The Movie Guy

The best movie surprise this year may very well be “Creed,” a sequel to the “Rocky” franchise that manages to evoke all of what you loved about the original 1976 film and refashion the classic underdog story for a whole new generation of filmgoers.

You know the story: Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone), an amateur fighter whose brawn is valued over brains by the Philadelphia street syndicate, is given a chance at boxing’s heavyweight championship via a slick PR move by reigning champ Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers) – Creed giving the chance to an unknown fighter dubbed “The Italian Stallion” from America’s birthplace during the bicentennial is too good a hook to pass up. Unfortunately, the plan backfires on Creed when he realizes Rocky’s literal left hook is just as good. Though Creed dodges Balboa’s bullet and retains his title in a split decision, Rocky proves himself in the ring and wins over the audience, including those in the theater- shot over 28 days for $960,000, “Rocky” won three Oscars (including Best Picture) and grossed $225 million. Continue reading →

“Room” achieves what independent films do best; it provides good actors with great material and uses a subtle approach to produce a deeper meaning. Given its sensational subject matter, “Room’s” subjectively-viewed character study gives the film a depth and strength lacking in studio movies. In its story of Joy (Brie Larson), a 24-year old girl trying to escape her 7-year kidnapped-confined prison with her 5-year old son, Jack (fathered by her captor), “Room” gives its audience a tense build to their literal breakout while providing a figurative breakout in the acting performance of Jacob Tremblay as Jack. Continue reading →

“Spectre” gives James Bond fans the long-awaited reunion of the classic super spy with his arch nemesis, the evil organization S.P.E.C.T.R.E. and, while highly-polished, does so in such a slow and tedious way to build to a comic-book climax that it really puts the “Uh-oh” in 007.

After 53 years of the James Bond film franchise, the expectations for any Bond film fan are pretty standard: gadgets, girls, guns, exotic locales, spectacular stunts, and an eccentrically extravagant villain hell-bent on world domination. Over the years, particularly in the mid-‘80s, the ideas and storylines in writer Ian Fleming’s original Bond novels had become exhausted and tiredly combined and copied to produce more Bond films- wasn’t 1985’s “A View to A Kill” just a pale copy of 1964’s “Goldfinger”? So, it was a relief when the Broccoli family, producers of the Bond films, decided to go back to basics and revitalize the franchise in 2006 with their adaptation of Fleming’s first Bond novel “Casino Royale.” Continue reading →

I found myself surprisingly moved by the overall message of “The Walk,” Hollywood’s retelling of the “incredible true story” of Philippe Petit’s high wire walk across the 140-foot span between New York City’s World Trade Center towers on Aug. 6, 1974. Rising above cliché and avoiding disastrous results like Petit himself, director Robert Zemeckis manages to craft a modern-day fairy tale using amazing special effects to tell the story of Petit’s absolutely true and incredible feat. Continue reading →

If there are no original story ideas and new stories evolve from combining old storylines, Ridley Scott’s “The Martian” is the perfect example- its story of abandoned astronaut/botanist Mark Watney (Matt Damon) trying to survive on the surface of Mars while NASA attempts to save him through a daring space mission is really just a major mash-up of two Tom Hanks films: “Cast Away” and “Apollo 13.” The most impressive thing about “The Martian” is that Scott and Damon almost make you forget the familiar material through good directing and likable acting. It’s fantastical finale, however, test the limits of your credulity. Continue reading →

With “Black Mass,” Warner Bros. continues its tradition of their classic gangster movies from the ‘30s and ‘40s by depicting the rise and fall of real-life South Boston crime lord James ‘Whitey’ Bulger and gives Johnny Depp one of his best performances.

Beginning in 1975, “Black Mass” traces the events of Whitey’s rise to power and eventual fall through the 20-year alliance with childhood friend and fellow ‘Southie,’ FBI agent John Connelly (Joel Edgerton). Returning to Boston, Connelly wants to make a name for himself and rise through the ranks of the FBI by stamping out the Italian mafia influence of the Angiulo family in the North End. He reaches out to Whitey’s brother, Billy (Benedict Cumberbatch) to meet with Whitey and get the secret street information that will bring down the Angiulo family. Billy, now a Senator, can’t be involved with his criminal brother but cryptically says if Connelly’s looking for Whitey, Whitey will find him. Continue reading →

If you’re waiting for M. Night Shyamalan to deliver the power punch felt in his first feature film “The Sixth Sense,” you’ll have to wait a little longer- his new horror film “The Visit” feels almost like a backhanded slap in comparison. While the film’s intentions are good, it suffers from its own misdirection and its sting and impact quickly fade.

I like Shyamalan or any director with style and smarts behind what they’re doing. However, with “The Visit,” his good intentions betray him. Employing the hand-held camera/found footage technique used in horror movies like “The Blair Witch Project,” Shyamalan legitimately uses this technique to deliver the surprising twist/payoff so many of his fans have come to look forward to and expect. However, in using this technique solely for the sake of the twist, he undercuts the plausibility of the story to such a degree that even the novelty of its unique perspective can’t reap the visual scares or surprises you’d think would be in store. Continue reading →

This review is brought to you by the letter ‘S.’

If there were three words I’d use to describe Paul Weitz’s film “Grandma,” they’d be smart, sarcastic and sensitive. They’d also be the words I’d use to describe Lily Tomlin, a comedienne I’ve loved for 50 years who plays the title role of “Grandma”. Elle Reid is a woman who embarks on a road-trip journey into her past to secure money for her granddaughter Sage’s (Julia Garner) abortion in the course of a few hours’ time. Because I grew up loving Tomlin’s work and what I liked so much about “Grandma” seems to be rooted in ‘S’ words, I figured I’d have fun telling you about how much I liked this movie by stealing from the TV show I grew up watching- “Sesame Street.”

Sesame Street & Saturday Night Live: The first time I saw Lily Tomlin was in 1975, the first season of Saturday Night Live. In SNL’s first season, Jim Henson’s Muppets had their own skits and I remember Tomlin hosting (having gained fame for her work on Rowan and Martin’s “Laugh-In” portraying characters like the precocious, rocking-chair bound child Edith Ann who spouted outrageous stories ending with the tagline “That’s the truth” and also just coming off of her Academy Award nomination for supporting actress in Robert Altman’s “Nashville”) and hugging a Muppet at the end of the skit. From that moment, I liked Tomlin and wanted to know more about her. Continue reading →

I really enjoyed “The Gift,” a suspense thriller that reminded me a lot of one of those good hour-long “Alfred Hitchcock Presents” TV episodes from the ‘60’s. If you’ve never seen an “Alfred Hitchcock Presents” episode, I’ll explain.

To provide competition for CBS’s success with “The Twilight Zone,” NBC decided to create its own anthology series that focused more on suspense than sci-fi. Their answer was “Alfred Hitchcock Presents” hosted by the ‘Master of Suspense’ himself, Alfred Hitchcock. What made “Presents” different from “Zone” was depicting more humanistic dramas than “Zone’s” penchant for other-worldly entities invading ordinary life. “Presents” episodes focused on the criminal aspects of the human condition- namely murder, theft and betrayal. What both series had in common was their goal to end each episode with the plausibly ironic or unsettling ending that would endear themselves to their viewer. While “Zone’s” endings felt like a surprise punch to the gut, “Presents” built slowly towards endings that were not only plausibly surprising but, in dealing with our human faults, made these endings all the more creepy and disturbing. Unlike “Zone’s” showy stage, “Presents” showcased actors in a stage both efficient and sparse- more like an episode of “Playhouse 90” that felt like you were watching a Broadway play. “The Gift” has all of that efficient staging and showcases actors in a story built on our humanistic faults of malice and revenge; its effectiveness is its culmination to a conclusion that leaves its viewer plausibly surprised, unsettled and disturbed. Continue reading →

“Mission: Impossible- Rogue Nation” plays out like a good game of chess and winds up being the perfect summer movie.

The chess analogy fits the story: The IMF (Impossible Missions Force), headed by Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise), is out to stop its direct mirror image (described in the film as the “Anti-IMF”) called the Syndicate- a government-born covert operative group whose members consist of missing, believed-dead, or disavowed agents that has gone rogue and are now a global terrorist threat. So good is the Syndicate that when Ethan goes to receive his IMF orders by playing a record in the listening booth of a London record shop, it’s the Syndicate that have made the record: its leader Solomon Lane (Sean Harris) reveals himself to Ethan and gasses the listening booth, abducting Ethan and taking him to a secure location where they can exact methods of torture to extract information. Continue reading →