Film Review: AVENGERS INFINITY WAR

Wow.  The term epic gets thrown around a lot when describing films these days, but it is truly applicable here.  Marvel and Disney swung for the fence with this movie, making a film worthy of being considered the culmination of 10 years and 18 films in the most successful big screen franchise of all time, and knocked it out of the park.  How does this movie even exist?  As a movie-going audience we have come to accept big blockbuster film events consisting of superhero crossovers as the norm.  It is difficult to remember only 10 years ago when Iron Man suddenly made “shared universes” a thing.  While I was driving to Thursday’s midnight showing with my wife, I was geeking out over the fact that when I was growing up we had Superman, Batman and Ninja Turtles as options for comic book movies and now the Avengers are fighting alongside the Guardians of the Galaxy and Black Panther (a relatively unknown character outside comic book circles who just appeared in a sensational solo movie that continues to rake in massive box office dollars) battling Thanos across the globe and cosmos.

Film Review: Logan

My wife and I checkout out Logan as part of a date night double feature last weekend and were surprised to find we liked it more that Beauty and the Beast (see that review here).  Logan easily stands as the best solo Wolverine movie since X-Men Origins was terrible in every conceivable way and, despite having good moments, The Wolverine was ultimately average and unforgettable (I’d kill to see the Darren Aronofsky version of that film).  Logan arguably is one of the best X-films, contending with X-man 2 and First Class.  The funny thing is they managed to create a great superhero movie by tossing out the superhero movie formula and crafting something totally different.  Logan plays more like a western and aptly references the classic film Shane during its runtime.  Simply put, because of its unique style for a superhero movie it won’t be for everyone, but I found it to be a strong movie and a fitting tribute to Hugh Jackman’s time as the iconic hero.

Film Review: Beauty and the Beast

Tale as old as time…

This one is difficult for me to write.  I wanted to love this movie.  I was born in 1984 so the Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin era of Disney make up my childhood movies, the films I’ve seen 100 times and hold a special place in my heart.  While there may be other animated movies that I consider to be my personal favorites (I love Aladdin and The Incredibles), Beauty and the Beast may well be the most perfect animated feature ever made and one that easily lends itself to live action adaptations on the big screen or the stage.  Knowing that opinion I have of the 1991 classic, you’ll understand why it pains me to say that I did not like this movie.

Film Review: Rogue One – A Star Wars Story

Film review for Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.

Film Review: Jungle Book

Disney has been dominating the box office and will for years to come with Marvel, Star Wars and Pixar now residing at the Mouse House.  However, what they are still best known for are their animated offerings and there has been a concerted effort to adapt many of these well-known classics into live action films for the big screen.  Alice In Wonderland, Maleficent and Cinderella were all successful both critically and commercially, but with Jungle Book Disney is taking their biggest risk yet.  Yes, Jungle Book is a well-known property with characters and songs that are extremely memorable, but a movie featuring photo-realistic animals shown talking and a runtime consisting of almost entirely CGI had the potential to fail royally and keep theater-goers away.  If you’ve checked the box office returns this clearly isn’t the case and that is because this movie is much better than it has any reason to be.

Lion King Trailer

Check out the latest trailer for Disney’s live(ish)-action adaptation of Lion King, set to arrive in theaters July 19, 2019.

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Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Trailer

Check out the trailer for Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker.  The film marks the conclusion of the 9-film main Star Wars movies dubbed the “Skywaker Saga” and will arrive in theaters December 20, 2019.

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Trailer for The Twilight Zone

Check out the trailer from the revival of The Twilight Zone, hosted and narrated by Jordan Peele (Us, Get Out).  The show will premiere with two episodes April 1 on CBS All Access and then Thursday nights beginning April 11.