***This review, especially starting in the seventh paragraph, is written for people who have seen the movie, or for those who don’t care about spoilers.*** Asteroid City (2023) bears all the marks of a Wes Anderson film. The compositions are deliberate. The colors are striking. The dialogue is direct and sometimes lacks subtlety. The characters […]
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The Batman
09 Mar 2022
Like Spiderman, Batman is ubiquitous. And, like the web-slinger, he has been victimized by uneven, and sometimes dreadful, attempts to squeeze another coin from the comic book cow. Yet both characters, when placed in the right hands, can yield compelling stories. Spiderman 2 and The Dark Knight are among the best of their genre. The […]
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Dune (2021)
26 Oct 2021
Dune is the most immersive and ambitious science fiction film since Blade Runner. Dune is long (2 hours and 35 minutes) and demanding, dropping the viewer into an information desert, crawling to find a voice-over oasis or searching the scorched horizon for an explanatory character to reveal the backstory. Wisely, Denis Villeneuve (who directed and […]
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A Conflict of Villains
19 Oct 2021
A horrifying police state controls all. Its terrifying power stops anyone who dissents from the correct point of view. Political dissidents are “tried” in a kangaroo court without a jury and sentenced to immediate execution. Propaganda fills the eyes and ears of all from the moment they wake up to their last moments before sleep. […]
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Nomadland: A New Kind of Western
13 May 2021
“What the nomads are doing is not that different than what the pioneers did. I think Fern’s part of an American tradition. I think it’s great.” Fern lives in her van, which has broken down and she is unable to fix it. She arrives, via bus, at Dolly’s house. Her sister lives on a clean, […]
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Poignant Pixar
05 Feb 2021
So many important political and economic issues are filling the air. Things feel very tense as 2021 seeks to prove that it will be just as memorable as 2020. It is time to take a break for a second from that because there is still fun to be had. I would encourage anyone who gets […]
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I’ve missed theaters this year. I saw Christopher Nolan’s Tenet earlier, but I’ve grown accustomed to a steady diet of Sour Patch, comfortable seats, and creative expression. Habits though, like ideas, have consequences. Many of my trips to the cinema over the years have been tiny investments in an economic and cultural system empowering a […]
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If you are looking for explosions, capes, or fingernail-gnawing intensity, neither The Assistant nor A Hidden Life* are for you. Instead of action, you get detailed compositions; instead of snappy dialogue, you get characters at the moral crossroads. While different in topic, scope, and the particular Beelzebub’s lurking unseen, the two films share a deliberate […]
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While I’m not often able to pull together a post since I’ve commenced graduate studies, I’m making an exception for Netflix’s new film The King. As I believe I remain the only Berean to ever be publicly labeled a monarchist or review a Netflix production, last Friday’s release of The King created a reviewing duty […]
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Avengers: Endgame
27 Apr 2019
***This review is mostly spoiler-free, but its themes might lead to broad conclusions by the reader. Nothing of the Endgame plot is revealed and no answers to the questions leftover from Infinity War are revealed.*** I drove two daughters and two of their friends to an 11:00 p.m., Thursday night showing of Avengers: Endgame. On […]
Bert Wheeler
Jeff Haymond
Marc Clauson
Mark Caleb Smith
Tom Mach