The Last Days on Mars
Star Blech Starring: Liev Schreiber, Olivia Williams Review written by Robert D. Patrick Ah, makeshift habitats erected in space. Sterile ivory chambers that are crosshatched with artificial light? Check. Blinking keypads in a padded labyrinth of human megalomania? Tick that box. These are typical sights for films dealing with space exploration. Never forget that our species wanders in an incubator comprised of eggshell safety. The...
Out of the Furnace
Sticks and Stones Starring: Christian Bale, Casey Affleck Review written by Robert D. Patrick Scott Cooper’s windswept, booze soaked, throaty debut won the bedraggled Jeff Bridges an Oscar in 2010. Cooper’s opus, a film about a weathered country singer on the precipice of demise, was a minimalist project that worked because of the steel guitar twang and the gutsy, visceral performance of its lead. “I felt like if we...
The World’s End
Of Suds and Sods Starring: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost Review written by Robert D. Patrick The World’s End is about five raucous, syllable bending Brits whom white knuckle barley pops with feverish gusto (most of that is accurate). The old pals reunite, after absconding from one another twenty years earlier, to take on a fanged beast of a pub crawl that they failed to slay in their youth. The mad capped league of friends, headed by...
Kick-Ass 2
Utopian Toilet Humor Starring: Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Chloe Grace Moretz Review written by Tom Bevis As far as books go, “Kick-Ass” is special to me. Not because it’s particularly that great or because I love it so much or anything, but because it’s one of the few Mark Millar books I actually liked. It’s not particularly good (you can read my thoughts on the original comic book and the first film) but it’s effective. In...
Elysium
Paradise Lost; Subsequently Found By Matt Damon Starring: Matt Damon, Jodie Foster Review written by Andrew Younger In dystopian storytelling, the protagonist often serves as little more than an avatar for the audience in order to explore some exaggerated negative feature of civilization. In order to be an effective audience surrogate, whether it is Winston Smith or Bernard Marx or Josef K., the dystopian protagonist only needs to...
Redemption
Post-Traumatic Stress Diss-Order Starring: Jason Statham, Agata Buzek Review written by Robert D. Patrick Jason Statham comes with baying gunfire, the expression of an Easter Island statue, and a jaw stubble reminiscent of Marvel’s Punisher. One does not often shoehorn the herculean actor’s block-like frame under the hood of a movie that demands bruised introspection and barbed self-exploration. In Redemption, director...
World War Z
Call of Duty: Zombie Mode The Movie Starring: Brad Pitt, Mireille Enos Review written by Tom Bevis A lot of people said World War Z, Max Brooks’ sequel to The Zombie Survival Guide, couldn’t faithfully be adapted. In a lot of regards, they’re right. Not as a film, anyway – the spanning and erratic narrative, told as an oral history of a world-wide zombie epidemic spanning tens of years, is more suited for television than for...
Man of Steel
Man of Get Me Out of Here This is Terrible Starring: Henry Cavill, Amy Adams Review written by Robert D. Patrick Fluffy, steaming hot pancakes with a dollop of butter on top. A broken levee of maple syrup lacquers your flapjacks as your incisors ravenously saw apart a piece of juicy bacon. And if you’re in the mood to be a little mercurial, you can always stuff your frothing maw with the chicken fajita omelette, adorned with a...
After Earth
Smith 2 Smith Starring: Will Smith, Jaden Smith I’m about to really bum you guys out, so I hope you can forgive me. After Earth is not a Will Smith movie. Here’s a shortlist of things I learned about the future from After Earth: 1) In 1000 years, whales will have two blow holes. 2) Also, in 1000 years, climbing a volcano will seem like a good idea. Not that astounding, I know, but no one’s walking into this theater to learn stuff. The...
The Hangover Part III
Sequel: The Sequel Starring: Ed Helms, Bradley Cooper Review written by Tom Bevis Full disclosure, here: I didn’t see The Hangover Part Two. Or The Hangover Part II, whichever they decided to roll with. Why didn’t I, you may ask? Because I liked the first one a lot. It mixed dirty comedy, ridiculous scenarios, and a mystery just one step below any neo-noir picture being made today. I wasn’t so surprised that it exploded the way it...