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Hot Take: A mix of crime drama and documentary with a whole lot of love for the heist movie sub-genre chock full of references to classic heist films or films featuring heists. Smart and fascinating with a combination of humor and suspense.

Mark Twain once assessed, “Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn’t.” American Animals is the latest evidence that Twain was spot on with his assessment. The docudrama about a group of college students who attempted to rip off the Transylvania University’s special collections library in 2004 blends a young, talented cast and their real-life counterparts who re-tell the story documentary style. It has a ring of I, Tonya to it, if I, Tonya were to actually feature the real Tonya Harding, Jeff Gillooly and LaVona Golden. American Animals also shows writer/director Bart Layton’s love of the heist sub-genre as the film is littered with homages and hat tips to some of the more iconic heist films over the years including The Thomas Crown Affair, Ocean’s 11, Reservoir Dogs and even the heist scene from The Dark Knight. It’s the stylistic choices by Layton that drives the film as we’ve seen so many heist movies in the past, even ones based on actual heists, so Layton’s blend of his own style with films that likely acted as inspiration for the criminals surprisingly makes it refreshing and fun to watch despite the film’s darker, more nihilistic overtones.Read More →

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Hot Take: More excellent work from Pixar who hasn’t always come through on sequels but did so with this follow up to the 14 year old original. It’s not incredible but it’s pretty good.

The main question you end up asking when watching Incredibles 2 is, “What took so long?” The answer isn’t the storyline which is about as basic as it comes. Incredibles 2 picks up immediately where The Incredibles left off. Superheroes are still illegal. The Underminer is the villain de jour. The Parrs are still a crime fighting family. After a failed attempt at stopping the Underminer and extensive damage to the city, the Parrs are warned by authorities once again that being a superhero is illegal and they must stop. Immediately following the incident, Bob (Craig T. Nelson), Helen (Holly Hunter) and Lucius “Frozone” Best (Samuel L. Jackson) are contacted by the Deavors, owners of DEVTECH. Winston (Bob Odenkirk) and Evelyn (Catherine Keener) want to orchestrate a publicity stunt using Helen’s Elastigirl as the face of superheroes to gain public support for the legalization of superheroes. This obviously requires Bob to stay home with the kids and take care of Dash (Huck Milner), Violet (Sarah Vowell) and Jack-Jack (Eli Fucile).Read More →

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Hot Take: This remake fails to capture the significance of the 1972 blaxploitation original. Director X can’t escape his music video roots. 

The 2018 version of Superfly tries to capture the original’s flair. Unfortunately, the remake feels less Hollywood and more Halloween. The performances aren’t bad but the script is weak, the director making his feature debut shows his inexperience and the updated soundtrack pales in comparison to the Curtis Mayfield classic. Instead of a movie, Superfly feels like a compilation of music videos rather than a full-fledged film and is almost too shiny and new to live up to the grit of the original. Maybe it’s the fact that Superfly has already been repackaged under other titles (the premise of a drug dealer trying to get out of “the game” is no longer new) but the 2018 version feels like a remake of a handful of films rather than just a reimagining of the 1972 blaxploitation classic.Read More →

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Hot Take: Absurdly over the top but it’s the fifth movie about dinosaurs being resurrected… shouldn’t it be?

While the first Jurassic Park was a classic film, the rest of the franchise has basically been a succession of B-movies. So, by the time you strap in for Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, it should come at no surprise that the film has chosen the B-movie path once again. The latest chapter in the Jurassic Park saga delivers another “good humans” vs. “bad humans” plot line with forboding “playing God is dangerous” overtones and some action-packed dino action scenes drizzled throughout the clunky story that almost no one will care about because we came to see the dinosaurs, damn it! Downright goofy in parts, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom is exactly what you’d expect from a summer popcorn flick and that’s both good and bad. There are enough fun moments for this one to be worthwhile, even if the script becomes nonsensical at times and feels like it’s designed to frightened the younger audience attending at others. Read More →

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Hot Take: Entertaining enough but it’s easy to imagine a scenario where you forget what you watched 15 minutes after walking out of the theater. It’s silly… but it’s about a group of grown men still playing tag. Shouldn’t it be?

Throwaway comedies are nothing new. I’d run down a list of them from the previous years but I’ve forgotten most of them. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. These comedies, while forgettable, can be considerably funny. They just don’t leave a lasting impression. Tag happens to be one of those throwaway comedies that works in the moment even if it’s mostly forgettable by the time the lights come up in the theater. Powered by a stranger-than-fiction true story about a group of middle aged men still playing the kid’s game of tag and a committed cast featuring strong performances from Ed Helms, Jon Hamm, Jake Johnson, Hannibal Buress, Jeremy Renner and Isla Fisher, Tag takes plenty of swings and connects frequently at delivering laughs, even if the comedy is juvenile. It’s a movie about a kid’s game, after all. Tag works, for the most part. It’s a funny escape and shares its premise with a ridiculous true story that might not need the embellishment applied to make it compelling. Read More →

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Hot Take: Apparently, Gotti needed to burn through 4 directors, 44 producers and 8 years to get made. At some point, someone, anyone(!) could have stopped this from happening. 

The backstory to the release of Gotti is more interesting than the resulting film sometimes described as a passion project of John Travolta but originally something much different. The film was originally supposed to detail the life of John Gotti Jr. and was attached to an impressive list of talent including, at one point or another during the 8 years leading up to its release, Barry Levinson, Nick Cassavetes, Joe Johnston, Al Pacino, Lindsay Lohan, Ben Foster and Chazz Palminteri. Somewhere in the timeline, Joe Pesci was cast and gained 30 pounds for the role of Gotti’s close friend Angelo Ruggiero. Eventually, he was re-cast and had his salary cut and sued Fiore Films, the original studio to own the film’s rights. In 2015, the film landed in the lap of Kevin Connolly of Entourage fame and he was slated to direct. In 2016, Travolta joined the cast and the film began production. Lionsgate, which was set to release the film domestically, was disappointed with the resulting film and chose to skip theaters and go directly to VOD rather than attempt to release the film during the crowded Awards season back in December 2017. Producers cut ties with Lionsgate and found a new distributor in Vertical Entertainment and financial backing from MoviePass Ventures. The former being a distributor that will release pretty much anything in theaters and the latter being a new business venture from the $9.99 per month movie ticket subscription service. The resulting release date became June 15, 2018 and upon release, Gotti became the rare release to receive an odious 0% Tomatometer from Rotten Tomatoes. That’s 25 reviews to date (as of June 19th) that have labelled the film “Rotten”. Although not part of the Rotten Tomatoes review aggregator, consider this review an unofficial “Rotten” review for the film, as well. But “Rotten” isn’t quite strong enough and while it wasn’t the worst of 2018, it’s pretty darn close.Read More →

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Hot Take: The scariest horror film since 2016’s The Witch. One that might cause you to lose sleep. At 2-plus hours, Hereditary is frightening from the very beginning to the absolutely batshit crazy end. That’s a rare feat indeed.

It’s been a few days since seeing Hereditary and I still can’t quite shake it. There’s an aspect of the film that isn’t horror at all. Within one of the scariest, most horrific movies I’ve seen is a tragic look at a suffering family in inexplicable collapse. First time writer/director Ari Aster’s debut leaves an auspicious, creepy, unnerving impression. It has a vicious slow burn quality that until it hits its stride is basically a family drama. There’s plenty of freakiness going on. Whether it be Annie’s miniatures or Charlie’s clucking sound, there’s an ominous feel to the family drama which opens at grandma’s funeral but it feels like a family drama nonetheless. Once it does it its stride, Hereditary becomes one of the most horrific tales in recent memory and leaves an indelible impression on you that you might not forget for some time. I sure haven’t.

***MINOR SPOILER ALERT*** (Usually, there are none but in this case, there are some minor reveals below. Skip the following paragraph if you’re looking for no spoilers at all.)Read More →

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Hot Take: Hotel Artemis is proof it takes more than a strong cast, interesting characters and original premise to deliver an entertaining film. Somehow with all those assets, this dystopian action flick is dull and goes nowhere. You’d think it would take more to get Jodie Foster back on the big screen after a five year absence.

Everything is there for Hotel Artemis to deliver a good cinematic experience. Everything except a solid, interesting script or a plot you might actually care about. Despite an excellent cast including the return of Jodie Foster to the big screen after a half decade absence, Sterling K. Brown, Dave Bautista, Sofia Boutella, Jeff Goldblum, Zachary Quinto and Charlie Day and a competent dystopian premise, a complete and utter disaster of a script that can’t seem to figure out who or what it is about makes 94 minutes feel twice as long and offers almost nothing memorable to hang it’s hat on. Okay, maybe there’s one fight sequence that’s worth re-watching (and due to the spoiler free nature of this review, I can’t divulge any details) but outside of that brief glimpse of excellence, Hotel Artemis is a wasted opportunity.Read More →

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Hot Take: Consistent with the franchise. This’ll be one you’ll happen to trip across on cable in a few years and watch again. The all-female cast doesn’t have as much fun as the all-male Ocean’s Eleven crew but comes pretty darn close.

In 2016, a gender bending twist on Ghostbusters hit theaters and was met with vitriol from Internet trolls everywhere. Despite the fact that I wasn’t overly impressed with the all-female reboot, the film wasn’t the atrocity the anonymous Twitter trolls and the secret Rotten Tomato commenters would have had you believe. With all of the controversy around that film’s release and the firestorm of opinions offered, it was natural to ponder if Ocean’s 8 would receive the same type of reception. Fortunately, the all-female cast of Ocean’s 8 led by Sandra Bullock didn’t have the icy reception of Ghostbusters which means the focus can be on whether or not the film was any good. For the most part, the answer is yes. Considering Ocean’s 8 is the fourth film in the franchise and is more sequel and less reboot since Bullock’s character is Debbie Ocean, sister of Danny Ocean, having enough gas left in the tank in its fourth iteration is a feat in itself. Ocean’s 8 actually ends up being a slick, speedy, fun but formulaic heist flick  that rests on its charismatic laurels and mimics many of the characteristics that made Ocean’s Eleven a huge success. Read More →

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Hot Take: Your typical “based on a true story” tearjerker that’s an excellent vehicle to showcase the talents of Shailene Woodley. The stunning visuals are a bonus, too.

Tami Oldham’s survival-at-sea tale took almost 4 decades to make it to the cinema. That’s a little surprising considering the speed at which harrowing true events find themselves converted into cinematic works. Starring Shailene Woodley and Sam Claflin who have previously toyed with our emotions in other films (Woodley tugged at the heartstrings in The Fault In Our Stars while Claflin  plucked at them in Me Before You), Adrift shares the story of two sailors who sail directly into Hurricane Raymond in 1983 on a delivery passage on a 44-foot-yacht traveling from Tahiti to San Diego. Lost at sea for over a month, Adrift mixes YA romance with Cast Away and The Perfect Storm and the result is better than expected thanks to a committed performance from Woodley and exactly what you’d expect from Claflin who is perfecting the hunky supporting love interest role. The scenes at sea are realistic and the flashbacks add some emotional heft that might not do much for those who tuned in just to watch a survival odyssey but most of the audience will be just as interested in their backstory as they are how harrowing 41 days at sea with little hope in sight would be.Read More →