“X-Men: Days of Future Past” is, pardon the pun, a marvel of comic book franchise filmmaking. It’s not only a strong (possibly the best) entry into the “X-Men” line, but one that carries all of the emotional and thematic weight of the series with it, turning the previous installments into the cars of a freight […]
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It’s summer movie season, meaning there will soon be plenty of blockbusters filled with cars racing in climactic chase sequences at a theater near you. You better believe there will be automotive wipeouts in high-octane pics like “22 Jump Street,” “Transformers: Age of Extinction,” and “The Expendables 3.” But while it’s a lot of fun
One of the worst things a superhero movie can do is gobble up its running time with multiple under-realized plots, included to cram in as many odds and ends of the source material as possible, that scramble to amount to something substantial in the final minutes. “The Amazing Spider-Man 2”—or “We Already Remade One Sam
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It was in 2001 that America met the Subservient Chicken, a massive creature of the avian variety that lived to cluck, peck seed from the ground with his giant beak, and take orders. No matter how outlandish, the Subservient Chicken was up to the task. Want to see him jump rope? He liked the exercise.
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As I anticipated in my preview piece, this year’s TCM Classic Film Festival was a sublime experience. The festival keeps growing year after year, and it’s easy to see why: great movies, lovely audiences (despite the fact that they seem to clap an unhealthy amount for Ward Bond), entertaining guests, grand theaters, perfect projection. And
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San Diego wouldn’t be one of the first cities that come to one’s mind when thinking of places with vibrant film cultures, nor should it be. Returning to Los Angeles for graduate school has only reminded me what a dearth of cinematic opportunity my hometown offers for a metropolis of its size, with its parade
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The question on everybody’s mind at last year’s TCM Classic Film Festival was: Is this the end of Grauman’s Chinese Theatre as we know and love it? There was a collective feeling of uncertainty as festival-goers filed into the grand old movie palace for the closing night presentation of Buster Keaton’s “The General,” the final
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Marvel Studios, under the direction of Kevin Feige, has discovered the ideal mold with which to make a superhero movie. Sure, things were rough in the beginning: While “Iron Man” was a rousing success, “The Incredible Hulk” and “Thor” were ambitious messes at best, and “Iron Man 2” was a very high-profile black mark on
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Joshua Jackson and Diane Kruger are tasked with surviving one of the harshest environments on earth, with only an innovative piece of machinery to help them. If you think this sounds like the premise of a new movie or TV show, think again; the two actors are actually traveling through the brutal heat of Death
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Last year, writing about Arnold Schwarzenegger’s then-latest film, I wrote, “‘The Last Stand’ isn’t an action movie, a comedy, a crime thriller, or a Western. It’s an Arnold, the smallest genre in cinema. Arnold Schwarzenegger is arguably the only post-silent era actor whose participation mandates that a film be thought of as something other than
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