Entering awards season two years removed from the success of his directorial debut
The Father, a film that was nominated for six Academy Awards, winning two, Florian Zeller’s follow-up,
The Son, had some lofty, albeit slightly unrealistic expectations, if for no other reason that some deemed it a continuation of the story. In contrast, others viewed its Christmas Day limited release to mean that the production company believed the movie would hopefully receive the same critical acclaim (
98% critics, 94% audience) as
The Father and wanted to keep the film fresh in voters’ minds as possible. Sadly, the film failed to resonate with either group
(a paltry 26% critics and a lukewarm 67% audience). As a result, the film will fail to reach $1,000,000 at the box office despite a star-studded cast that flanked (and outmatched) the relatively unknown Zen McGrath (
Dig), who played the title character.
Continue reading The Son (2022) →
Love it or hate it. There isn’t much middle ground or neutrality regarding Damien Chazelle’s (La La Land, First Man) divisive Babylon, a fantastical look at the debaucherous look at the rise and fall of the Hollywood movie industry during the 1920s. While some might believe its 56% /52 % scores on Rotten Tomatoes suggest it’s an ordinary movie, those average scores may result from people either loving or hating it. I enjoyed the movie. It is far from being in my top ten of the year. With only a couple of 2022 films left to watch, Babylon sits at #16 (out of the 74 2022-released films I’ve seen). It’s a fine film and one that is worth viewing.
Heavy military boot comp movies cannot help but draw comparisons to Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket. The groundbreaking drama showcased the great lengths that United States Military Academies sometimes go too far to “break” their recruits. Another great example is the under-appreciated but long-remembered G.I. Jane. Both films featured recruits that were not wanted (Full Metal Jacket with the obese, dimwitted Leonard “aka Gomer Pyle” Lawrence (played fantastically by Vincent D’Onofrio) in Full Metal Jacket or Demi Moore as the lone trial candidate of a U.S. Navy female integration program in G.I. Jane. A similar example is Men of Honor, the story of Carl Brashear (Cuba Gooding Jr.), the first African-American U.S. Navy Diver.
While the lock for this year’s Best International Feature Film appears to be the fantastically made 
In a day and age when far too many movie trailers give away the entire movie, it is refreshing when a well-marketed one gives us just a hint to grab our interest. For me, I’ll start a preview. The second I deem a movie worth seeing, I stop watching the trailer. It’s a little more complicated when I’m in the movie theater. I don’t want to be ‘that guy’ who closes his eyes and plugs his years. However, with the runtime of movies getting longer and longer and the ability to choose seats ahead, I often don’t arrive at my seat until right before the movie starts. I got the basic jest of Marc Forster’s (