“Top Gun: Maverick” – Shock and awe. If ever there was a movie where my expectations were set to negative one million, it’s every Fast and Furious movie. One tick higher was Top Gun: Maverick. Like every other Gen X/Millennial, I have fond memories of the original Top Gun, complete with the ability to sing…

I despise Stephen King, his novella of Rita Hayworth, and The Shawshank Redemption. It was an un-readable blot of blueberry mustard smeared on a Maine tourist map from 1973. Why ’73? Well, that’s the last year of Maine’s state pride as it is the last year it WOULD NOT be associated with this human cowlick…

With Hold the Dark, Jeremy Saulnier’s third such endeavor and fourth feature, the director’s reputation as a state-hopping connoisseur of America’s backwoods is well and truly confirmed. A reputation not so much for achievement as inclination; mainly an infatuation with subcultures situated at the peripheries of mainstream society. His penchant for uncompromising and violent depictions…

We have discussed this many times, the separation of the actor from the person and the person’s politics and religion. In the movie review world, except for rare occasions like the aging Queen Rex Reed, an actor or director’s greatness overwhelms whatever personal shenanigans that he or she might harbor in real life. Nevertheless, Clint…

Switchblade Sisters AKA The Jezebels (1975) Normally if a movie contains knife fights, rape, pimping, drug dealing, nudity and shootings, you can safely assume it’s a drama. Not Switchblade. It’s pure comedy from start to finish. It’s so OTT there’s not one ounce of dramatic tension to be found, but wander into its overheated, estrogen-fuelled…

There are plenty of people who take enormous pleasure in hooting through terrible movies. The so-bad-it’s-good crowd. Fair enough. I must admit I enjoy The Exorcist’s craptastic sequel, a flick that regularly ends up on lists of the worst ever made. I also heartily respond to the mammalian madness of Orca: The Killer Whale, a…

“Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” – It’s not complicated. We’ve seen the multiverse coming to the MCU for quite a while. It all started when the Ancient One (Tilda Swinton) taught us about the multiverse in Doctor Strange. We get another glimpse of it in Avengers Endgame, when the Ancient One explained to…

80% of people claim to have read 1984 while only 16% have actually done so, and 78% of people who’ve seen Brazil claim to have understood its parody of 1984. While we have no data on how many are telling the truth, it’s safe to surmise that 14% made the connection. Like 1984 the world…