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.
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Category Archives: Topher Grace
Interstellar (2014)
Interstellar is a good movie that aims to be not just a great movie but a movie that people talk about for years and years to come. I imagine that there will be a circle of fans who will do this, but I think, for the majority of people, this will be a movie that they enjoy but won’t ever think of as being unique or legendary. I think this movie tried too hard to make that lasting impression rather than just live in the moment of making a great film. As I will mention below, this movie could have been much more straightforward and, in doing so, much more effective. I felt the first 45 minutes of the movie created a cast of characters and a setting in which numerous stories could have been told, and the film could have succeeded. I say this because Interstellar is, first and foremost, a space exploration movie with overtones of the importance of human relationships and weighing what is best for society against what is best for an individual. However, I would like to know if I recommend the movie. And I do recommend it. As much as I wanted it to be great, it wasn’t. But it was still good. At 168 minutes, it is at least 45 minutes too long. And the spaceship scenes themselves are absolutely brutal. There is way too much dull talk of esoteric physics that went straight over the heads of 90% of the audience. It wasn’t needed and forced you to try to use your brain to comprehend everything that was happening. That wasn’t why I was there. I go to movies to not have to use my brain.
Continue reading Interstellar (2014)