I have very little patience for movies with plots fueled solely by one character inexplicably not telling another character a key piece of information. My patience is particularly tested when the information in question actually isn’t very damaging. And so this week’s feature, People Like Us, was kind of an exercise in patience. The central […]
I wish I knew what it would feel like to walk into a screening of Brave knowing nothing. Although I would miss out on the little somersault my stomach does whenever it sees Pixar’s little lamp mascot pop out of frame, I wish I could experience Brave knowing nothing of Up and Wall*E, Tangled and […]
In the interest of full disclosure, I should probably admit that I feel a greater connection with the characters on Girls than I probably have with any characters since Freaks and Geeks. I should probably also admit that this connection is a double edged sword, given how often people like to casually toss off the […]
How has your summer movie season been going? Despite an early high, I’ve been in a bit of a movie slump of late, with a string of films that failed to connect with me. Last week’s Brave gave me some hope that it could be turning around, though, which leads us directly into the lovely […]
Matthew Weiner said that this season of Mad Men was about the unhappiness at the center of contentment. The season finale, “Phantom,” dealt with this idea explicitly – making that subtext text by having not one, but two characters explain exactly how little any of our characters’ success means to them. Pete, in a heart […]
I recently read an article on Cracked about the way that many classic sci-fi and fantasy films disguise incredibly straight forward stories with amazing worlds. Take Avatar. The movie itself is incredibly straightforward. Many, many people have criticized the fact that it is essentially the same plot as Pocahontas or Dances with Wolves. But the […]
When Veep first premiered, Kelly took the show to task for being endlessly cynical and overusing “shocking” profanity. She also admitted to being a West Wing-raised idealist. I’ve never seen The West Wing (a pop culture omission that makes me feel only slightly less ashamed than the fact that I’ve never seen Jaws), but I would […]
After last week’s (sadly unreviewed by me) action battle awesomefest, I spent most of this week’s Game of Thrones wanting to hug the characters. Maybe that’s not the right reaction to have to characters so completely embroiled in the Game of Thrones, but tell me you didn’t get a bit teary eyed watching Tyrion come […]