***1/2 out of **** Rated R (for strong language, drug material, and peril of children) Released: Late 2018 limited; February 15, 2019 expands Runtime: 126 minutes Directed by: Nadine Labaki Starring: Zain Al Rafeea, Yordanos Shiferaw (Rahil), Boluwatife Bankole (Yanos), Kawsar Al Haddad, Fadi Yousef, Nour El Husseini, Elias Khoury Life on the streets for a [...]
After over forty years, the Skywalker Saga has finally been told. Now, the final chapter just needs to be put together. Writer/Director J.J. Abrams tweeted this image from the final day of shooting for Star Wars: Episode IX, when production finally wrapped. The new trilogy trio -- Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, and Oscar Isaac -- [...]
Released: February 15, 2019 Runtime: 73 minutes for entire shorts program Program: Oscar Nominated Animated Shorts for 2018 During every Oscar ceremony, there’s a stretch of categories with nominees that virtually no one has ever even heard of, let alone seen: the shorts. Divided into three competitive groups – Animated, Live Action, and Documentary – the Academy Award nominated [...]
First The Rider, then this, and now this?! That trinity of indie glory may anoint Chloé Zhao as the filmmaker I'm most fascinated by right now. The Rider, which I ranked #4 on my Top Ten List for 2018, was a moving breakthrough of small indepedent cinema on multiple levels, not the least of which is [...]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=118&v=eSLe4HuKuK0 Just when I was ready to let it go, Frozen II pulls me back in. Despite my love for the original Frozen, the pop culture zeitgeist that blew up into a phenomenon became too saturated. Then what really left me cold was that lame Christmas episode tagged onto the front of Coco, followed by [...]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=134&v=nr2g8zRwX4Q We're all tired of the over-burdened superheroes, already, and Shazam! knows it. As this latest featurette shows, the comedy-driven Big-style entry from DC chucks angst for awe, and is fueled by a spirit of OMG NO WAY fun. Starring Zachary Levi in the title role and Jack Dylan Grazer (IT) as his middle school [...]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Girzu81oS8Q An inevitable biopic -- arguably even long overdue -- the movie about Middle Earth creator J.R.R. Tolkien has finally be made. The film's first teaser trailer reveals...pretty much what you'd expect, if not exactly, as it juxtaposes real-life events (from serving in WWI to his time as a student at Oxford) against visions of [...]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=58&v=fOJ9YhY9v0Q I think I know why the previews for the new live action Aladdin movie look so bad: Disney seems to have put all of their best artists on the live action Dumbo. Okay, obviously that's not the case, but the stark difference in quality (not to mention originality between the two sets of previews starts with [...]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=58&v=7hHECMVOq7g When the first teaser for the Mouse House's live action Aladdin premiered, I said, "Disney's going to have to do a lot better than this with their next, first full trailer..." Well this may only be a new TV spot (above) and not a full legit trailer, but it's certainly not doing better. If [...]
Roma just became the film to beat. Despite winning 7 awards over all, The Favourite did not emerge from the BAFTAs (The British Academy of Film & Television Arts) -- a.k.a. the British Oscars -- as the favorite for a Best Picture win later this month at Hollywood's Oscar gala. That would appear to be Roma, [...]