I have criticized Disney remakes in the past for their pointlessness; I have also given some a pass for their ability to entertain. The Lion King is not only a black hole of entertainment, it even goes […]
Tag: Adventure
Aladdin (Ritchie, 2019)
It is quite the relief when a movie that has been beleaguered with terrible promotion turns out to be better than expected. And let me tell you, Guy Ritchie’s Aladdin instilled no confidence before its release date. […]
Dumbo (Burton, 2019)
These Disney live-action remakes are threatening to create more cynics than converts, as we haven’t yet seen one that can stand on its own and make a case for itself. Worse yet, 2019 is going […]
Ready Player One (Spielberg, 2018)
Sorry Spielbergers. I’m not sure I’m the audience for this kind of stuff. I do admire the thoroughness of the VFX work and how wonderfully the different avatars are rendered, and the whole sequence inside The […]
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (Persichetti, Ramsey & Rothman, 2018)
It’s hard for some films to live up to hype. They’re talked up so much and made to seem like the greatest thing, and then when you get around to watching them, they can’t live […]
Mirai (Mamoru, 2018)
This is quite the shocking development for me, since I truly thought Mirai was going to be my deserving underdog for the Oscar this year. It’s hard not to root for Japanese anime whenever it’s nominated. It’s […]
The Wild Boys (Mandico, 2017)
What if Guy Maddin remade The Island of Dr. Moreau and it made it super gay? It’d probably be something like Bertrand Mandico’s The Wild Boys, which is an all-out unusual experience. Part coming-of-age narrative, part gay fantasia, […]
Incredibles 2 (Bird, 2018)
I’m very fond of the first Incredibles film, and by and large, its sequel is a welcome return. The characters are much the same as we’ve left them, as are their voice actors. Their personalities continue to […]
Mission: Impossible – Fallout (McQuarrie, 2018)
Fallout brings little that is new to the Mission: Impossible franchise. It also brings everything that is new. It’s not a contradiction as you would assume. To the first point, it follows similar currents that the other films […]
The Nutcracker and the Four Realms (Hallström & Johnston, 2018)
I’m not sure who asked for Disney to take The Nutcracker and its lore, dunk it in soul-numbing shellac, and turn it into a tedious fantasia for the holiday season. The ballet is still there, […]
The Ornithologist (Rodrigues, 2016)
Provocative and evocative. These two words are the best way to sum up João Pedro Rodrigues’ strange film The Ornithologist. Attempting to put a queer spin on the mythos of St. Anthony of Padua, Rodrigues charts […]
Paddington 2 (King, 2017)
We are lucky to have a film so pure, so in tune with what is right and decent, and so hugely entertaining as Paddington 2 is. I remember being similarly enchanted by the first film, despite initially […]
Star Wars: The Force Awakens (Abrams, 2015)
I do think that The Force Awakens leans a little too heavily on the mythos of the first trilogy, almost repackaging the journeyman hero elements of A New Hope and sending it out to us as though it were […]
Star Wars: The Last Jedi (Johnson, 2017)
Big, bold and beautiful. It’s hard to describe Rian Johnson’s achievements here any other way. This is the kind of Star Wars film that lives up to the grandeur of the title: high stakes galore, with whopping […]
Ferdinand (Saldanha, 2017)
Ferdinand is a difficult film to dislike, what with its sympathetic hero and the colourful characters supporting his journey. I quite like its firm stance against the barbaric spectacle of bullfighting, and if you dig […]
The Lonely Film Critic 