Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on August 27th, 2018
When it comes to Paul Schrader, I feel the argument can be made that he is the greatest American screenwriter. I know it’s a bold statement but when you look over his credits that include Taxi Driver, Rolling Thunder, Hardcore, Raging Bull, The Last Temptation of Christ and so many others I feel there just isn’t anyone out there that can compete. Lately though he’s seemed to have had a difficult time recapturing that greatness, there has even been a part of me that has felt that perhaps I should give up on hoping he’ll crank out one more great film and simply appreciate the filmography he’s delivered us cinema fans over the years. Paul Schrader, despite having some classic titles to his name he’s still a writer and a director that isn’t for everyone. His films typically are dark in tone and typically shine a light onto the underbelly of society that most would prefer to not know about. It’s because of his fearlessness in tackling these subjects that has made me a fan of his for years so when the opportunity to see First Reformed came along I didn’t hesitate, this was a screening I couldn’t miss.
As the film opens we get a long shot that pushes in to an old church, we quickly find out the church is named First Reformed. Inside we meet Reverend Toller (Ethan Hawke) as he is delivering a sermon to a very sparse crowd of parishioners. It doesn’t take long to realize that Toller is a damaged man, both physically, emotionally and spiritually. We get insight into the reverends thoughts through his journal entries that he writes and are narrated for us. Things get moving when Mary (Amanda Seyfried) approaches Toller after a service and requests he speaks with her husband Michael (Philip Ettinger) who she fears wants her to have an abortion.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on August 19th, 2018
“Welcome to the future.”
This is how Josephine (Ellen Burstyn) introduces a church group that is touring her geodesic home, which also doubles as a museum dedicated to inventor R. Buckminster Fuller. Josephine and her grandson, Sebastian (Asa Butterfield) have their own way of living in their home, a place where it is assumed Sebastian has never left long enough to experience how the real world functions. His interactions with the public don’t stretch beyond the casual tourists who come by the home, and as a teenager he’s never experienced “junk food” of any kind. But Sebastian’s reality crumbles after his grandmother has a stroke in the middle of a tour and he meets Jared (Alex Wolff).
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on August 17th, 2018
When it comes to films about man vs. nature, we typically see films where they are defending themselves in the wild where weather and predators are the biggest dangers they have to face. (The Grey and The Revenant are the titles that first come to mind.) In the new release Flora, writer/director Sasha Louis Vukovic is here to show us that there is more to fear than wolves and bears, but how deadly pollen can be. Somewhere I can imagine M. Night Shyamalan is happy to see that someone else has tackled this subject since his disastrous film The Happening made a whimper at the box office years ago. Fortunately for Vukovic, he didn’t make the same mistakes and instead has crafted a film that is perhaps one of the more realistic horror scenarios that has come out in some time.
The film takes us back to 1929 when a team of students head out into an uncharted forest to meet up with their professor on an expedition to study the local flora. Unfortunately, when they arrive their professor is nowhere to be found. To make matters more dire, the supplies they were expecting to be at camp for them to survive have been destroyed, and the only way out of the forest is by foot and more than a few weeks’ hike to civilization. While this is a nice setup with many horror elements in place, the film never quite commits to being a horror film.
Posted in: The Reel World by Brent Lorentson on August 12th, 2018
Ever since Jaws splashed onto the screen back in 1975, Hollywood has been attempting to follow its success, and though some films have been valiant efforts, nothing seems to come close to the Spielberg classic. Sure, effects have come a long way over the years, and through the Hollywood magic of special effects they can create a more realistic looking shark, but to be fair, many of the film’s more memorable moments don’t even have the shark on screen. When I first heard about The Meg, it was going to be in the hands of Eli Roth of Cabin Fever and Hostel fame. This seemed to be like a good pairing that would result in a blood-fest filled with shark carnage that would leave shark fans pleased, but eventually the studio decided to pass, and the project seemed almost dead in the water. I had known about the film’s struggles to get made for years but hadn’t known that it went back to the 90’s when the rights to the book by Steve Alten had been first purchased. When the studio signed Jon Turteltaub (National Treasure), it was clear they were aiming to produce a summer tent-pole film, and as my excitement grew, I caved and started reading The Meg series that Alten had published, and I was hooked. I’ve been looking forward to this film for a while. Could it possibly live up to my expectations? …Well, it came close.
The film opens up with Jonas Taylor (Jason Statham) as he is on a deep-sea rescue mission. While he and the few members of his crew are searching for survivors on a wrecked sub, there seems to be something in the water with them that is attacking the sub. All we know is that it is something massive, and it forces Taylor to have to make a quick decision that results in several casualties. It’s years later when a scientific research team is exploring the Mariana trench and is planning to dive deeper than ever before, past a layer that was believed to be frozen. It’s when the dive team passes beyond this cold layer that we see some beautiful effects, as this underwater world we are getting to explore with the team is filled with numerous deep-sea dwellers, though it doesn’t take long before the team is attacked. Apparently Jonas is the only one available who can possibly save the deep-sea crew. As it just so happens, one the crew members turns out to be Taylor’s ex-wife Lori (Jessica McNamee). This is also the point where it’s discovered Taylor’s claim that the prehistoric megalodon is haunting the deep sea turns out to be true. Why Taylor would make this jump in reasoning from what we saw in the opening scene is beyond me, but I’ve accepted that this is a popcorn ride, not something we’re meant to dwell on.
Posted in: The Reel World by Brent Lorentson on August 9th, 2018
Ever since Do the Right Thing came out in 1989, Spike Lee has been a director critics and fans have kept an eye on. Over the span of his career he’s done everything from music videos with Michael Jackson, documentaries, television shows -- but mostly he’s made his claim to fame in film. His films have been all over the place. As critical and box office successes, Inside Man to this day may be his biggest success financially, but of all his films it is the one that feels the least like a Spike Lee film. The man has a distinct visual style; most of his films take place in New York, but the typical thing you’ll find in his films is the “black culture” and the topic of race relations. With his latest film Blackkklansman, Lee ventures into some familiar territory, but for the first time in quite a while he delivers a movie with a strong message but also manages to be entertaining.
It’s the 1970’s when we meet Ron Stallworth (John David Washington). He’s in the middle of an interview to become the first black officer of the Colorado Springs police department. The interview is equally as uncomfortable as it is amusing at the same time, and this kind of tone is what plays out over the course of the film. Let me say from the start, this film doesn’t shy away from delivering racial slurs that are pretty much spoken from start to finish of this film. When Stallworth first gets hired, he’s stuck down in the records room, but it isn’t long before he is asked to help out on an undercover assignment that requires him to infiltrate a gathering where a prominent Black Panther member will be speaking. This is a scene that is handled really well by Lee as we watch Stallworth listen to the speech; it’s also here where Stallworth meets a potential love interest, Patrice (Laura Harrier), who happens to be a black activist leader.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Brent Lorentson on August 8th, 2018
You have to go back to the early 40’s for when Archie, Jughead, Betty and Veronica first appeared in comic book form. Over the years, though, their characters have changed with the times, though the town of Riverdale always seemed to maintain an innocent charm where nothing bad ever seemed to happen. Well, that is until recently where the comics took a shift and thrust our characters into various scenarios, one even including Riverdale being overrun by zombies. These changes occurred when Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa took over the brand, and now he has brought the town of Riverdale and its inhabitants to the small screen for the CW network. Though this iteration differs from the early days of the Archie comic universe, all the familiar characters are here, and they are showing us the shady underbelly of Riverdale that I’m so glad we are getting a glimpse of, one episode at a time.
When Season 1 left us, we were with Archie (K.J. Apa), and his dad, Fred Andrews (Luke Perry) lay bleeding in Pop’s Chocklit Shoppe after a “botched robbery”. Season 2 picks up right where the previous season left us and wastes no time ramping up the danger in town as a mysterious killer dubbed “The Black Hood” begins killing off the residents of Riverdale. Wanting to protect his town and his friends, Archie forms a group called The Red Circle. As you can expect, this glorified neighborhood watch group is simply a recipe for disaster, but also entertaining television. While Archie is on the hunt for “The Black Hood”, Betty (Lili Reinhart) finds herself caught up in the mess as well as the killer plays a sort of cat-and-mouse game with her by leaving her clues to their identity. Jughead (Cole Sprouse) is keeping busy this season, as he’s relocated to Southside High and he is adjusting to his life while becoming a member of The Serpents. Personally seeing how Jughead evolves as a member of the Serpents, from his gang initiation to the power struggles we see develop over the course of the season, is one of the best things going for this season. Finally we have Veronica (Camila Mendes) who is adjusting to her father’s early release from prison and coming home to continue with “The Family Business”. As you can imagine, Season 2 is loaded heavily with material for our characters, and there is so much that continues to work its way into the story that it almost never hits a lull.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on July 26th, 2018
Like so many others, when I read the book Ready Player One by Ernest Cline I simply fell in love with the nostalgic ride through the 80’s, all thanks to a virtual reality world called The Oasis. From start to finish it was a book filled with pop culture references that would make film and video game geeks squeal with delight, and it was no surprise that the book was a hit and would be turned into a film. There were only two names I could think of that could ever come close to making this film a reality: Robert Zemeckis and Steven Spielberg. With Spielberg involved, he was the only person I could imagine who had the clout to get all the licensing rights needed to pull this adaption, but still the biggest question I had was, does Spielberg still have it in him? I’m not questioning the man’s talent, but instead it’s the magic and wonder he would bring to his films, from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, ET, to Jurassic Park, where he could get us to believe the fantastic and impossible was real while we sat in a dark auditorium watching his film.
The Oasis is an open virtual reality world like nothing we have ever seen before, but with how our technology is developing it is quickly becoming a possibility for things to come. There are worlds and planets within The Oasis where you can be in constant battles to win coins, or go to exotic places for a vacation. It’s a world where you can be whatever you want and experience just about anything you want. Basically think about Westworld, but on steroids. The creator of this world is Halliday (Mark Rylance) who before dying announced to all of The Oasis that he created an Easter Egg hidden somewhere in The Oasis, and whoever was to find it would gain sole control of The Oasis and all of Halliday’s fortune.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on July 21st, 2018
I’m going to go ahead and say Super Troopers is without a doubt one of my favorite comedies of all time. Sure, I know many will disagree with me, and that’s fine. Since I first saw their film back in 2002 when I got the DVD, I was always excited to see what would come next from the Broken Lizard comedy troupe. There was Club Dread, which induced a few chuckles as they tackled the slasher genre, and then they had Beerfest, which was pretty funny but simply didn’t hold up to their performances as Vermont’s Highway Patrolmen. The antics from the first film are simply classic to me, and the film is something I manage to quote from on a weekly basis amongst friends, and when I hear that someone has managed to go all these years without experiencing the film, it’s something I feel the need to remedy immediately. It’s more than just a simple stoner comedy, and rumblings about a sequel have been going on for years, but things seemed to always fall apart. Now after all these years, it’s finally happened.
In case you were wondering, just because the film releases on 4/20, this isn’t a movie that requires you to smoke the green dragon to enjoy. The Broken Lizard gang just knows their audience and simply wanted to be part of the joke. For those who saw the first film and couldn’t stand it, well, there’s no sense in even bothering to check out this entry. As for those who have managed to miss the first one, please check out the first before going in so you can enjoy the film for everything it has to offer.
Posted in: The Reel World by Brent Lorentson on July 13th, 2018
In 2010 there was a little film called Winter’s Bone that came out; it didn’t make a splash at the box office, but it was one of the critical darlings of that year. For many it was the first time people got to see Jennifer Lawrence on screen, and it’s safe to say it is because of that film she is the star that she is today. I remember first seeing Winter’s Bone and being so floored by the film I immediately watched it again, and I had to know who it was that had directed the film. Debra Granik was the woman responsible for the film. It was a name I had never heard before, but it was one I’d be on the lookout for in the following years. Though she did a documentary between projects, it seems the wait is finally over as Leave No Trace is about to hit the big screen.
Will (Ben Foster) and Tom (Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie) are father and daughter who are living off the grid in a park on the outskirts of Portland, Oregon. When we first meet the pair we get a glimpse into their day-to-day life as they forage for food and practice hiding in their environment. It’s in these opening scenes we get to see the happiness these two share while living in this beautiful, lush, green sanctuary, and we can almost understand why someone would want to choose this lifestyle. Whenever the pair is in need of supplies they trek back into the city, where Will stops off at the VA hospital for his check up and receives his medication. Will turns around and sells his pills to nearby homeless veterans, and with that money he buys groceries and supplies with his daughter. It may not be a perfect life, but it’s clear that Will and Tom are happy with how things are.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on July 3rd, 2018
Sometimes a movie comes along that has everything going for it: a great cast, a great cinematographer, and a decent plot, but when you watch it, you just scratch your head wondering why it ended up so bad. That in a nutshell is Terminal. It stars Margot Robbie, Simon Pegg, and Mike Myers, and for each of them I believe this is a film they quickly want to move past. The tagline for the film is Revenge Never Looked So Good, which is a big part of the problem with the film. I absolutely love the look of the film. It’s beautiful and to a point creates its own style I’d call neon-noir, but unfortunately no matter how good something may look, it doesn’t always mean it will be good.
A good portion of the film is about Bill (Pegg), a teacher who is waiting for a subway train but is told by the night janitor, Mr. Franklyn (Myers) that one won’t be coming for hours. Mr. Franklyn eventually recommends a diner (conveniently called The End of the Line) for Bill to wait. It’s at the diner where Bill meets the quirky Annie (Robbie), who is his waitress but is also intrigued by his illness. To add some more padding to the film, we have a pair of hit men who are introduced in the film’s wonky timeline who take a mysterious job that leaves them locked up in an apartment for days as they are waiting for a phone call to signal when the hit is to go down. How Annie involves herself into the mess with the hit men strays into spoiler territory, but I’ll simply say it was a designed coincidence from sloppy storytelling.
