Nebraska
Long overshadowed by Sideways, we’re giving this understated dramedy its due for depicting Midwest with the specificity Hollywood rarely gives it.
Alexander Payne’s Nebraska is as unassuming as the regular Midwestern folk it depicts. Even though this small, quiet, black-and-white comedy was flooded with nominations during the 2013 awards season it won almost none of them. Ten years on, it remains overshadowed by Payne’s more popular works like Sideways and Election. But this odd little dramedy is not only one of Payne’s finest films to date, it’s also his one true love letter to his home state of Nebraska and the Midwest itself.
Elderly alcoholic Woody Grant (Bruce Dern) has fallen for a Publisher’s Clearinghouse–style scam and is convinced he’s won a million dollars. Determined to collect the cash in person, son David (Will Forte) ignores his mother and brother’s pleas and agrees to drive him all the way to Lincoln, Nebraska. On the way, the pair get waylaid in Woody’s hometown of Hawthorne, giving David a glimpse of not just who his father is, but how a place and the people in it shaped him. Continue Reading →
Strays
SimilarArmageddon (1998), Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999), Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (2006), Bridget Jones's Diary (2001), Bring It On (2000), Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007), From Russia with Love (1963), Ghostbusters (1984), Goldfinger (1964), Night at the Museum (2006), Ocean's Eleven (1960), Shrek the Third (2007), Snakes on a Plane (2006), The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005),
Watch afterBarbie (2023) Blue Beetle (2023), Elemental (2023), Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023), Meg 2: The Trench (2023),
Oppenheimer (2023) Talk to Me (2023), The Nun II (2023),
Talking animals have been an entertainment staple for practically as long as movies have been around. Most classics of the genre, like 1993’s Homeward Bound, aim squarely at children in the audience. Director Josh Greenbaum’s Strays seeks to subvert that approach by weaving dirty jokes and curse words into familiar genre tropes. The result is considerably more grating and unpleasant to watch. Continue Reading →
Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken
SimilarAlex Strangelove (2018), Billy Elliot (2000), Bring It On (2000), Enchanted (2007), Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005), Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006),
StarringColman Domingo, Sam Richardson,
Studiodentsu,
It’s not easy being a teenager. It’s especially not easy being a teenager like the titular protagonist of Ruby Gillman: Teenage Kraken. As that title would suggest, Ruby Gillman (Lana Condor) is a Kraken living in a seaside town with her family. Her parents and younger brother seem to have no trouble assimilating to the broader world, while Ruby struggles. All she wants is to blend in as a normal human-- albeit one with blue skin and no spine. However, to be an average teen, she’ll likely have to break some of her mom’s strict rules, namely, never going near the ocean. Continue Reading →
Studio 666
Is Satanic panic even a thing anymore? When’s the last time we’ve heard anything about backmasking, or songs somehow influencing impressionable teenagers to kill themselves? It’s entirely possible that this is all still a thing, and I’m simply too old and out of touch to know anything about it. B.J. McDonnell’s Studio 666, the feature film debut of Foo Fighters, is a lovingly hokey homage to a time when “the Devil’s music” was such a grave concern for parents (and Tipper Gore) that Congressional hearings were held about it, and lawsuits were filed against heavy metal bands in an attempt to hold them responsible for what was more likely caused by untreated mental illness and drug abuse. Continue Reading →
MacGruber
SimilarArmageddon (1998), Bring It On (2000), Hellboy (2004), Mars Attacks! (1996), Night at the Museum (2006), Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006),
In the age of streaming, any movie, short of maybe Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, can become a TV show. It doesn’t matter if your original film was a box office turkey, these channels just want “content” and any previously established brand name will do. Through this phenomenon comes MacGruber, a continuation of a Saturday Night Live character and the star of a 2010 movie that crashed and burned financially. But when Peacock desperately needed something, anything, to release over the holidays, MacGruber rose from the aches like a conceited phoenix. Continue Reading →