The Greatest Hits
High Fidelity meets The Butterfly Effect in Ned Benson’s hipster rom-com The Greatest Hits. While that sounds like a fun movie mash-up, The Greatest Hits is anything but.
April 2024
With Love and a Major Organ
Pardon my cautiousness with this review. I’m just trying not to sound like a hypocrite.
What Jennifer Did
Documentarian Jenny Popplewell returns to true crime with her latest film, What Jennifer Did. Finding a comfortable balance between a conventional format (talking heads, unsettling nighttime B-roll) and the resourceful surveillance storytelling she exhibited in Netflix’s American Murder: The Family Next Door, Popplewell recounts the details of a disturbing attempted double murder, while also dissecting its police procedural.
Monkey Man
By: Jeff Ching Are we seeing the genesis of Dev Patel as Hollywood’s next big action star? Will Monkey Man become a colossal action movie franchise similar to John Wick? Monkey Man is certainly in the running for this year’s best action movie.
Wicked Little Letters
The scandal at the centre of Britain’s dark comedy Wicked Little Letters – mail addressed from an anonymous source that uses risqué language – seems petty in comparison to the waves of crime procedurals at-home audiences educate themselves on weekly. But as naïve as the crime may appear to be, the controversy spoke to the times and ignited much needed awareness around inequality.
Good Burger 2
I liked Good Burger 2, but it also feels like it was made for me and, maybe like, ten other people. Good Burger 2 is the sequel to its 1997 predecessor, which began as a recurring sketch on Nickelodeon’s variety show All That. Milking nostalgia is a current trend, but when does it become too much of an inside joke?
Someone Like You
Faith-based movies don’t really bother me. They speak to a specific crowd, and drive home values that make those movie goers comfortable. If the films strike a discord in the messaging, the filmmaking is usually so hokey that the movies are easy to ignore. The odd exception exists (Unplanned, 2019’s worst movie) but, otherwise, these movies are like water off a duck’s back. Fickle faith-based movies, on the other hand….
Wylie Writes’ Two-On-One with Jeremy LaLonde and Dax Ravina
Daniel’s Gotta Die is one of my favourite comedies of the year so far. It sports a terrific cast and inspired direction, and fearless dark humour. Since this exotic ensemble comedy has many working parts, I was interested in finding out more details about how the production came together so well.