Suspense/Thriller | www.jaredmobarak.com

REVIEW: Mom and Dad [2018]

2018/01/142020/04/13 Jared Mobarak

Whatever. I have to imagine every parent at some point wonders where their life could have gone if they didn’t have children. This doesn’t make them bad people—only those who actually act on the urge by abandoning their families without so much as a goodbye fall under that label. It just proves they’re human. It’s merely a manifestation of fatigue and frustration as the late-night parties and carefree, irresponsible attitudes necessary to let loose disappear. Gone are the dreams you can try and fail at knowing you don’t have a…

REVIEW: Proud Mary [2018]

2018/01/122020/04/13 Jared Mobarak

No one leaves. The first trailer for Proud Mary hit the internet in July of 2017. After that came a few badass 70s-style James Bond-like posters with star Taraji P. Henson in shadows, gun drawn. It was hard not to get excited for what appeared to be a stylized assassin flick in the vein of John Wick with a bona fide bankable black woman in the lead, Tina Turner’s emotional adaptation of John Fogarty’s anthem rocking in the background. But then the release date hit with a January bow. Critics…

REVIEW: Stratton [2017]

2017/12/292020/04/17 Jared Mobarak

I’m thinking that the only two people in the universe we can trust are you and me. It must have been a tough blow to see the newly minted Man of Steel bow out of a project that potentially had franchise capabilities five days before shooting was to commence, but that’s exactly what happened when Henry Cavill left Stratton over “creative differences.” I have to give him credit for doing so, though, since interviews circa late 2014 have him sounding pretty excited about the prospects of bringing to life a…

REVIEW: Nocturama [2016]

2017/12/212020/04/17 Jared Mobarak

It was bound to happen. What if a devastating act of violence was committed without purpose? Does it still have meaning? The answer of course is “yes” since such an attack leaves victims whether dead or psychologically scarred. Consequences reverberate well past borders of the town, country, and continent in which they occur because of the inherent fear they conjure. We wonder who will be next, dread the realization it could be us, and let paranoia seep into our very soul. This is why it’s called terrorism. It disrupts the…

REVIEW: Murder on the Orient Express [1974]

2017/11/042020/04/22 Jared Mobarak

With the help of a hat box. If the way in which Hercule Poirot (Albert Finney) manipulates his suspects into perfectly incriminating themselves upon inquisition—often unbeknownst to us until the final reveal—infers that he has a photographic memory, we the audience need a bit more exposition as it concerns yet unseen connections than perhaps the film would like to share. This is why director Sidney Lumet and screenwriter Paul Dehn provide an opening montage of newspaper clippings and shadowy reenactments of young Daisy Armstrong’s kidnapping and subsequent murder. Because it…

REVIEW: Blade Runner 2049 [2017]

2017/10/232020/04/25 Jared Mobarak

Because you’ve never seen a miracle. Survival is a selfish endeavor, but not necessarily one driven by ego. On the contrary, survival is often a selfless means to place community ahead of the individual. Look at our country’s current, abhorrent divisions along lines we should have erased decades ago or never created in the first place. As long as privilege exists and one race, gender, religion, et al holds power and sway above the rest simply because it fears relinquishing its place atop the “status quo,” rebellion is only a…

REVIEW: Never Here [2017]

2017/10/162020/04/25 Jared Mobarak

You’ve done a bad thing. Miranda Fall (Mireille Enos) is a cataloger. Her art leads her on journeys following new subjects in order to understand who each is by what each does and possesses. She voyeuristically captures their lives in photographs and objects, exhibiting her findings as though a celebration despite some of her targets believing it more akin to a memoriam. And why shouldn’t they? Miranda is ostensibly stealing their identities for public consumption and in turn private financial compensation. She uses the mundane routines and patterns of others…

REVIEW: In a Lonely Place [1950]

2017/10/152020/04/25 Jared Mobarak

There’s no sacrifice too great for a chance at immortality. Just because you might be innocent of one crime doesn’t mean you’re a saint who’d never commit another. We’ve seen this type of complex premise as recently as “The Night of”, a miniseries about racial prejudice and police neglect wherein the accused (and audience) is unaware of whether he committed murder. And as facts of the evening in question are put into context, details also surface about the defendant to color him in a different light than initially assumed. Our…

REVIEW: The Foreigner [2017]

2017/10/122020/04/25 Jared Mobarak

Trust or fear. I like a good action thriller without a clear target because it allows the story to develop where cat and mouse chases usually reside. Martin Campbell‘s The Foreigner is a good example as it shows what happens when a sharp plot is made paramount. We know who the bad guys are—a group of young IRA rebels rekindling a fight long since dormant—but not their identities. So distraught dad Quan Ngoc Minh (Jackie Chan) must improvise along his quest for vengeance after his daughter is killed in a…

REVIEW: Blade Runner [1982]

2017/10/022017/10/03 Jared Mobarak

“All those moments will be lost in time like tears in rain” An over-populated Earth circa 2019 uses synthetic androids known as replicants for the hard labor of colonization. Their lifespans are barely four years long, their circuitry prone to fits of amoral aggression. Each subsequent version becomes stronger and smarter, the risk of mutiny forever increasing. So they’ve been outlawed on mankind’s home planet, any violator made subject to a shoot-to-kill order on behalf of the law enforcement wing known as blade runners. Amongst the violent cesspool that is…

BIFF17 REVIEW: Prodigy [2017]

2017/09/272018/03/14 Jared Mobarak

“Love is the guise under which selfishness operates” Guilt is a powerful thing. It can make you act in ways that go against your own survival and yet still ensure those actions are selfishly motivated. You aren’t necessarily acting to help another or have their best interests in mind. You’re goal is to make-up for something you did previously. It’s about feeling better and feeding a misguided notion that you’re somehow the center of attention—the inevitable bringer of unwarranted pain and suffering. Wars have been fought over guilt. Religions have…