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In: 2017, Hot Take

Hot Take: The true-life tale of Jeff Bauman, one of the victims in the Boston Marathon bombing who lost both of his legs. Well told and anchored by an excellent performance of Jake Gyllenhaal.

Last year, the first movie about the Boston Marathon was released. Patriots Day starring Mark Wahlberg focused on the manhunt for the two bombers after the bombing. It was, as expected, a well done retelling of the work done by the FBI and Boston police to hunt down the men behind the 2013 bombing. This year, a second film about the bombing, Stronger, hit theaters and featured a much more personal retelling from the eyes of Jeff Bauman, one of the survivors of the bombing who lost both of his legs in the horrific explosion. The focus of the film is Bauman and his on-again-off-again girlfriend who Jeff went to see run the Marathon. It  dives into the impact it had on Jeff’s life, Jeff’s family and everyone and everything around him. It’s inspirational yet never tries to make Bauman out to be a martyr and, thanks to an excellent performance from Jake Gyllenhaal, shows his growth from the experience but also the deep psychological toll the incident took on him.Read More →

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In: 2017, Hot Take

Hot Take: More fun than The LEGO Batman Movie. Same vibe, though.

Sophomoric humor, goofy LEGO action and a silly soundtrack are the threads that tie the three LEGO movies together. The latest — The LEGO Ninjago Movie — blends elements of The Princess Bride (the opening featuring Jackie Chan as a wise shop owner telling the story of Lloyd and Ninjago to a random boy who comes into his shop) and Star Wars (Sort of a “What If?” version of the Darth Vader/Luke Skywalker saga without really being about Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker) and the previous LEGO films. Essentially, The LEGO Ninjago Movie has established that those behind these LEGO adventures are perfectly satisfied with re-producing the preceding work and not looking to re-invent the wheel. What happens in The LEGO Ninjago Movie, though, is that it kind of works and because the story features all original characters, it feels more original than The LEGO Batman Movie which not only rips off The LEGO Movie but also borrows heavily from the Batman franchise in its attempts to satirize the work.Read More →

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In: 2017, Hot Take, Uncategorized

Hot Take: Could have easily called it “White Privilege Problems.” It’s hard to care about a self-involved dick who can’t seem to grasp reality. Why is Ben Stiller so good at playing a self-involved asshole?

I’ve felt like the main character in Brad’s Status before. It lasts for about 10 minutes and then I tell myself to snap out of it. Snapping out of it is never the case in Brad’s Status, however. Instead, it’s basically a film starring Ben Stiller as an unaware jerk who can’t seem to grasp that an upper middle class life is good enough when a few people he went to school had more success. The level of self-pity Brad has makes it nearly impossible for you to really care about his “plight” which ends up becoming monotonous as Brad drones on to anyone who will listen about his problems, including us, the audience, thanks to a dry, listless narration from Stiller in the main role.Read More →

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In: 2017, Hot Take

Hot Take: An attempted launch of a new franchise, the first “Mitch Rapp” novel-to-cinema conversion feels like a dud… a very violent, uneven been-there-done-that spy thriller. Are the books this generic?

The hope for American Assassin was probably the second coming of Jason Bourne… which was basically the second coming of James Bond… which has re-invented itself multiple times thanks to a change in the lead role. Hope is not a strategy though and, unfortunately, American Assassin‘s strategy to launch a franchise behind the Mitch Rapp character who is featured in 15 novels by Vince Flynn looked to stay inside the lines when it comes to spy thrillers with the only risk being to turn up the violence a notch or two. The result is a very disappointing initial film which fails to deliver on the promise of a best-selling novel series and is in the possession of one of the biggest plot holes I’ve seen in recent cinema history. (Maybe the novel has the same plot hole? That would be disappointing to find out.)Read More →

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In: 2017, Ranked

On September 14th, mother! became the 100th movies seen and (eventually) reviewed by MHT with a release date in 2017. From a pace perspective, the site is 25 movies behind the previous year but there’s been plenty of days where we’ve been viewer-ready but the theaters haven’t cooperated with a movie to see. Baby Driver (seen in the last 25 movies graded) was joined by 4 5-star films released and seen in the time span it took to get from 75 to 100 with Wind River taking over the top spot on the Top Movies of 2017 list. In addition, mother!, It and A Ghost Story all received 5 stars. There were also 2 movies that couldn’t even muster up 1/2 a star with The Emoji Movie and Kidnap receiving 0 stars. Please check out the previous postings here:

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In: 2017, Hot Take

Hot Take: I’m not sure I get it but I’m still thinking about mother! 2 days later and in my book, that’s a great accomplishment for a movie.

Film students will write papers on mother! someday. Maybe this week. Writer/director Darren Aronofsky will be called a lot of things for what he crafted. Ambitious, audacious, vile, thought provoking, pretentious, provocative, contemptuous, shocking, original, disgusting… the list goes on and on. Not all the words are positive. There’s no way I can unequivocally recommend mother! Look at the Audience Score (44% right now) on Rotten Tomatoes. There’s a pretty good chance you’ll watch mother! and hate it. There were times while watching mother!, I wanted to hate it. A few people even walked out of the showing I went to. After some time to contemplate and really settle on what I thought the film was about (It’s not abundantly clear), I loved this piece of art. It may have been the weirdest mind fuck of a film since 1998 when I watched David Lynch’s Lost Highway but it was a journey I will likely take again and enjoy all of the nuances I missed while being bombarded from all sides during the first viewing. (For the record, I hated Lost Highway the first time I saw it and now it’s one of my favorite 100 films.)Read More →

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In: 2017, Hot Take

Hot Take: If movies were edible, Home Again would be comfort food. 

In 2014, Reese Witherspoon’s role in Wild earned her a 2nd Academy Award nomination. 9 years prior, she won for her role in Walk the Line. Both films represent a more serious side of Witherspoon. Even though Witherspoon has established herself as an excellent actress who can tackle serious roles, her most recognizable roles have been in romantic comedies. Outside of her voice work in a few animated films, the movies to bank the most box office were Sweet Home Alabama, Four Christmases, Legally Blonde and it’s sequel. The one thing Hollywood has been void of lately is a cheesy romantic comedy sometimes referred to as a chick flick. As the roles for women have opened up and there’s been proven box office success in women in roles dominated by men *COUGH* Wonder Woman *COUGH*, the romantic comedy hasn’t played as important of a role in the box office as it had previously. There’s been a void almost. Home Again, the latest from Reese Witherspoon and first from Hallie Meyers-Shyer who is the daughter of Nancy Meyers (Something’s Gotta Give, The Holiday, It’s Complicated, The Intern), is a perfectly viable option to fill that void. Read More →

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In: 2017, Hot Take

Hot Take: Well told fact-based tale of Colin Warner, an 18-year-old from Crown Heights in New York who is wrongfully convicted of the murder of a teenager in Flatbush, Brooklyn and sentenced to life in prison told in the most positive way a story like this could be told.

The central storyline of Crown Heights is heartbreaking. Colin Warner wasn’t even in the wrong place at the wrong time in 1980 when he was fingered by an eye witness as the murderer of a teenager he never even met. Unfortunately, his mug shot made a photo lineup and once the police had a suspect, Warner’s life changed forever. In the film, Warner is played by Lakeith Stanfield and we spend most of our time with Warner behind bars as not only was Warner wrongfully arrested, tied to the actual murderer in court, Warner was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for the murder while the actual murderer received a shortened sentence because he was a minor.Read More →

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In: 2017, Hot Take

Hot Take: Formulaic horror sequel with a longer fuse than most. Sometimes the slow burn is good. Sometimes it’s a waste of time. Annabelle: Creation is the waste of time.

As mentioned in the It review, horror is not my genre of choice. Sequels aren’t really my thing, either. They are a necessary evil in the world of cinema and a staple of the current box office. Annabelle: Creation checks both the horror and sequel (well, prequel) box as David Sandberg (Lights Out) brings the prequel of a prequel (Annabelle was a prequel of The Conjuring) to life in an effort to capitalize on the inexplicable box office success of the first film — the original pulled in $256 million on a $6.5 million budget. For this reviewer, Annabelle: Creation felt like your standard horror flick with a few extra helpings of jump scares and extended stares into darkness waiting for something to happen. Something usually happened but it became more and more predictable as the film progressed.Read More →

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In: 2017, Hot Take

Hot Take: A blend of horror and a coming-of-age story that allows you to forget, at times, that you’re watching a horror movie, only to bring you right back to the frights of the classic King tale.

I watched Stephen King’s It when I was 14. The two-part four-hour miniseries frightened the hell out of me. I never liked clowns and It did our relationship no favors. Even with the fright factor, the miniseries was one of my favorite Stephen King adaptations. I’m not much of a horror fan but, for some reason, the King brand of horror is right up my alley. Needless to say, the release of It was wildly anticipated by this guy. Fortunately, the newest version — focused on the kids-only chapter of the novel and miniseries with a different, more CGI-aware horror and an R-rated vulgarity not allowed for broadcast TV — while different, is in most ways better than the 1990 version and lived up to lofty expectations.Read More →