Search for 2015

When one considers the impact Judd Apatow has had on the movie scene over the past decade, it's surprising to realize that Trainwreck is only his fifth feature as a director. This also marks his return to the romantic comedy genre after a two-fil...

True Story can be seen as a true crime story but it's primarily about the relationship between a criminal and the journalist interviewing him; the details of the quadruple murder come in a distant second. The ironically titled narrative is about ...

Unfinished Business is bad - not epically bad but bad enough. Little contained in this misfire of a film works and the few successful things are dragged out to the point where they die a lingering death. In fact, it's odd that this movie was acco...

The average horror movie is rarely blessed with a complex storyline.  Unfriended takes this plot simplicity to an extreme. Since the movie-going experience in this case is all about the gimmick, the narrative is almost nonexistent. In a strange ...

"No need to remember when, 'Cause everything old is new again." - Peter Allen & Carole Bayer Sager We live in an era of remakes, reboots, and sequels. Hollywood, having apparently run out of new ideas (or, more accurately, being ...

It’s amazing that, two years in a row, a movie with the name “Frankenstein” in the title will claim a spot of dishonor on my “Turkeys of the Year” list. In many ways, 2015’s Victor Frankenstein is an even worse mov...

Two distinct problems of execution keep The Visit, M. Night Shyamalan's "comeback" from being anything more than another disappointing title on an increasingly uneven filmography. Despite a promising premise and effective "Shyamala...

A couple of old guys taking a walk on the Appalachian Trail - it doesn't sound like a winning motion picture formula and, as it turns out, it isn't. Like all road trip movies, the success (or lack thereof) of A Walk in the Woods relies heavil...

During its short lifespan, the original World Trade Center hosted a number of strange and surreal occurrences but perhaps none was more astonishing than the tightwire walk by Frenchman Philippe Petit. The event took place during the morning of August...

Disaster movies have always been popular, but I’ll leave it to psychologists to determine the reason why viewers react positively to tales of mayhem and catastrophe. The making of a disaster movie offers its creators an unusual set of challenge...