Medium Mashup

Category: Movie Reviews

  • Gone Girl Review – Playing with Genre

    gone-girl_c99723(Because Gone Girl has been out and available for some time now, I will be talking spoilers in this review. Also, because this review skews toward a broader discussion of genre, I am including it as a “review” and a “deep end” piece)

    Six months after its release, I have finally gotten around to watching David Fincher’s Gone Girl. During that time, it had been nigh-impossible to avoid spoilers altogether (Neil Patrick Harris even spoiled his own death during the Oscars), but I did my best, and it ultimately paid off. Much of Gone Girl’s success comes not only from its twists and turns, but from how surprisingly early they come. Each major twist reshapes the narrative, as well as the genre.

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  • Avengers: Age of Ultron Review

    the-avengers-age-of-ultron_zGf6N1(The top portion of this review will not contain spoilers. However, if you have seen the movie or would like to hear a few more specifics, I will go into details below. That section will contain significant spoilers)

    In a way, Avengers: Age of Ultron is the Iron Man 2 of the Avengers series. It makes a lot of the same mistakes as IM2 did, primarily by trying to stuff in too many plot elements and sequel set-ups for the movie to come together as a cohesive whole. You can feel Joss Whedon stressing out over the movie, as more and more things get piled on while he tries to wrangle a decent Ultron film out of it. I counted at least ten different stories and new character/place introductions in the first half hour alone.

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  • Going Clear Review

    going clearGoing Clear, a documentary by Alex Gibney about the Church of Scientology, aired on Sunday and has already made waves throughout Hollywood. Many celebrities, who know people involved in the church, have been tweeting openly about the effect the film had on them. Meanwhile, the Church has been trying to dissuade anybody from believing the “lies” that had been exposed. It is obvious that Going Clear has struck a chord with viewers, but far less obvious is how much of an effect it will ultimately have.

    In terms of the information presented in the documentary, Going Clear is not “news.” Everything exposed here has been reported on heavily by various newspapers and online media, and the documentary was based on the previously published book Going Clear by Lawrence Wright (which I’m currently in the middle of, and finding fascinating). Especially well-publicized has been the “Anonymous” attacks against Scientology, originally spurred by 4chan board members and now consisting of, well, anybody who wants to refer to themselves as “Anonymous.”

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  • John Wick Review

    John Wick Busting Fools

    (This review contains spoilers for the first 30 minutes of John Wick. However, it should not lessen your enjoyment of the movie)

    John Wick’s plot is thus: John Wick (Keanu Reeves) is a family man who is devastated by the loss of his wife to a long-time illness. She leaves him a puppy for him to care for, and he begins to bond with it. Then some Russian thugs led by Alfie Allen (Theon Greyjoy in Game of Thrones) show up, steal his car (a 1969 Mustang), and kill his puppy. So John Wick kicks ass and takes names for the next hour-plus.

    Well, maybe there’s A LITTLE more to it. When Alfie Allen’s dad finds out about what he did and who he did it to, he immediately realizes his mistake. You see, John Wick isn’t just some schmuck with a puppy, a sweet ride, and a dead wife. He’s John Motherfucking Wick, Badass Extraordinaire. As Alfie Allen’s dad says, he’s not the boogeyman. “He’s the man you send to kill the boogeyman.” And Alfie Allen killed his puppy (a very Theon Greyjoy move, if you ask me).

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  • Kingsman: The Secret Service Review

    Colin Firth and Taron Egerton in Kingsman: The Secret Service

    For a director with only five films under his belt, Matthew Vaughn has done a lot to distinguish himself. His first directorial feature, Layer Cake, was a slick British crime flick that proved Vaughn was more than just a Guy Ritchie producer with director-envy. With Kick-Ass, he established himself as one of the most unique action filmmakers in the business, with brilliantly staged fight sequences that were as hilarious as they were violent. When handed the dying X-Men franchise, he almost single-handedly revived it with X-Men: First Class, a film that showed how spin-offs and reboots didn’t have to be slaves to their original source.

    What’s immediately interesting about Kingsman, his most recent film, is the way that it initially feels like a mashup of all of Vaughn’s previous works. Like Layer Cake, Kingsman is a distinctly British film, and also delves a bit into British crime. Like Kick-Ass, it is a highly-stylized and ultra-violent action film that functions on its own terms and as a satire of a particular genre (superhero films for Kick-Ass, and early James Bond films for Kingsman). Like X-Men: First Class, a significant portion of the film is given over to a team of young new recruits and the dangers that face them while becoming part of a team.

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