Aquaman And The Lost Kingdom (2023) - Movie Review

The DCEU has finally come to an end. The never-ending Crisis of bad timing, bad management, and just generally bad decisions on the part of Warner Bros. is about to be laid to rest and reborn as (hopefully) something better. Not that it’s been all bad, though. Hell, I’d argue that it wasn’t even mostly bad; Wonder Woman, Suicide Squad (both of them), the Snyder Cut, and, where today’s subject is most pertinent, Aquaman all still hold up as worthy adaptations of the DC pantheon of heroes. I still have my issues with the franchise’s lesser moments (all the turning-around I’ve done on Zack Snyder still hasn’t made Man Of Steel look any friggin’ better), and the tail-end has led to some truly inexplicable releases like Black Adam and the Skittles movie, but as someone who still holds a torch for capeshit, I want these movies to be good. Which is why this last hurrah is especially disappointing.

Same Kind Of Different As Me (2020) - Movie Review

Okay, this film technically came out in 2017 (which was after it spent a good three years on the shelf from its 2014 finish date), but considering it only just became available here in Australia this year, and how royally muffed-up the cinematic release schedule has been across the board all year, I’m counting this as a 2020 movie. This is actually one that I’ve been keeping an eye out for when it would drop over here, and it’s something I hinted at when I reviewed Monster Trucks. Yep, this is another film with Don Burgess attached to it as DOP that seems like a major step-down for such a legendary figure. However, as I’ll get into, this is a much better fit for him than something like Monster Trucks.

Monster Trucks (2016) - Movie Review

Every so often, a trailer will come out for a film that… well, quite frankly, does the absolute least when it comes to selling a film. Specifically, failing to make the film look even a tenth as dumb as it probably is. This is most certainly one of those examples, and considering this got a special New Year’s Eve screening last, this technically falls under the 2016 list. Call it a technicality, but I don’t want to disrespect this new year by having it be related to this garbage.

Allied (2016) - Movie Review

While the popular conception of the period drama is usually confined to stuffy and immaculately dressed stories set in Victorian England, it’s actually far wider in scope than that. It basically applies to any film that is set in a specific time period that isn’t the present: Ouija: Origin Of Evil technically counts as a period piece. In staging the days of old, filmmakers need a certain level of fidelity to the era in which the story is set in order to do what all good films should be capable of and making us believe that what we are seeing isn’t something that was shot a year or two ago.

Sure, some films use that disconnect between the setting and time of release to rather compelling effect like the intentional anachronisms in A Knight’s Tale. But that’s an exception to what would ordinarily be considered the rule: If it’s set in a particular time period and the film relies on the specificity of that period, then adhering to it is probably a good idea. So, what happens when one of the most forward-thinking filmmakers still working today sets out to make a period romance?

The Walk (2015) - Movie Review

There are very few filmmakers whom possess such a stranglehold on pop culture history as Robert Zemeckis. Whether it’s his audience-pleasing favourites like Who Framed Roger Rabbit and the Back To The Future trilogy, his critical darlings like Forrest Gump and Cast Away or even his cult classics like Used Cars and Death Becomes Her, the man likely owns a decent part of the collective cinematic mindset. Through his willingness to adapt not only to newer filming techniques but also to the Hollywood system at large, he has more than earned his place in the pantheon of directing greats. That, and he will also hold a very near and dear place for me personally, since he’s also one of the only directors still working today that has a consistently good track record in terms of effects work; it’s kind of astounding just how well a lot of his films have visually held up. So, when news hit that the king of dual role casting was behind a new release, it became clear that this is something I would be watching even without the whole critical routine.

Flight (2013) - Movie Review