2019 IN REVIEW – My Favorites
Alright, so, as always with these things, I’m not claiming that these are necessarily the objectively best of the year, but rather my favorites, hence the title. Also, since I watch movies largely based on what I’m in the mood for, I don’t necessarily rank based on what I think are the overall best of my favorites, but rather I break the list down into genres, fitting each film into the one that I think best exemplifies their essence and what I would be looking for from them based on that genre. As a result, some of these could easily crossover into other genres, and I have notably placed musicals in places that you might not expect since I do not necessarily consider the presence of songs performed by characters to be a wholly unique genre — there can be musical horror films, after all, but the key distinguishing feature there is the horror element, since a fan of only musicals like Singin’ in the Rain aren’t likely to want to watch a gory movie in which characters tap dance on the heads of zombies. Make sense? Cool. So, without further ado… go screw yourselves, Oscars. I’m right, and I also beat you yet again.
Read more…2019 IN REVIEW – The Worst of the Year (…and also the ones in between)
Alright, so 2019 wasn’t the year I wound up kicking back into high gear with my writing, but I’m determined to get my list of best and worst movies reviewed before this early Oscars ceremony, and, dammit, if I have to cut out talking about the ones in the middle this time, I will!
First, though, I want to give a preview of the films you won’t be seeing on either list. These are films I saw and either liked or disliked, but didn’t particularly find to be extraordinary. If they are on the following section, they are anywhere from just mundanely bad to good, not great — at least in my opinion, of course…
| TITLE | RELEASE DATE | RATING (x/5) |
|---|---|---|
| Escape Room | 1/04/19 | 2 |
| The Upside | 1/11/19 | 2 |
| The Kid Who Would Be King | 1/25/19 | 3.5 |
| Cold Pursuit | 2/08/19 | 2 |
| What Men Want | 2/08/19 | 2 |
| Isn’t It Romantic | 2/13/19 | 3 |
| Alita: Battle Angel | 2/14/19 | 3 |
| How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World | 2/22/19 | 3 |
| Greta | 3/01/19 | 2.5 |
| Little | 4/12/19 | 1.5 |
| Missing Link | 4/12/19 | 3 |
| The Hustle | 5/10/19 | 1.5 |
| Pokémon Detective Pikachu | 5/10/19 | 3 |
| Brightburn | 5/24/19 | 2.5 |
| Ma | 5/31/19 | 3.5 |
| X-Men: Dark Phoenix | 6/07/19 | 2.5 |
| Late Night | 6/07/19 | 3 |
| Men in Black International | 6/14/19 | 2.5 |
| Child’s Play | 6/21/19 | 3.5 |
| Annabelle Comes Home | 6/26/19 | 3.5 |
| Stuber | 7/12/19 | 1.5 |
| The Lion King | 7/19/19 | 2.5 |
| Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw | 8/02/19 | 2.5 |
| Dora and the Lost City of Gold | 8/09/19 | 3.5 |
| Good Boys | 8/26/19 | 3 |
| Hustlers | 9/13/19 | 3.5 |
| Abominable | 9/27/19 | 2.5 |
| Pain and Glory | 10/04/19 | 3 |
| Let It Snow | 11/08/19 | 2 |
| Last Christmas | 11/08/19 | 2.5 |
| Noelle | 11/12/19 | 1.5 |
| Lady and the Tramp | 11/12/19 | 2.5 |
| Charlie’s Angels | 11/15/19 | 2.5 |
| Queen & Slim | 11/27/19 | 3.5 |
Right, so with all that out of the way, let’s get on to the real meat of this and present… my top 22 picks for the worst movies I saw from 2019…
Read more…
REVIEW – Rubber
Directed by: Quentin Dupieux
Produced by: Gregory Bernard, Julien Berian, Kevos Van Der Meiren
Written by: Quentin Dupieux
Edited by: Quentin Dupieux
Cinematography by: Quentin Dupieux
Music by: Gaspard Augé, Mr. Oizo
Starring: Stephen Spinella, Roxane Mesquida, Jack Plotnick, Wings Hauser, Ethan Cohn, Charley Koontz, Haley Ramm, Hayley Holmes, Daniel Quinn, Devin Brochu, David Bowe, Remy Thorne, Robert
Year: 2010
You didn’t think that my long absence from writing would mean that I was totally skipping Halloween 2019 entirely, did you? No sir. In fact, I’m hoping that this review will serve as a means of kicking me in the rear and getting me writing on a regular schedule again. While I had hoped that I would find motivation sooner in the month so as to provide you, my hypothetical reader, with a return to the month-long series of Halloween reviews, as the old saying goes, “Better late than never.” Maybe Christmas will turn out better? Speaking of things turning out better than expected, have you seen the movie Rubber? (Insert cliché joke about hacky segues.) Read more…
REVIEW – Avengers: Endgame
Directed by: Anthony Russo, Joe Russo
Produced by: Kevin Feige
Screenplay by: Christopher Markus, Stephen McFeely
Edited by: Jeffrey Ford, Matthew Schmidt
Cinematography by: Trent Opaloch
Music by: Alan Silvestri
Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Don Cheadle, Paul Rudd, Brie Larson, Karen Gillan, Danai Gurira, Bradley Cooper, Benedict Wong, Josh Brolin
Year: 2019
—
It’s been about 11 years since Marvel began this grand experiment that would change the way that people looked at superhero movies forever – yes, arguably even more so than Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight Trilogy and probably more so than even Richard Donner’s Superman. Twenty-two films and counting, all standing alone and yet tying into one another (with a few fringe TV shows on the side that are themselves ostensibly part of the same universe) and culminating into two films: last year’s Avengers: Infinity War, which saw Marvel doing the unthinkable and delivering on the promise that Thanos – the big bad teased at the end of the first Avengers film six years prior – would live up to the hype and even see the studio doing the unthinkable by letting the villain actually win, and now this film, Avengers: Endgame, the film that would feature the surviving heroes – conveniently including the ones who started it all – returned to the spotlight and going on a journey to correct what went wrong in what is arguably the most deserved victory lap film any studio has ever deserved. Does this one, with Infinity War setting the bar so high, live up to the standards set by its predecessor?… Well, if it doesn’t, it pretty damn well comes close! Read more…
REVIEW – Selena
Directed by: Gregory Nava
Produced by: Abraham Quintanilla Jr., Moctesuma Esparza, Robert Katz
Written by: Gregory Nava
Edited by: Nancy Richardson
Cinematography by: Edward Lachman
Music by: Dave Grusin
Starring: Jennifer Lopez, Edward James Olmos, Jon Seda, Constance Marie, Jacob Vargas, Lupe Ontiveros, Jackie Guerra, Rebecca Lee Meza, Panchito Gómez
Year: 1997
April 16, 2019 would have been the 48th birthday of influential Tejano singer Selena Quintanilla-Pérez. Tragically, Selena was murdered just shy of her 24th birthday on March 31, 1995 by the former head of her fan club, Yolanda Saldívar, who had been recently fired for embezzling money. Despite her young age and shortened career, Selena has gone on to become one of the highest selling Latino artists of all time and has gone on to be a major influence on countless artists after her. I was only 8 when she died and despite having heard a few of her songs here and there, I was not exactly aware of her as an artist until the film based on her life was released a mere two years after her death. The film became a staple in my family’s household, thanks in large part to my younger sister, who also had the film’s soundtrack and, I believe, some of Selena’s other albums. After moving out on my own, I largely forgot about the film beyond a few references (“Selinas!” “It looks like ‘Papa Yoyos’!” etc.), a general feeling that the film was mediocre, but the music was excellent, and so when theatres in my area decided to mark the singer’s birthday this past week with a screening, I decided to revisit the film and see if the experience could help me not only reassess it as a film, but see also if the film could provide me with some insight into the singer’s life, culture, and impact as an artist. Read more…
2018 IN REVIEW – My Favorites of the Year
I honestly didn’t know I ended up liking so many damn movies from 2018. Who knew? There’s a lot of reading here, so I’ll just cut to the chase… here are the 60(!) films I loved most from what turned out to be a pretty fantastic year of film, divided into categories, since I usually can’t seem to pit certain genres of movies against others. Consider this a roughly ordered list of the best films for any of your present moods! Read more…
2018 IN REVIEW – The Worst Movies of the Year
Alright, so I’m going to beat the Oscars, I just know it! … Personal goals aside, I did figure out that there were plenty of movies I liked or at least was indifferent to from 2018, much more than I hated. That being said, any year will have its stinkers, and here are 24 of them in rough order. I mean, it could change with time, but I feel good about this, currently, and definitely feel good about my top pick, so take this as kind of a list of terrible or even just really bland, boring movies from the year that leads up to the one to rule them all.
Read more…2018 IN REVIEW – The Movies In Between That I Have Seen…
Yes, I am, indeed, very late to starting this, but despite the agony of malaise, lack of motivation, and all sorts of other emotional afflictions I’ve been facing, I am determined to get my 2018 in Review series completed by the time the Oscars are awarded, starting with the films that I considered neither enjoyable nor awful enough to put on my favorites nor my worst of the year lists! As per usual, if you don’t see the movie here, there’s a good chance that I either didn’t see it in time, hated it, or maybe even loved it! Films that are on this list are not necessarily bad, mind you, but neither are they the greatest movies of the year.
Some of them were considered among the worst of the year, but I found something to enjoy in them, nonetheless, as is the case with the first movie on the list (which isn’t organized according to quality but rather release date within the US). Some of them either received widespread accolades or were loved by many, but I found them lacking in some way to not put it on my favorites list. Perhaps I found them boring or severely overrated? Three of the films on this list were nominated for Best Picture for multiple ceremonies, after all. Regardless, I hope you enjoy reading this list, even if I found none of them superlatively great nor bad. Please excuse the roughness due to aforementioned afflictions…
REVIEW – Olaf’s Frozen Adventure
Directed by: Kevin Deters, Stevie Wermers
Produced by: Roy Conli
Screenplay by: Jac Schaeffer
Edited by: Jeremy Milton, Jesse Averna
Cinematography by: Alessandro Jacomini, Cory Rocco Florimonte
Music by: Christophe Beck, Jeff Morrow
Songs by: Elyssa Samsel, Kate Anderson
Starring: Josh Gad, Kristen Bell, Idina Menzel, Jonathan Groff, Chris Williams, John de Lancie
Year: 2017
So, for Christmas this year, I decided to do something a bit different. Instead of Christmas films – the like of which I feel I’ve exhausted all good possibilities over the past 7 years – I’m going to be reviewing… Christmas shorts! Easier, quicker, and, for the most part, uncharted territory on this blog, with a couple exceptions. Read more…
REVIEW – A Quiet Place
Directed by: John Krasinski
Produced by: Michael Bay, Andrew Form, Brad Fuller
Written by: Bryan Woods, Scott Beck, John Krasinski
Edited by: Christopher Tellefsen
Cinematography by: Charlotte Bruus Christensen
Music by: Marco Beltrami
Starring: Emily Blunt, John Krasinski, Millicent Simmonds, Noah Jupe, Cade Woodward
Year: 2018
Damn. Who knew that Krasinski had this in him? Always an affable actor, Krasinski’s work behind the camera, unfortunately, has been less than… well, good up until this point. Krasinski made his directorial debut in 2009 with the David Foster Wallace adaptation Brief Interviews with Hideous Men, which seemingly passed through the public consciousness without much notice. It took another seven years for the actor-turned-director to take another shot at directing with 2016’s The Hollars, a star-studded family dramedy that similarly fizzled. Luckily, Krasinski seemingly isn’t one to back down, as his third film, A Quiet Place, is an unexpected, drastic departure from his previous two productions, with the director putting together a fairly intense, bold horror film that has me wondering if he just hadn’t found his niche until now. Read more…
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