We’re halfway through the 2016 season and while it is unlikely any movies mentioned will still be even thought of come Award season, MHT would like to recognize the best films and performances of the first half of 2016:
Best Picture
And the winner is…Read More →
Hot Take: It feels like you walked up to the cinematic bar and asked the bartender for an Old Fashioned. A classic le Carre spy thriller with great performances especially Stellan Skarsgard.
Sometimes films transfer us back to a different time in many ways. At first, I thought Our Kind of Traitor transferred me back 15-20 years because I ran into someone I used to work with at Blockbuster Video who was also taking in the latest John la Carre novel adapted for the big screen. However, once the film started, Our Kind of Traitor felt like something from a different decade. As Stellan Skarsgard masterfully played a Russian money launderer ready to turn against the Russian Mafia who seeks out the help of Perry (Ewan McGregor), an average British citizen on holiday with his wife (Naomie Harris) to get damning evidence into the hands of the British government, Our Kind of Traitor delivers a cinematic experience reserved for another time in history.Read More →
Hot Take: What. The. Hell? (And why was it actually pretty awesome?)
Within minutes of the viewing experience that is Swiss Army Man, you’re well aware that you’re in for something completely different. How different? Well, flatulence, masturbation, drinking the spit of a corpse who, oh by the way, talks and feces all play a major role in the storytelling. And that’s the best I can do without any major spoilers.Read More →
Hot Take: Spielberg is a master behind the camera and now, for the second film in a row, Mark Rylance is his secret weapon. It might be big budget kid’s fare but darn if it isn’t entertaining and wonderfully acted.
In the hands of Steven Spielberg, you can expect good things. The 1982 children’s story The BFG is the latest to get the Spielberg touch. The Roald Dahl children’s story which features a young girl who befriends a big, friendly giant and whisks away to Giant Country and Dream Country before the young girl, Sophie (Ruby Barnhill) comes up with a plan to help the BFG (a CGI-enhanced Mark Rylance) rid himself of his bigger brethren who both pick on BFG and happen to munch on children in their spare time. The story itself is purely juvenile with discussions of snozzcumbers (a foul-tasting vegetable grown in Giant Country), frobscottle (a bubbly concoction), whiz poppers (the flatulence caused by drinking frobscottle) and a number of other uniquely pronounced words specific to the BFG’s bungling of them.Read More →
Last week, Finding Dory kicked some serious butt as it took down Independence Day: Resurgence and friends (Dory beat all four new releases combined). This week, Finding Dory will own Independence Day weekend as four newcomers vie for second place. Will a Tarzan reboot topple a Purge sequel or will a Spielberg adaptation of a Roald Dahl classic be the BFD (big first début, of course!)? Here’s MHT’s recommendations of what to see and not see for the weekend of July 1st:Read More →