Tag: Lukas Haas

REVIEW: Midnight in the Switchgrass [2021]

Jared Mobarak

We all got excuses. I think Bruce Willis‘ agent needs a raise because they are going above and beyond to make sure their client gets A-list billing no matter what project he takes. I’d estimate the actor has about five total minutes of screen-time in Midnight in the Switchgrass—a majority of which is his FBI agent (Karl Helter) being a tired and soon-to-be retired mother hen for his much younger and more driven partner (Megan Fox‘s Rebecca Lombardo). It’s a cushy gig that probably put a few bucks in his…

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REVIEW: Widows [2018]

Jared Mobarak

This isn’t your world. When the first trailer for Widows dropped, I thought, “Steve McQueen is branching out to genre fare now.” This wasn’t a slight, just an observation. I obviously wanted to see it, but thought I could wait before the notes out of TIFF declared it a must-see. Suddenly I needed to reevaluate my perception of what this thing was behind its marketing push. Would there be more than just revenge and heist-based thrills? Would this be a slower burn a la co-writer Gillian Flynn‘s novels augmented by…

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REVIEW: Red Riding Hood [2011]

Jared Mobarak

“All sorrows are less with bread” Why, in movies, does a thrown axe/sword/dagger/knife always land squarely in the back of one’s opponent as he’s about to maim? Can’t it comically thud to the ground, short the half revolution necessary to inflict injury, allowing the antagonist to look at the camera with a twinkle in his eye before clawing the heroine’s face off? I know its Hollywood and audiences have preconceptions about good versus evil and all, but realistic physics mixed with plausible probability may help something called authenticity. But what…

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REVIEW: Brick [2006]

Jared Mobarak

“Where do you eat lunch?” This is a film I have been highly anticipating for over a year. After first hitting the festival circuit in January of 2005 it went through the cycles, finally getting a stateside limited release at the end of March 2006. Buffalo, I ask you now to open your eyes to a masterpiece of cinema as Brick finally debuts at the Amherst Dipson. Brick is a not a film as much as a symphony where each instrument is tuned to the beat of the conductor. Each…

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