Rarely have I experienced such disappointment partway through a movie as I did with the newest X-Men universe movie X-Men: Apocalypse. It starts out just phenomenally well, set in ancient Egypt about 3000 BCE and the visuals, the story, and the introduction of the powerful mutant En Sabah Nur (Oscar Isaac). A powerful mutant in a simpler society, he rules with an iron fist, until the locals bury him and his entourage deep in a…Read More
Review: Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens
Let me take the mystery out of this review: Star Wars: The Force Awakens is good. It’s really good. You’re going to see it regardless of what I say, but trust me, you’re going to enjoy the heck out of it! Anyone who has been alive in the last fifty years knows the story arc of the Star Wars franchise, starting with 1977’s Star Wars IV: A New Hope, a film that introduced us to the great cinematic…Read More
Review: Ex Machina
What makes us human? It’s a philosophical puzzle that goes back as far as human history is recorded, something we’ve wrestled with since the dawn of time. In the modern era, it was savant Alan Turing who suggested the definitive test for the “humanness” of an artificial intelligence, now known as the Turing Test: if you interact with an unknown entity through a computer and cannot ascertain whether it’s an AI or an actual person,…Read More
Review: The Bourne Legacy
The Bourne trilogy (Bourne Identity, Bourne Supremacy and Bourne Ultimatum) is one of the most dynamic action thrillers in the history of cinema, with Jason portrayed by Matt Damon in the career-defining role of the everyman who finds he’s been programmed by the CIA to be a deadly assassin. The third film ends with Bourne lured out of hiding by reporter Simon Ross (Paddy Considine) promising to write an exposé on Project Treadstone, the CIA…Read More
Review: Robin Hood
If you can get over the fact that this is most assuredly not the story of Robin Hood of Nottingham Forest, eternally battling the evil Sheriff of Nottingham for Maid Marion’s hand, you might find that Robin Hood is an interesting and exciting war movie set in medieval times with Robin Longstride (Russell Crowe) as the central character. Like director Ridley Scott’s last outing with Crowe, Gladiator, Robin Hood is a dirty, gritty movie with so much…Read More