Anyone who thinks image-making matters less than “the story” (whatever that means) should watch David Fincher’s The Social Network and Aaron Sorkin’s The Social Reckoning side by side. Shot by the same cinematographer, Jeff Cronenweth, it won’t be long before you realize why Fincher’s film stands the test of time as one of the most impactful masterpieces of the 2010s. But
Read MoreThe one good thing about Michael Showalter’s Verity is that it has more verve than previous adaptations of Colleen Hoover’s work. It’s not very good, but at least Showalter has fun with compositions that recall the oeuvres of Brian De Palma and Paul Verhoeven. Plenty of split-diopters and superimpositions create a quasi-campy quality as cinematographer Jim Frohna captures Lowen Ashleigh’s (Dakota
Read MoreIn collaboration between DreamWorks Animation and Sony Pictures Imageworks, here comes Joel Crawford and Januel P. Mercado‘s Forgotten Island. Taking place in the 1990s/early 2000s Philippines, the fantasy comedy film follows two young women about to be separated by a fork in the road. Raissa Molina (voiced by Liza Soberano) is accepted into a university in California, but it comes at
Read MoreWithin the first second of Josef Kubota Wladyka’s Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty!, the American filmmaker of Polish and Japanese descent immediately grabs our attention with large (and maximalist) title cards that announce a boisterous theatrical event. Divided into six chapters (plus an epilogue), Wladyka follows a Japanese dancer named Haru (Rinko Kikuchi), who competes in ballroom competitions with her boyfriend Luis (Alejandro Edda). A story
Read MoreResident Evil does not follow the video game’s exact plot. This has been a frequent complaint online. While that’s true, none of Paul W. S. Anderson’s movies followed the exact plotline. For the most part, almost none of the movies follow the story, and the only one that came close flopped two years ago. So what is a filmmaker to do? Zach
Read MoreThe first forty-five minutes or so of Jacob Chase’s Insidious: Out of the Further are excellent. In that section, there are two incredible setpieces that genuinely had me on the edge of my seat. One is a Backrooms-inspired liminal horror that sees its protagonist, Gemma (Amelia Eve), trapped in a never-ending, claustrophobic hallway with creepy-looking creatures that do little more than
Read MoreWe can thank Destin Daniel Cretton as one of the architects of the MCU’s current and much needed reinvigoration, with the introspective Wonder Man being a major highlight of their post-Avengers: Endgame projects. And now there’s Spider-Man: Brand New Day. The fourth entry in the current Spider-Man franchise finally gives Tom Holland textured material to explore with his character, away from
Read MoreIt would be fair to say that the Sony Spider-Man Universe (SSU) hasn’t had a particularly great run ever since the release of Ruben Fleischer’s Venom. Apart from those trilogy’s box-office successes, each live-action installment (the Spider-Verse films are innocent) was critically and commercially reviled and became the subject of ironic memes rather than actual fan engagement. J.C. Chandor’s Kraven the Hunter might have killed
Read MoreMamoru Hosoda’s Scarlet, a derivative adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Hamlet. The film begins with the most spiritually charged image of the Japanese animator’s career as the titular character (voiced by Mana Ashida) arrives in the “Otherworld,” a purgatory that stands between life and “nothingness.” Scarlet attempts to fight her internal (and external) demons and prove to the forces that be that
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