all the characters involved, then, that the man from whose loins they were loosed is no longer around to defend himself.
But, you know, whatever, I guess. At any rate, he’s dead, dead, dead. And just won’t let us forget it.
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