Movie Reviews

      Upgrade is an unexpected triumph.  I call it unexpected because the title of this movie is horrible (every time I say the title, I say it like Maya Rudolph’s character in Idiocracy, where it sounds more like “upgrayde”), and the marketing of the movie made it look like the kind of throwaway action flick we get every year: low budget, violent, minor actors, etc. But Upgrade is far more than that.  Upgrade is a smart, thrilling, compelling,…

      Here’s a brief conversation between myself and my girlfriend while watching Adrift:   Girlfriend: How long is this movie? Me: Two hours. Girlfriend: How much longer do we have? Me: *looks at watch* an hour. Girlfriend: *sighs* I feel Shailene Woodley’s pain.   I wasn’t in nearly as much pain watching this movie as my girlfriend was, but this brief conversation sums up a lot of how I feel about Adrift, a poorly constructed,…

In one of the first scenes of Ron Howard’s Solo, we get an encounter between Han Solo (Alden Ehrenreich) and an Imperial desk clerk.  Solo is a small time crook who has found his way off the streets by joining the Imperial Army.  Here is how the encounter went down: Imperial Desk Clerk: Name? Han Solo: Han. Clerk: Last name? Han stares silently into the distance. Clerk: Your last name?  Who are your people? Han:…

      Deadpool is back!  But this time, it’s personal.  After the funny, entertaining, game-changing first film, the Merc with the Mouth changes gears in this sequel, which offers up more blood, characters, action, and, more impressively, more depth and emotion. After tragedy strikes our foul-mouthed mercenary, Wade Wilson/Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) must find a new meaning of life and does so in a troubled mutant named Russell (Julian Dennison).  When Russell is being hunted…

      This is a 100% SPOILER FREE review, so if the length is a little short, it’s for you as a reader to not be spoiled.     The 2018 cinematic event is finally here!  After eighteen movies over the past ten years, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has come to this point, where the heroes that we have grown to love over the last decade face their biggest challenge yet: Thanos, an intergalactic…

      Mac, Rabbit, Thorny, Foster, and Farva are back for some more shenanigans in Super Troopers 2, the crowd-funded sequel to the 2001 cult stoner comedy.  The original Super Troopers gained notoriety with the midnight movie crowd as a classic, quotable stoner comedy of pure ridiculousness. Now most comedy sequels don’t work.  Movies like Caddyshack 2, The Whole Ten Yards, The Hangover Part II (and Part III for that matter) all failed miserably to live up to their predecessors.  Great…

      According to www.dictionary.com, the definition of the word rampage is, “violent or excited behavior that is reckless, uncontrolled, or destructive.”  This definition describes what I wanted out of this film.  I wanted complete and utter chaos.  I wanted heightened, ridiculous, over-the-top action.  That was it.  The plot, characters, acting, none of that matter.  I just wanted mayhem. Unfortunately, I only got that for the last third of the movie, which was everything I…

      A Quiet Place is a movie set in a world of silence.  This is a dystopian future where people must survive mysterious creatures who are blind, but incredibly sound sensitive.  The movie itself is very quiet, because that is how our characters will survive.  But what first time director and star John Krasinski does so well is immerse us in this horrifying world.  There was a moment during the film where I…

      Blockers is one of the funniest movies I have seen in a long, long time.  In fact, I’d have to go back to 21 Jump Street back in 2012 to find a comedy that I laughed this hard in.  But what makes Blockers the best comedy of 2017 so far – as well as one of the best movies of the year so far – is the balance of laughs and heart mixed with rounded…