Netflix’s latest film, Awake, has the most preposterous premise I’ve seen in a long, long time. One that can be easily debunked with basic kindergarten science. Some will say “suspension of disbelief!”, which is fine, but how can I suspend my disbelief when the entire plot device the film relies on is: Unexplained Scientifically improbable…
Is it possible to do questionable things for a noble cause? Well, veteran director Catherine Hardwicke (“Twilight”) and first-time full feature screenwriter Gareth Dunnet-Alcocer clumsily answer that thematic question with Miss Bala, an Americanized reshaping of a 2011 Spanish-language tale with the same name. Their vision replays similar story beats as the original, but lacks…
Alex Garland’s Annihilation is a complex puzzle, mixing the extraterrestrial with the most microbial elements of humanity. Its characterization is strong throughout — as its themes are mirrored in its leading lady — but its most promising components come in the form of visual metaphors. They’re scattered strategically throughout the 115-minute science fiction thinker. Where…
Like last year’s “The 33,” which told of the survival and rescue of a group of Chileans trapped in a gold mine in 2010, Lionsgate’s Deepwater Horizon, produced by and starring Mark Wahlberg (“Ted 2”), along with John Malkovich, Kurt Russell and Kate Hudson, relates the horrifying experience of another true life disaster culled from…
