I haven’t written about what’s leaving and what’s coming to Netflix in a while, but let’s be honest: Netflix has so much content, it can be hard to realize that the catalog changes on any given month anyway. Particularly now that it’s so aggressively producing its own unique content, both movies and engrossing TV series. Still, let’s have a look at May, 2017’s big list. Leaving Netflix There are some really good movies leaving Netflix…Read More
The Best September Movies On Netflix
Every month Netflix releases new movies for people to watch as licenses are negotiated and new companies join the fold. This month, September, 2016, here’s what’s coming on Netflix and is definitely worth seeing: Footloose (1984) Is there a more iconic 80’s movie about dancing, freedom and adolescence? Well, sure, there are all the great John Hughes movies, but still, Footloose is worth a re-watch for a young Kevin Bacon, the nostalgia and the terrific…Read More
Review: Star Trek Beyond
As a lifelong fan, I so wanted to love this latest Star Trek film. I’ve been hooked on the optimistic future, melodrama and visual effects of the show since William Shatner was helming the original Starship Enterprise. When J.J.Abrams brought his flair and action sensibilities to the reboot of the franchise after ten increasingly dull films, I loved it. The 2009 reinvention of the entire mythos was excellent, from its gripping opening scene to the…Read More
Review: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
While I love the great Tolkien books and am still amazed at the accomplishment of Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy — a film powerhouse that’s raked in almost three billion dollars worldwide — I have to be candid that I was not as thrilled with The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. That’s the first part of a trilogy based on J.R.R.Tolkien’s book that introduced us to Middle Earth and its epic battles between the…Read More
Review: 12 Years a Slave
It’s difficult to imagine a more troubled historical era in American history than the mid 1800s when the Northern states had emancipated former black slaves as free citizens, while Southern states continued the heinous practice of slavery, albeit with the promise of “papers” granting freedom after a certain period of indentured servitude. Lesser known were the bands of slavers who would kidnap free blacks in the Northern states and ship them South, sold into slavery…Read More
Review: Star Trek Into Darkness
The Star Trek TV show was an important step in the evolution of science fiction, a post-Cold War series that offered a hopeful future, a future where race, creed, religion and gender were irrelevant and that even aliens from other planets were accepted as equals. The TV show spawned additional series, along with ten feature films, but things had become rather grim and the campy humor and brash personalities of the Star Trek universe had…Read More
Review: Creation
Charles Darwin was one of the most profound thinkers of the modern era, with his groundbreaking theory of evolution and idea that rather than being created by God in “his image”, we evolved from monkeys. But who was Charles Darwin and where did he get this radical idea? That’s the story behind Creation, as it explains in the opening titles: “Charles Darwin’s “The Origin of Species”, first published in 1859, has been called the single…Read More