Mr. Brown Versus

I think we can all agree that just about the most annoying thing one can do in a theater (next to talking non-stop) is whipping out the smartphone and begin Tweeting, playing games, or checking your email. It's bloody obnoxious and it detracts from the movie-watching experience, but don't tell that to Paramount Pictures, who are going to allow moviegoers to be inconsiderate jackasses and fiddle with their phones whilst watching Terminator: Genisys . I wish I were making this up. “This is a true breakthrough for the movie industry. Video games are a multi-billion dollar industry, and merging that with the movies in a way that’s interactive, fun and truly memorable is a very exciting proposition for an industry seeking to innovate. This breakthrough may be equally exciting for the video game industry. The movies offer the very best in screen and sound while providing audiences with a first of its kind, collective, in-person gaming experience.” I'm sorry, but " A tr...

First, I want to start off by saying that I really enjoyed watching Mad Max: Fury Road  during the Memorial Day holiday. Before entering George Miller's dystopian car chase through a barren wasteland, I had not seen the original Mad Max films, so I was coming in as a newbie and therefore, judged the film on its own merits. The image of a man hanging from the front of a moving vehicle, playing an electric guitar that spits fucking fire is an image that will stay with me as long as I'm a fan of the medium. The cinematography by John Seale, who had come out of retirement to help make this movie, is breathtaking from first frame to last. The technical aspects of the film - Visual Effects, Sound Mixing and Editing, etc. - are all first-rate, and are worthy of celebration come Awards season. It's almost something of a revelation to watch female characters contribute to the story and to the main protagonists, rather than be the traditional damsels in distress who only serve as res...

I should be talking about what the half-year in review for 2015, both the good and the bad. I should be talking about stuff like the hilarious Melissa McCarthy-led espionage spoof, Spy , or my honest thoughts about Mad Max: Fury Road .  Today, I'm not. I can't.  It honestly doesn't feel right to me, given the latest tragedy in Charleston, South Carolina, where a young white man went into a historical black church and slaughtered 9 people (thankfully, the police found the perpetrator today and have placed Dylan Roof under arrest).  As Rachel Maddow pointed out tonight, there are several ways we can put this senseless act of violence into context. We can say that this is another tragedy where a person who had no reason to have firearms, shot and murdered innocent people in cold blood, and you wouldn't be wrong: from Columbine, to Tuscon, to Auora, to Sandy Hook, this act of senseless savagery keeps happening because of our nation's reluctance to talk a...

I'm back from my month-plus long sabbatical (see: dealing with classes) and the good news is that I've seen 2 dozen films between April and June, so I hope to review at least half of those movies on here (The other half, I've decided, will go on Letterboxd, and they'll be seen here .) in the weeks to come. For right now, I want to get back into the swing of things by reviewing a few trailer that have caught my eye, for better and not-so better. Brawl of the Century: There's a large amount of fans that want nothing more than to shove a hunk of Kryptonite up Zack Snyder's ass for his version of Superman in Man of Steel  rather than see the the big follow up in Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice  (due out March 25, 2016), but I'm not one of them. Making Clark Kent an uncertain hero, both in the eyes of the U.S. government and internally as he learns to trust the people he's sworn to protect is a nice touch, and it makes the character more interesting tha...