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In: 2014, Hot Take

Hot Take: The breakneck pace of The Maze Runner is so fast, you might not even be upset to realize this was basically a two hour teaser for the second movie in the trilogy.

The Maze Runner, the first of three films based on The Maze Runner young adult novel series by James Dashner, moves at a frenetic speed shocking for even your typical action fare let alone a movie based on a 300-plus page novel. The action-first approach expands the film’s appeal to more than the young adults the novel series targets. Read More →

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In: 2014, Hot Take

Hot Take: You know that moment you end up watching a movie every time it’s on even though you’d never ever admit you think it’s a good movie. I call that moment the guilty pleasure.

This buddy romantic comedy with romantic undertones has more holes than Swiss cheese. The trouble is Zac Efron, Miles Teller and Michael B. Jordan look like they are having such a good time together as three friends who make a pact (which at some point becomes a bet) to stay single, it’s hard to hate the film.Read More →

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In: 2014, Hot Take

Hot Take: Eddie Redmayne as Stephen Hawking is extraordinary. The rest of the movie is ordinary. Well, that’s just my theory anyway.

Based on everything I’ve read about the life of Stephen Hawking, his biopic seemed more fiction than fact. If this is fact, it’s even more disappointing The Theory of Everything delivered a rather dull take on an extraordinary life and mind.Read More →

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In: 2014, Hot Take

Hot Take: Believe this report… See this movie. (It does the best it can with a two hour feature length limitation.)

Ever watch a good movie late at night and not be able to keep your eyes open? Despite your best efforts, you doze off a few times and miss a few key scenes which keeps this probably great movie from being great just because you kept falling asleep.

This is the best description of how it felt to watch Kill the Messenger I can give. Throughout this roughly 2 hour “based on a true story” drama, the gaps in the story telling which steamroll the audience through journalist Gary Webb’s investigation and subsequent series of articles identifying the CIA as a catalyst for the crack cocaine boom of the late 1980s are frequent and frustrating in an otherwise compelling film. Read More →

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In: 2014, Hot Take

Hot Take: Watch. Enjoy. Repeat.

I’ve been intrigued by the concept of living the same day over and over until you get it right ever since seeing Groundhog Day. Somehow Edge of Tomorrow escaped me last year when it was in theaters. Accidentally, this morning, I caught it on HBO and now I wish I wouldn’t have missed it at theaters. Read More →