How does one react when a crisis seems both right next door and worlds away? This is one of the many questions the characters in Chris Mason Johnson‘s film Test, which tackles the AIDS crisis from the POV of a young gay man who is an understudy in a dance company. Rather than just focusing on the harrowing aspects of this era, Test seeks to explore the characters who just happen to be living in a time when this all was possible. In this respect, Test is a wonderful character study and tone poem, that although it doesn’t necessarily succeed in every avenue it hopes to explore, it’s well made enough to be an engaging film.
There are few blockbusters will be presented with the surety that Edge of Tomorrow has. I mean this is a movie with a Groundhog Day plot device, aliens, military intrigue, politics and scifi tropes, it HAS to be self confident and completely in control or the movie would fall apart. Audiences taking in movies should
There are few villains more revered in film lore than Maleficent. She is, in my estimation, the greatest of the early Disney villains and certainly top 5 villains in their entire history. It is with that weight and history that we find ourselves begin presented with Maleficent, another in the long line of fairytale revisions.
Normally I do these types of posts on Fridays but since I was having wordpress issues as well as traveling all day to spend the Memorial Day weekend at home, I figured I’d just make this a fun little side post for the weekend. My good friend and fellow Awards Circuit writer Kristen wrote about the film the other day and it inspired this post. There are few musicals that I feel warrant a remake, but one of them is definitely Oklahoma. Not because its bad mind you, in fact the film is quite good, but that the movie with its “shot on a movie set” feel makes the material seem so dated when the music is so timeless. So I’ve decided to put my casting cap on and try and figure out what a modern day Oklahoma might look like.
Is it possible to create an engaging film, set up new mythologies, retcon and reboot an entire franchise in one film? The answer, if X-Men: Days of Future Past is any indication, is a resounding yes. Much was expected of this film. This movie had to balance a ton of X-Men actors (all but two