Festival Of Films Blog

REVIEW: STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS After its...

Tue, 21 May 2013 11:40:32 -0400

After its kinetic rejuvenation in 2009, the Star Trek franchise – captained by J.J. Abrams – once again takes flight, boldly going where no CGI has gone before. Captain James T. Kirk (Chris Pine) is still up to the same rule-breaking, womanizing shenanigans that in any other universe would have him discharged from military service, but here earns him his own ship. That is, until his ever logical right-hand man Spock (Zachary Quinto) sells him down the river for violating the “Prime Directive” of Starfleet. Stripped of his post, Kirk is forced to relinquish control of the Starship Enterprise to its former Captain, Christopher Pike (Bruce Greenwood).

The demotion doesn’t last long when Starfleet is attacked by one of its own: a baritone-voiced ubermensch named John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch). After launching multiple attacks that kills civilians and Starfleet members alike, Kirk is returned to his old ship and urged by Admiral Marcus (an awful Peter Weller) to follow Harrison into Klingon territory. The Klingons are a belligerent race that will interpret any Starfleet presence in their region as a provocation of war. With eggshells under foot, Kirk leads his crew into deep space and learns the truth behind Harrison’s actions.

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REVIEW: BEFORE MIDNIGHT It’s rare that a film shows us true,...

Tue, 21 May 2013 11:39:01 -0400

REVIEW: BEFORE MIDNIGHT

It’s rare that a film shows us true, enduring love. We’ve seen plenty of romantic movies in which love endures the obstacles of distance or time, and they almost always end with the couple finally getting together and presumably living happily ever after. But what we don’t frequently see is love enduring itself. Romantic films tend to be about “getting together.” Before Midnight is about “staying together.”

The third part in what director Richard Linklater calls his “accidental trilogy,” Before Midnight picks up nine years after the second film – Before Sunset – and 18 years after the first – Before Sunrise. If you haven’t seen the first two (like me), have no fear, as Before Midnight is a remarkable stand-alone film and an early candidate for Best Picture.

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REVIEW: STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS After its...

Mon, 20 May 2013 17:31:12 -0400

REVIEW: STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS

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REVIEW: THE GREAT GATSBY In The Great Gatsby, the eponymous Jay...

Mon, 13 May 2013 22:23:59 -0400

REVIEW: THE GREAT GATSBY

In The Great Gatsby, the eponymous Jay Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio) throws extravagant parties at his Long Island mansion in hopes of attracting his beautiful former love Daisy Buchanan (Carey Mulligan). Director Baz Luhrmann takes the same approach in trying to get a hold of his audience. His The Great Gatsby is an over-indulgent, bombastic facade, compensating for its shallow host/director.

Based on the novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby is told in hindsight by Nick Carraway (played flatly by Tobey Maguire). Once a spry, hopeful war veteran hoping to make a living selling bonds in 1922 New York City, Carraway now resides in a sanitarium trying to cope with the events of the previous summer. After moving into a humble cottage in the “newly rich” West Egg, Long Island (modeled after Great Neck), Carraway soon became aware of the scandalous life that seemed to inherently come with being wealthy in NYC.

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WHY THE MANDARIN WAS PERFECT IN IRON MAN 3 The following article...

Tue, 07 May 2013 15:43:00 -0400

WHY THE MANDARIN WAS PERFECT IN IRON MAN 3

The following article contains a MAJOR SPOILER regarding Iron Man 3. It is strongly recommended that you do not read this until after you’ve viewed the film.

If you saw Iron Man 3 last week (given the $175 million opening it enjoyed, chances are you did), you were probably caught off guard by The Mandarin. Given how he was displayed in the trailers, fans fully expected him to the primary villain facing off against Iron Man. His measured speech delivered in an undeterminable accent threw a cloud of mystique over the character, played by Ben Kingsley. Where did he come from? Who are his allies? What does he want? He wears lavish robes, is adorned in jewelry, and sits on a throne. All of this means he MUST have power, and this is why we should fear him.

It’s not until you watch the film that you see Marvel has successfully orchestrated one of the greatest trailer misdirections of all time. It turns out The Mandarin isn’t a powerful terrorist leader at all. He’s just an actor, and a particularly goofy one at that. His entire existence was a ruse devised by Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce) in order to satisfy his own evil plot. Writer and director Shane Black took Iron Man’s greatest nemesis from the comic books and reduced him to a punch-line; a meager pawn in the scheme of a villain that hardly appears in the comics at all.

And it’s an absolutely brilliant decision.

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REVIEW: IRON MAN 3 Iron Man 3 should be renamed Tony Stark, as...

Tue, 07 May 2013 09:03:20 -0400

REVIEW: IRON MAN 3

Iron Man 3 should be renamed Tony Stark, as that more accurately captures the true subject of Shane Black’s new summer blockbuster. The third entry in the Iron Man canon and the first Marvel film released post-Avengers, Iron Man 3 offers a hefty share of CGI battles featuring an innumerable quantity of red and gold suits of armor. But those who want nothing more than crash-bang-boom action will have to be patient, as we also spend a healthy portion of time with Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), the man beneath the iron mask.

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REVIEW: IRON MAN 3 Iron Man 3 should be renamed Tony Stark, as...

Mon, 06 May 2013 16:02:00 -0400

REVIEW: IRON MAN 3

Iron Man 3 should be renamed Tony Stark, as that more accurately captures the true subject of Shane Black’s new summer blockbuster. The third entry in the Iron Man canon and the first Marvel film released post-Avengers, Iron Man 3 offers a hefty share of CGI battles featuring an innumerable quantity of red and gold suits of armor. But those who want nothing more than crash-bang-boom action will have to be patient, as we also spend a healthy portion of time with Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), the man beneath the iron mask.

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REVIEW: THE ICEMAN Richard Kuklinski (Michael Shannon) was a...

Sun, 05 May 2013 09:50:39 -0400

REVIEW: THE ICEMAN

Richard Kuklinski (Michael Shannon) was a family man. He married his first and only love, Deborah (Winona Ryder), and together they had two beautiful daughters, Anabel and Betsy (McKaley Miller and Megan Sherrill). They moved into a nice house in Trenton, New Jersey and enjoyed a relatively luxurious lifestyle. When asked about “Richie’s” profession, Deborah would reply that he worked with stocks in some capacity. That’s what Richie told her and she had no reason to question it.

What was their real source of income? Richie was a contract killer for the mafia – and he was good at his job.

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REVIEW: THE ICEMAN Richard Kuklinski (Michael Shannon) was a...

Fri, 03 May 2013 20:25:20 -0400

REVIEW: THE ICEMAN

What was their real source of income? Richie was a contract killer for the mafia – and he was good at his job.

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REVIEW: MARRIED AND COUNTING In late 2010, only five states (and...

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 13:35:00 -0400

REVIEW: MARRIED AND COUNTING

In late 2010, only five states (and Washington D.C.) recognized gay marriage as legal. At the time, gay couple Stephen Mosher and Pat Dwyer were preparing to celebrate their 25^th anniversary together. Sharing a small, love-filled apartment in Hell’s Kitchen, NYC, Stephen and Pat wanted nothing more than to be able to call each other “husband.” Unfortunately, New York did not allow gay marriage. Unlike most states, however, New York did honor gay marriages that were performed in other states and recognized them as legal. So Stephen and Pat planned a romantic “wedding tour,” in which they would get married in every single state that would allow them.

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REVIEW: PAIN & GAIN I never thought I’d say this, but...

Mon, 29 Apr 2013 17:10:38 -0400

REVIEW: PAIN & GAIN

I never thought I’d say this, but Michael Bay just isn’t the same without big robots. Actually, that’s false. Bay is exactly the same without the robots. The problem is, that polished, decadent style from Transformers doesn’t work around human drama. At least, not the way Bay does it.

Pain & Gain is what Bay might consider an independent film. Compared to his usual $200 million budgets, this movie cost only $25 million and features hardly any explosions. On top of that, Pain & Gain is based on real events, so Bay was restrained from turning any of his characters into invincible heroes. With no special effects to hide behind, there was an opportunity here for Bay to create an intimate lens into a true story of normal guys making an ill-advised foray into crime. Instead, he gave us a frantic hodge-podge of clashing genres.

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REVIEW: MARRIED AND COUNTING In late 2010, only five states (and...

Mon, 29 Apr 2013 17:09:12 -0400

REVIEW: MARRIED AND COUNTING

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REVIEW: TO THE WONDER To the Wonder is only the sixth feature...

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 09:42:54 -0400

REVIEW: TO THE WONDER

To the Wonder is only the sixth feature film in filmmaker Terrence Malick’s forty-year-long career. Known for taking several years in between projects, Malick has seemingly rushed his latest to the screen only two years after the alternately challenging, pretentious, baffling, beautiful, and altogether polarizing tone poem The Tree of Life. Daunting or not, this largely incoherent mood opus might be Malick in his purest form — a minimalistic plot, existential themes, philosophical whispered voice-overs, impressionistic cinematography of nature, and classical music. Seeing a more gorgeous-looking film this year is predicted to be impossible, but to watch To the Wonder is to have visual beauty and poetry wash over you and not feel a real sense of meaning or purpose. It’s like a cure for insomnia

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REVIEW: THE LORDS OF SALEM Most art is self-indulgent, but three...

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 15:24:19 -0400

REVIEW: THE LORDS OF SALEM

Most art is self-indulgent, but three out of four of writer-director Rob Zombie’s films have been freakishly aggressive, excessively ugly assaults on the senses. The jury is still out on whether or not the shock rocker-turned-shock filmmaker is actually going places as a horror-genre auteur. He’s normally more of an assailant than a director, wallowing in grubby, obnoxious white-trash freak shows. But, as relentlessly violent and twisted as Sir Zombie’s work is, his films do boast some sort of fascinating allure that’s hard to articulate.

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REVIEW: OBLIVION In a world, where original and substantive...

Sun, 21 Apr 2013 20:53:00 -0400

REVIEW: OBLIVION

In a world, where original and substantive science fiction is hard to come by sometimes, Oblivion isn’t very original or substantive either. But it tries, and that’s better than not trying at all. Elegantly designed and ambitiously cerebral, this Kubrickian space opera is predicted to be more thought-provoking than any of your big, soulless tentpoles and star vehicles of the summer season. On the terms of aesthetics and ambition, this summer’s upcoming blockbusters have their work cut out for them. Director Joseph Kosinski (2010′s emotionally empty but coolly enjoyable TRON: Legacy), adapting his and Arvid Nelson’s unpublished graphic novel with screenwriters Karl Gajdusek and Michael Arndt, improves on emotional involvement from his last feature. And yet, the screenplay still feels alternately underwritten and overwritten when some narrative twists are sprung on us.

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WEEK IN REVIEW: 4/8 - 4/14 Walking Dead Showrunner to Pen The...

Mon, 15 Apr 2013 13:20:59 -0400

WEEK IN REVIEW: 4/8 - 4/14

Walking Dead Showrunner to Pen The Shining Prequel - Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining is perhaps one of the greatest horror films ever made. Despite being a stand-alone landmark of cinema for over 30 years, somebody decided that the experience wasn’t full enough, and now a prequel is in the works. Glen Mazzara, former showrunner of The Walking Dead, has been brought on to write the screenplay, which will be an original work considering Stephen King never wrote a prequel to The Shining. King is releasing a sequel to The Shining later this year entitled Doctor Sleep, but it has nothing to do with this film.

Is this necessary?

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REVIEW: TRANCE Danny Boyle is a filmmaker whom we can always...

Mon, 15 Apr 2013 13:17:00 -0400

REVIEW: TRANCE

Danny Boyle is a filmmaker whom we can always trust to give us something fresh and exciting in any genre or no genre at all. Ranging from 1996′s brutally real but energetic drug-addiction dark comedy Trainspotting to 2002′s grippingly scary zombie-movie reinvention 28 Days Later… to 2005′s warm, whimsical Millions and 2009′s fanciful rags-to-riches fairy tale Slumdog Millionaire, and 2010′s harrowing survival story 127 Hours, he certainly can’t be accused of repeating himself or having a formulaic oeuvre. Now, with Trance, Boyle defies expectations again. A twisty, dreamlike, labyrinthine psychological neo-noir puzzle, Trance, is such a stylish, hyper-cool, brilliantly crafted trip that it can easily be spoken in the same breath as Memento, Vanilla Sky, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Inception and, most recently, Looper. For a brain-teasing parlor trick, it works like gangbusters.

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REVIEW: THE PLACE BEYOND THE PINES If Derek Cianfrance’s Blue...

Sat, 13 Apr 2013 10:36:32 -0400

REVIEW: THE PLACE BEYOND THE PINES

If Derek Cianfrance’s Blue Valentine was an intimate, heartbreakingly hopeless look at the slow disintegration of love, his latest film, The Place Beyond the Pines, is a sprawling, heady generational drama with tragedy and a glimmer of hope. Co-written by Ben Coccio and Darius Marder with Cianfrance, the film is the director’s less concentrated but most ambitious so far and, flaws and all, it’s an intoxicating, absorbing, and affecting saga of guilt, fate, and fathers and sons

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REVIEW: ANTIVIRAL The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree...

Fri, 12 Apr 2013 13:50:23 -0400

REVIEW: ANTIVIRAL

The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree in Antiviral, the feature debut of Brandon Cronenberg, son of David. As should be expected from anyone with the surname of the King of Venereal Horror, the film is icky and strange, daringly sick and emotionally icy. At the front is an intriguingly out-there germ of an idea for a vicious satire about celebrity mania, but considering this film’s conception came from a short by the writer-director himself, it’s just an idea in search of a story.

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REVIEW: EVIL DEAD Early posters for Evil Dead boasted that it...

Tue, 09 Apr 2013 12:05:05 -0400

REVIEW: EVIL DEAD

Early posters for Evil Dead boasted that it would be “the most terrifying film that you will ever experience.” Well, it certainly did satiate my appetite for blood. But in order to truly make an audience feel terror, a filmmaker must make us empathize with characters by letting us get to know them and eventually want to see them survive. The original Evil Dead Trilogy didn’t succeed at this, but it wasn’t really trying to. That series was tongue-in-cheek fun from beginning to end. Fede Alvarez’ new Evil Dead makes one critical mistake that almost knocks it off the rails: it tries too hard.

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