Category: Reviews
Kathryn Bigelow’s fierce, fervent Detroit is a loud cry for change
Kathryn Bigelow’s Detroit pushes its atmosphere like an invading force. Through sheer will and punishing fury, it leaves a charred, empty sense of helplessness, and there’s nothing that can be done to salve the burn. Indeed, audiences who watch Bigelow’s dramatization of the Algiers Motel tragedy will feel the wrath of her filmmaking. An uncomfortable,…
‘Spider-Man: Homecoming’ will ensnare you in its web
Someone open the shutters, swing open the drapes, and let the sunshine in! Everyone’s favorite web-slinging superhero Spider-Man has his groove back in the joyous Spider-Man: Homecoming. After an early 2010s run with mixed results and the worry that a new stab at the spider would put audiences off the iconic character, Marvel Studios has…
With ‘Baby Driver,’ Edgar Wright revs up an instant classic
Through the smash-bang symphony Baby Driver, Edgar Wright, the beloved genre king behind Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead, brings passion to pulp. Baby Driver is nearly two hours of joy, spontaneity, creativity and gripping gravity, all packaged in a Rube Goldberg machine, where every finger tap, blinking light, music note, street sign and…
Cars 3 floors past predecessor, gets series back on road
With the weight of its predecessor weighing down on it like 500 Hummers, the newest installment in Pixar’s Cars universe floors it back to where it all began, and finds its footing (err, wheeling?). The first Cars films was an amiable, loving ode to small town values (the “Our Town” sequence a damning fist to…
Wonder Woman an epic step forward in blockbuster filmmaking
In the immortal words of Dolly Levi, “it takes a woman!” It’s precisely the lesson Hollywood needed to learn as it scratched its head, wondering how to keep the highly-lucrative superhero genre afloat in a sea of familiarity and waning patience from audiences and critics alike. They wanted something fresh. They got it. Tinseltown has…