Han Solo’s origin story is a genuinely fun action movie that recalls the lighthearted tone of the original Star Wars films without blatantly mimicking their structure or leaning too hard on nostalgia. The new characters are fun to watch, the old ones are given genuine reasons to appear instead of simply being thrown in, and the story moves at a lively pace that doesn’t undercut its own serious aspects.
That’s how you move a story forward.
I was apprehensive about Rian Johnson directing a major installment in one of Western cinema’s most iconic franchises (I had issues with Looper), but I needn’t have worried—despite sometimes packing in more stories and ideas than it can give careful attention to, The Last Jedi solidly improves on its predecessor by being one thing from start to finish: unpredictable.
Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever eaten churros. They look yummy.
As a tremendously well paced and executed summer blockbuster, Homecoming gives its wall-crawling hero a fresh look, a vivaciously (over)confident personality, and a simple but compelling story that does a great job of fitting within existing Marvel cinema canon.
It’s hard to make “overwhelming odds” consistently feel convincing. Blockbusters have relied on those for so long that their villains and threats have to keep raising the stakes in order to be taken seriously. Rogue One takes a different approach–instead of making a “newer and bigger” Empire, it reminds us why the original was so credible, injecting significance even into small-scale events and questioning our heroes’ confidence in their own beliefs along the way. If the excellent but familiar The Force Awakens demonstrated an understanding of why Star Wars: A New Hope is an enduring classic, Rogue One understands why Star Wars is still a terrific series with powerful and gripping stories to tell.
Before I’d ever heard of the Marvel comic event that would eventually beget this film, I had a vision of a superhero story where collateral damage is used as an excuse to discredit superheroes and to call for their arrest or cessation. Captain America: Civil War more or less is that story, and its often serious tone makes for a compelling if sometimes emotionally unforgiving story that strikes a healthy balance between being fun, without being irresponsible (usually), and being introspective, without being depressing.
As did the Avengers films, Captain America in many ways feels like a sequel to the Iron Man films and several other stories in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, as well as a foretaste of what the franchise will hold in the years to come–but rather than simply being a series of movie-length advertisements and product placements, Civil War feels more like the unfolding of a diverse array of character beliefs and motivations that have become increasingly morally difficult to reconcile. Even though some aspects of the premise feel thinly constructed and halfhearted, the movie finds enough value in its action and its interpersonal stories to excuse the gaps in its foundation. If you’re a longtime Marvel follower seeking a realistic treatment of superheroes that isn’t as dark as DC’s Watchmen, this is that story.
This review is dedicated to my longtime best friend–a lover of wolves, a conservationist, and an anime fan. And, very recently, the birthday girl!
Director and co-writer Mamoru Hosoda delivers in Wolf Children a gem of an ode to the heartrending challenges and unimaginable joys of parenthood. Hana is a university student who falls in love with a kindhearted man who gives her a daughter and son–and also happens to be a wolf–but is taken from her all too soon. Enduring through her tears, Hana gathers every ounce of her strength and determines to make a life for her unusual family, and to raise her children into wonderful people who would make their father very proud, wherever they may go and whatever they may be.
Director J.J. Abrams once said that as a youth he enjoyed Star Wars more than the Star Trek franchise he’s dabbled in, and the high-energy antics he brought to the latter franchise find the warmest of welcomes in George Lucas’ time-honored saga.
The Force Awakens feels reverent of its venerable legacy even to an arguable fault, yet thanks to its wide variety of compelling characters, interesting themes, amazing art designs, and epic battles, beyond a shadow of a doubt Star Wars’ latest entry provides a suitable and stunning look at what the renowned original films might have been like if they had been made today.
(It feels so good to finally make time to finish a post I’d been too busy to work on for two months.)
After FBI agent Kate Macer gets drawn into a conflict south of the Tex-Mex border, she learns that the war on drugs is much more complicated, and much more tragic, than any one side could have planned for.
The Denis Villeneuve-directed Sicario—hitman–excels as a thriller, as a setting and atmosphere showcase, and most importantly as a message, whose predictable yet unpredictable narrative delivers endless questions but always works to invite empathy among all its horror.
Life is a bundle of changes for 11-year-old Riley Anderson. A new home, a new state, a new school, a new group of friends. And change can be a scary thing, especially when it comes at a cost. Riley’s unstable circumstances affect how she relates not only to other people but to her own disorganized emotions, and in developing its heroine so strongly as a character and a human being, Pixar’s latest film Inside Out distinguishes itself not merely as one of the long-acclaimed studio’s finest films, but also as one of the most thematically mature and important animated films to come along in a while.
Artificial intelligence really is a doozy–every time you turn around, it seems another robot has turned rogue on its well-meaning maker and needs to be put down. Who better to do the job than Marvel’s delightfully imperfect and thoroughly lovable Avengers, and who better to be responsible than … Tony Stark? Besides demonstrating the clear dangers of a lack of communication, Age of Ultron improves on its excellent predecessor in essentially every way and manages to add in a bigger heart and a greater sense of groundedness in the process, making this a prime example of what a summer superhero film can be.
Projected Realities 
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