Over seven years into my movie review website and BlacKkKlansman, this is the first Spike Lee-directed movie I’m reviewing. I actually did not realize this until I checked on his category and saw that he wasn’t listed as one of the directors in my categories list. It certainly isn’t because I don’t enjoy a good Spike Lee movie. I think it’s more than of my first 370+ reviews, more than 300 of them have been since 2010. And while Lee has certainly directed many films since 2010, I haven’t heard of nearly any of them. I did see (and enjoy) 2013’s Oldboy and am quite surprised I did not write a review on it. It is a movie that I will go back and watch again and review. But Lee is absolutely better known for the movies he directed over a 15-20 year period, starting with 1989’s Do the Right Thing and ending with 2006’s Inside Man. Shockingly, he does not have a Best Director Academy Award nomination to his credit and only has one real nomination at all (as a screenwriter for Do The Right Thing). While Lee isn’t a Steven Spielberg, he has directed a handful of movies so memorable that people can roll them out of their mouths at a moment’s notice. I mean, come on…in addition to the films mentioned, you’ve got Mo’ Better Blues, Jungle Fever, Malcolm X, He Got Game, Crooklyn, Clockers, The Original Kings of Comedy, 25th Hour…movie after movie with Rotten Tomato scores well over 65%. These are all movies that everyone should see before they die. I mean, seriously, how does Malcolm X not earn him a Best Director nomination. It is one of the greatest films ever made. Now I’m not going to sit here and say that BlacKkKlansmanis going to earn him that elusive Best Director nomination, but certainly enough of a movie to make Lee relevant again…something, unfortunately outside of sitting courtside of New York Knick basketball games, that he hasn’t been in over a decade.
Continue reading BlacKkKlansman (2018)
Category Archives: Adam Driver
Paterson (2016)
Adam Driver (Silence, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens) hasn’t been the most endearing character early in his career. It’s not entirely his fault, though, and Jim Jarmusch’s (Broken Flowers, Coffee and Cigarettes) has given me a new appreciation for him. The first movies I saw starring Driver were movies I absolutely abhorred (This Is Where I Leave You, While We’re Young), and my reason for disliking these so much wasn’t because of him, but because of the characters, he portrayed. Even in movies like Silence and Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens, I was not overly invested in his characters. He annoyed me in Star Wars more than anything else. He clearly played second fiddle to Andrew Garfield in Silence, a movie in which his more talented counterpart completely overshadowed Driver. Paterson has opened my eyes to his depth as an actor and, really in just the fifth movie that I’ve seen him in (I do not recall his performance at all in Inside Llewyn Davis, Lincoln, or Midnight Special), he proves to be relatable to and not someone who I find to be annoying.
Midnight Special (2016)
Midnight Special…First, the good. The tone was incredible. It was seductive. It was menacing. It was creepy. It was engaging. It kept you on the edge of your seat. Finally, it had the right director. Jeff Nichols (Mud, Shotgun Stories) is still pretty new to the game. This is just his fourth directorial effort, and, once again, Nichols teams up with Michael Shannon as his leading man (99 Homes, Revolutionary Road) for the first time since the absolutely incredible Take Shelter, a movie that was nothing short of a thing of genius. In addition to the amazing Take Shelter, Mud and Shotgun Stories were both fantastic movies. Midnight Special was supposed to be the next great chapter in the Nichols/Shannon book of greatness. Unfortunately, this was the furthest thing from the truth.
Continue reading Midnight Special (2016)
Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens (2015)
Honestly, there is no point in reading this review until after you’ve seen the movie. There is no way that my review on a Star Wars movie will influence whether you see this movie or not. So this review will have spoilers. Not to belittle my review, but this is mostly my honest thoughts on the film and not whether you should see it. If you come here quickly to look at the score, I gave it an 89/100. Undoubtedly if you’ve watched the other films, you need to see this film in the theater. If you are newer to the franchise and wonder which movies you need to see before watching Episode VII, I would say you should watch IV, V, and VI. Those are the ones that will help you best understand this film. There is no need to see I, II, or III. I don’t know if you can fully appreciate VII without seeing IV, V, and VI first. It is assumed that you have seen these films. If you haven’t, there is no real effort or desire to explain anything that happened in the past. Continue reading Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens (2015)
Inside Llewyn Davis (2013)
For every one of their blockbusters (True Grit, No Country For Old Men) or every one of their movies with grandiose, almost absurd plots (Fargo, Miller’s Crossing), there are the more subtle, lesser-watched but still critically acclaimed movies (A Serious Man, The Man Who Wasn’t There) by director brothers Joel Coen and Ethan Coen. In the mold of this last type of genre comes their first effort in three years, the simple yet thought-provoking Inside Llewyn Davis, a film that stars Oscar Isaac (Drive, Robin Hood) in, perhaps, the surprise performance of the year and the role that will land this talented young actor many more opportunities.
Continue reading Inside Llewyn Davis (2013)