A franchise’s future often lies in its past. The narrative need to look back upon the legacy of a series starter and the history of its characters provides a clear entry point for many sequels that may otherwise struggle to justify their existence beyond merely financial reasons. It’s a strategy used to moving effect in…
The problem with modern comedies is, well, most just aren’t funny. They take ridiculous, over-the-top situations (which is not entirely bad unto itself), but add a healthy dose of violence, profanity and toilet humor. In the case of a self-parody or genre-bending tale like “This Is the End,” these ingredients usually work; for something like…
If you were to travel back to the nondescript year of 2004 in your time machine (hopefully of the hot tub variety) and tune into one of those crappy upstart TV stations (the CW in this case) you’d find a little show about a girl detective who, while solving campy mysteries, also has to deal…
In a world of ice, Disney finds great warmth. It’s the sort of cutesy irony that sounds like it should be coated in sugar, but with Frozen, Disney takes the sweet concept and transforms it into their most poignant and powerful picture in over a decade. Or nearly even two decades if you consider that…
I suppose every new animated feature has to have a comic relief side-kick that follows in the footsteps of Scrat of “Ice Age” fame. In Walt Disney Studio’s Frozen that sidekick appears to be a snowman named Olaf. His purpose is unclear (other than to make the kids laugh) but from the synopsis of the…
A more politically correct trailer for Movie 43, the mother of all ensemble comedies (12 directors, 50+ A/B level actors, 8 writers), has been made available on the web by Relativity Media. Of course, when I say more politically correct, I just mean it’s just not nearly as offensive as the red-band trailer was (we…
Aubrey Plaza has this look about her. She is short with large eyeballs so she has this way of looking up at people and showing them non-verbally that she thinks they are morons and whatever situation she is in at the moment is stupid. If you are a fan of the TV show “Parks and…
