REVIEW: Good Kill [2015]

“They don’t call it a hellfire for nothing” There are agenda movies that remain impartial to display a right and wrong interpretation of the ordeal on display through natural causes and there are those manipulated into force-feeding a single viewpoint upon the audience devoid of nuance. Andrew Niccol‘s Good Kill is the latter. The very few instances where he presents the alternative argument to his thesis—that drone strikes are a necessary evil with collateral damage proving the consequence of a “greater good” scenario—either arrive as though the character exclaiming it…

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REVIEW: American Wedding [2003]

“We should all be so happy” You don’t know how great it was seeing Finch (Eddie Kaye Thomas) and Jim (Jason Biggs) shoot down Kevin’s (Thomas Ian Nicholas) latest attempt at the “taking the next step” speech in American Wedding. I love it when filmmakers—in this case stalwart Adam Herz steering the ship with his third director in as many installments—can mock themselves for the formulaic redundancies fans easily pick out. College is over and the East Great Falls boys have officially become citizens of adulthood. The only step left…

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REVIEW: X-Men: First Class [2011]

“Mutant and proud” The new world order begins and sides are chosen as Matthew Vaughn—five years late—finally gets his crack at the world of Marvel mutants. X-Men: First Class arrives to tell us the origins of what we’ve seen in the original trilogy, retreating back into the 40s, paralleling of the Holocaust with the world’s inevitable reaction to a new breed of evolution and how the oppressed become the oppressors to survive. It’s a very fine line between good and evil, right and wrong, retribution and revenge. Charles Xavier hones…

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REVIEW: Unknown [2011]

“And that’s where I first saw Leonardo’s Vitruvian Man” I have it on good authority from a friend that Jaume Collet-Serra’s Unknown, as well as Didier van Cauwelaert’s French-language novel it’s based on, is uncannily similar to Roman Polanski’s Frantic. Unfortunately, to my chagrin, I have no opinion on the accusation, having not seen the 1988 film, but I’d lie if I didn’t admit my view of the new release is a bit tainted now. The premise of both are definitely eerily similar and my friend knows what he’s talking…

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REVIEW: The Boat That Rocked [Pirate Radio] [2009]

“All he did was sleep with someone else’s wife” Why must Hollywood retitle a film that was produced in Britain? It’s the same language and frankly The Boat That Rocked sounds so much cooler than Pirate Radio … doesn’t it? Either way, no matter what it’s called, writer/director Richard Curtis has crafted a second hit to follow up his magnificent romantic tapestry Love Actually. Taking place on a renegade ship, anchored in the North Sea, the film follows eight DJs, their producer, his God son aboard to be “set straight”…

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