The dog days of the summer schlockbusters are upon us and soon we will be inundated with mediocre and below average films such as the new “Ghostbusters,” another “Ice Age” installment and the dismal “Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates,” among others. Trying to fight this deluge, though, is the animated feature from Universal Pictures…
I am often chastised for expecting children’s film to be more than childish, but I think there are enough precedents to show that films which often appeal to younger crowds can also be pleasant for their parents (“Inside Out,” “Minions” and “Shaun the Sheep” come to mind in 2015 alone). That is certainly not my…
The modern explosion of stereoscopic 3D cinema has been many things in many different filmmakers’ hands, but it’s never quite been whatever it is that French New Wave pioneer and long-time experimenter Jean-Luc Godard has done with it. Whereas before the technology ranged from irrelevant to immersive, Godard has now brought it to a place…
Seven Psychopaths may be the best movie title of the year. Martin McDonagh certainly has a way of coming up with apt and memorable titles for the audience to carry around with them, he is also responsible for “In Bruges.” One could easily argue that Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson were also psychopaths in “In…
The town in Frankenweenie is New Holland and it must be Tim Burton’s dream of what a town should be. There is a large windmill hovering on the edge of town, an abnormally spacious pet cemetery, and most of the school kids are various shades of macabre characters from horror literature and films. Even the…
Sounds punctuate the neighborhood in Kleber Filho’s exhilarating Neighboring Sounds (Brazilian title, O som ao redor): A dog barks incessantly, street vendors blast their stereos, the noise of TVs reverberate through the streets, a vacuum cleaner rumbles, a washing machine vibrates, and a car sideswipes another. Neighboring Sounds employs a wealth of cinematography and sound…
Marty’s friends have a lucrative scam going. They kidnap people’s dogs and return them several days later for reward money. No harm, no foul, right? Wrong. When they liberate the beloved Shih Tzu from a local gangster, they find themselves in a world of shit and Marty, unfortunately, finds himself knee deep in it too….
