In 'The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part', we're introduced to a new character (Rex Dangervest) who shows up early on in the story to help Emmet on his journey to save his friends. Emmet quickly begins to idolize Rex as he represents all the manly, heroic traits that he lacks himself. As a source of humor and meta-commentary on the career of Chris Pratt—who voices both characters—Rex is a welcome addition to the series. His backstory and arc throughout the film, however, introduce a huge problem into the world-building of the franchise. In my opinion, they kind of brick the universe.
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'Serenity' doesn't have a twist ending. At best the trailer is simply withholding information.
When reviews for 'Serenity' began dropping online, there was one common thread across every headline. Every single one exclaimed the ridiculousness of the films "twist ending". While I agree the film is ridiculous on the whole, it is consistently so and doesn't suddenly become the film it is at the end. The film telegraphs its reality so overtly from the [near] beginning, that you can't even call it foreshadowing anymore. To put it simply, there is no actual twist.
Read MoreWhich movie subscription service should you get?
For the first several years of it's existence, MoviePass remained the movie-going public's best-kept secret. A revolutionary service that would allow you to essentially see "unlimited" theatrical releases for one reasonable monthly fee. In the beginning the pricing structure was maybe a little cost-prohibitive for casual movie-goers, but as the price came down it quickly became unconscionable to NOT have a MoviePass account. They're no longer the only game in town though. We already have two competing movie subscription services with a third rolling out in beta now. If you haven't hopped on the bandwagon yet, there's no better time than now. The question is, which movie subscription service should you get?
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The truth about the ending of 'The Shape of Water'
The Shape of Water is a beautiful film and I hope that its Best Picture win will encourage more people to seek it out. Back when we reviewed the film for The Spoiler Warning Podcast, I stated what I thought were obvious observations about the ending of the film. Mainly that the character of Giles paints a fairytale end with his narration to obscure the true tragedy of the films narrative. I was quite surprised with the pushback I received for my reading of the film. Having revisited the film, I felt inspired to collect my arguments here. Obviously, spoilers to follow.
Read MoreForget rising ticket prices, where have all the showtimes gone?
With the economy the way it is, everyone has been feeling the pinch. For the average consumer, and business owner alike, this means cutting costs and doing whatever they can to make an extra buck. If you’ve been to the movies any time in the last year, you’ve probably noticed a pretty drastic rise in the cost of a movie ticket. While this has had many people up in arms, I’ve caught on to an even worse trend. Theater owners everywhere have been cutting back on their operating hours and even dropping all of their morning showtimes...
Read MoreHow this trend in video game films could actually improve future video gmes and future films based on them
Lets face it, the film industry is sort of hurting right now. They’re desperately searching for anything with a preestablished audience to turn into a crap film that millions of people are going to see regardless of it’s quality. They’re doing it with novels, older movies, comic books, and even video games. Now history has taught us that video games make really bad films (i.e. the Street Fighters, Mortal Kombats, Super Mario Brothers, Double Dragon, Resident Evil, Doom, etc). Recently, however, we’ve begun to hear of some video game to film adaptations that actually stand a chance of being decent (if not brilliant) films. If these films continue to crop up and do well at the box office, we could actually see an improvement in the quality of video games in general as companies shoot for film adaptations...
Read MoreSpoilers vs. Familiarity
If you’ve ever been excited about a film, only to have major plot elements ruined for you by some jerk, then you know that spoilers are one of the worst things you can possibly experience as a filmgoer. While a film may be worth repeat viewings, you’ll never be able to recreate that first time experience. Lately, however, I’ve been finding that my favorite filmgoing experiences are for films that I already have an intimate familiarity with.
Read MoreA good 'bad film' vs. a bad 'good film'
Judging film can be quite difficult. If I’m just watching casually, each viewing can be an isolated experience and I can love or hate it in it’s own right. However, being a host of a film enthusiast podcast, I feel more of an obligation to justify every opinion I have and judge each film within the context of every film that I’ve seen before it. I mean, I really struggle with the fact that I enjoyed Push and Crank High Voltage, but thought Seven Pounds was a terrible film. The more I think about it, the more I feel that there really is a difference between a good ‘bad film’ and a bad ‘good film’.
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