It’s the final day of 2018. What that means is that it is time to reveal the first half of my personal 2018 awards winners. This list will honor what I consider to be the best in song, heroics, and television. To see a complete of the nominees, click here. Also, do remember that the film nominations will be revealed in early 2019. Continue reading “6th I’m Jeffrey Rex Awards, Part One – 2018”→
That’s right, people, it’s a tradition now. Last year, I wrote an article about the lessons that cineastes and the industry were taught by 2017. So, now, for the second year in a row, I’m ready to present you with a thorough list of the most interesting lessons that we were all taught by cinema, the film industry, or the studio system this year. Continue reading “18 Lessons 2018 Taught Cinephiles and the Film Industry – Special Features #40”→
The following is a short review of Black Mirror: Bandersnatch — an interactive film on Netflix.
Black Mirror as a series has become one of those anthology series events that I look forward to every time it pops up on Netflix. Black Mirror gives us decent-to-great science-fiction stories that don’t always seem far-fetched. But no Black Mirror episode has felt more like an event than its first interactive film — Bandersnatch — which was released on Netflix today. Continue reading “REVIEW: Black Mirror: Bandersnatch (2018)”→
In this, the second and final part of my 2019 film preview, I will discuss and present you with the most interesting 2019 non-tentpole films, as well as the films that may be talked about during awards season 2019. Now, just to get this out of the way, I will only mention adaptations if, and only if, I think they have Oscar potential, as the wise men and women call it. Continue reading “2019 Film Preview, Pt. 2: Original and Awards Films – Special Features #39”→
US Theatrical Release Poster – Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
The following is a review of Creed II — Directed by Steven Caple, Jr.
Back in early July this year, I watched and reviewed the highly anticipated sequel to Denis Villeneuve’s Sicario. The sequel subtitled Day of the Soldado was directed by Stefano Sollima and his film provided us with a perfect example of just how wrong it can go when you make a change in the director’s chair for a sequel. Day of the Soldado was offensive and hollow, and it is one of the biggest film disappointments of the year for me. Continue reading “REVIEW: Creed II (2018)”→
The following is a review of Bird Box — Directed by Susanne Bier.
The post-apocalyptic novel upon which Susanne Bier’s film of the same name, Bird Box, is based came out in 2014. So, let’s just get one thing out of the way, its ideas, though perhaps stale in a world where A Quiet Place just came out months ago, do not deserve to be cast aside just because Krasinski beat Bier to the punch. Besides, A Quiet Place isn’t even the film Bird Box resembles the most. Continue reading “REVIEW: Bird Box (2018)”→
Today I’m revealing the first half of the 2018 nominations for this blog’s IJR Awards (I’m Jeffrey Rex Awards, but you probably already guessed that). The two legend awards (Film Legend and TV Legend) aren’t getting any nominees, instead, I’ll reveal the winners, or honorees, in the two upcoming IJR Awards 2018-posts. Continue reading “IJR Awards 2018: Nominations, Part One of Two”→
It’s that time of the year again. We are still in awards season, Golden Globe hopefuls are getting their acceptance speeches ready, and we are getting closer and closer to the new year. We are getting closer to the end of December. So, I thought, this is probably a good time to look at what films we’ll fall in love with in 2019. In this, the first of two articles about 2019 films, I present you with select franchise or blockbuster films that I have on my watchlist for the upcoming year. Continue reading “2019 Film Preview: Franchise Films and Blockbusters – Special Features #38”→
The following is a review of Roma — Directed by Alfonso Cuarón
There was something very nice and special about my experience of watching Alfonso Cuarón’s latest drama on Netflix, the sole distributor of this film. This is a streaming platform that hopes to be able to take this Mexican heartbreaker all the way to the Academy Awards. Netflix gets a lot of criticism from the film community and, for a lot of it, it is well-earned. Their logo is bright red-on-white, its logo’s sound effect is loud and intrusive, and once the film comes to an end you are yanked away by the service to watch the trailer for some other Netflix Original, thus rushing you out of the experience of sitting with a film, taking it in properly, during the final credits. Continue reading “REVIEW: Roma (2018)”→
Theatrical Release Poster – Sony Pictures Releasing
The following is a review of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse — Directed by Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman
The late, great, legendary film critic Roger Ebert opened his review of my favorite Spider-Man film, Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 2, with the line: “Now this is what a superhero movie should be,” a sentence that feels pretty appropriate to use today when describing the first of, likely, many theatrically released Sony Pictures Animation Spider-Man-related films because Into the Spider-Verse is a special movie in virtually every way imaginable. Continue reading “REVIEW: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)”→