What Maisie Knew was a movie that I accidentally watched twice. I couldn’t remember if I had seen it and was not entirely convinced until I was about 30 minutes in. But since I had already made it that far and I couldn’t remember anything that happened in the movie, I decided to stick it out. Now I remember why I had forgotten it all. It was worth forgetting. It’s not that it’s a bad movie. On the contrary, I would consider it to be a slightly above-average movie. The main problem with it is that it had much more potential than it lived up to, and the story that was trying to be told at the beginning of the movie was very different than the movie that was shown at the end. Continue reading What Maisie Knew (2013)
I’m not the biggest fan of reboots. I often think, “Why?” or “What’s the point?” or, “Can Hollywood not come up with an original idea?”. However, at the same time, I’m a big fan of origin stories. Usually, if the first movie in a franchise is good, I’ll keep watching the sequels until they start to stink. Once you lose me, though, you lose me, and I’m not coming back. So each subsequent movie in a franchise doesn’t necessarily need to be better than the starting movie (in fact, I don’t expect it to be), but it still better be pretty darn good. My favorite movies in the last decade include Batman Begins, Iron Man, and The Hangover. These three movies illustrate my point perfectly. The Dark Knight, unquestionably, and 
Emma Thompson (Howard’s End, Remains of the Day) got hosed out of an Oscar nomination! I had made it a goal to see all the nominees in all major Academy Award categories. Still, I didn’t see the snubs or the next in lines for Best Actor, Best Actress, etc., unless their movie received a nomination in one of the other major categories. It’s been a while since I reviewed all of the really good films of 2013. I’m sure I had already replaced Amy Adams (
If one trailer in 2013 left you thinking, “That movie could either be good or terrible,” it was the trailer of The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. This movie stars Ben Stiller, more or less, outside of his usual comedy genre. This movie is certainly not There’s Something About Mary or Meet the Parents. This isn’t the equivalent of Ed Helms in 
In many ways, Robert Mandel’s (F/X, The Substitute) School Ties is a timeless movie. Released in 1992, this movie, set around a prep school in the 1950s, is just as entertaining and essential 20 years after it was release date as it would have been if it had been, had it been released 20 years before. It revolves around a school’s honor code which has been, is, and always will be a topic that strikes at our inner core. We all view an honor code differently. We always have and will always continue to. For some of us, it’s a governing body that is more important than any criminal law. For others, it is something we sweep under the rug and forget about as quickly as we are informed about it. For most of us, it is something in between and can cause our thoughts to vary about it, to some degree, depending on time, place, and circumstance.