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In: 2015, Hot Take, Trailers

Anticipation (Before Trailer): 80/100

Anticipation (After Trailer): 95/100

Chi-Raq looks like quintessential Spike Lee… and that’s a good thing! Unfortunately, it also looks like the film won’t get much more than a limited theatrical release on December 4th before heading to Amazon Instant Video. Oh, and here’s a shocker: This Spike Lee film is being met with controversy over it’s title and portrayal of gang violence in Chicago.

If there’s justice, this will get more than the 200 theaters Dancin’ It’s On found it’s way to.

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Anticipation (Before Trailer): 90/100

Anticipation (After Trailer): 95/100

When an animated film has Oscar buzz, it’s hard to ignore. Charlie Kaufman has already delivered Being John Malkovich, Adaptation and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Now, with his first animated film, Anomalisa has been captivating festival audiences all year. The trailer lands a “must see” blow. I’m ready for this one to hit theaters!

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In: 2016, Hot Take, Trailers

Anticipation (Before Trailer): 35/100

Anticipation (After Trailer): 35/100

At least Michael Bay has taken a break from destroying my childhood. It doesn’t feel like a stretch to venture to guess 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi will be a balls-to-the-wall action film with very little focus on plot development. Just a guess.

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In: 2015, Hot Take

Hot Take: If only Burnt‘s plot was as beautiful as the gorgeously plated food shown throughout the film. It manages to take a fairly simple, often recycled movie recipe and screw it up. At the very least Bradley Cooper and Sienna Miller should have worked (it worked in American Sniper) but even that pairing wasn’t tasty. Check please!

Burnt might help you overcome a loss of appetite or insomnia but it is not likely to entertain. Even with Bradley Cooper as chef Adam Jones who is trying to put his life back together after self-destructing  and burning everything and everyone around him, the film tries to do so little yet can’t even accomplish that. In addition to Cooper, there’s the usually delightful Sienna Miller who is unremarkable as Jones’ chosen prodigy.Read More →

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In: 2015, Hot Take

Hot Take: If the poster is to be believed, Dancin’ It’s On is an award winning film. I’d have a hard time believing the film won an award if it were the only movie nominated. It’s an absolute train wreck. Because of that, it’s kind of fun to watch and imagine Mystery Science Theater 3000 picking on it.

So You Think You Can Dance is a guilty pleasure of mine. The popular dance show has been on for 12 seasons and since it’s inception, there’s been an increase in movies featuring dance. Dancin’ It’s On is one of those movies. Read More →

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In: 2015, Hot Take

Hot Take: Our Brand Is Crisis is a fairly mediocre political comedy… Wag the Dog without the bite. Sandra Bullock is fun to watch though and that makes it slightly better than forgettable.

At some point in Our Brand Is Crisis I stopped caring about the plot and decided to enjoy Sandra Bullock’s performance as “Calamity” Jane Bodine, an American political advisor brought out of “retirement” to help a long shot candidate in Bolivia salvage their campaign. I’d bore you with more details about the actual plot but you’ve seen this “paint by numbers” storytelling before. The draw is Bullock and some decent supporting work by Billy Bob Thornton (as Bodine’s nemesis Candy) and Anthony Mackie and Ann Dowd.Read More →

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In: 2015, Hot Take

Hot Take: It’s Karaoke Night at the cinema and Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse is performing Superbad and Zombieland. It’s decent karaoke but it’s still karaoke.

Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse picks the low hanging fruit of every zombie comedy and throws in some of the easy to pick high school guy coming of age comedy fruit as well. That’s not to say it doesn’t have some funny moments but there isn’t much original content.Read More →

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In: 2015, Hot Take

Hot Take: On the surface, Woodlawn is a decent docudrama with heavy pro-Christianity overtones. By the end, you realize it’s what Remember the Titans would have been if it were infused with religion and stripped of any real racial tension.

Early in Woodlawn, Tony Nathan (Caleb Castille) gets his first shot at being the tailback for the recently integrated Woodlawn High School football team. While the black running back shows promise, he doesn’t like being hit. Coach Tandy (Nic Bishop) gives Nathan a pep talk about how it can be helpful to hit someone who is trying to hit you. From then on (in one of it’s many turbo stories of success), Nathan continues to run fast and evade tacklers but, occasionally, he runs through a few would-be tacklers and even over a couple. Unfortunately, the Erwin Brothers, the film’s directors, stick to the flashy faith-based narrative throughout the movie but runs out of bounds whenever any other issues are brought into this “based on a true story” film.Read More →

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In: 2015, Hot Take

Hot Take: Why?

Rock the Kasbah is a disaster of a movie. There are unintentional tributes to the Bill Murray catalog throughout. It’s as if writer Mitch Glazer and director Barry Levinson met and said, “What if we took everything Bill Murray ever did and stripped away everything funny?” Even The Razor’s Edge, an earnest attempt at a dramatic role for Murray, was funnier.Read More →