O WHAT A TANGLED WEB WE WEAVE: Movie Reviews of Baby Driver and Spider-Man: Homecoming by Howard Casner
Posted: July 11, 2017 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Ansel Elgort, Baby Driver, Edgar Wright, Eiza Gonzales, Jamie Foxx, Jon Favreau, Jon Hamm, Jon Watts, Laura Harrier, Marisa Tomei, Martin Starr, Michael Keaton, Spider-Man: Homecoming, Stan Lee, Tom Holland, Tyne Daly | 26 Comments »
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I am now offering a new consultation service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
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Warning: SPOILERS
I can certainly see why people are so in love with Baby Driver, the new heist film from writer/director Edgar Wright. It’s about as stylish as you can get, and with a stylishness that has a bouncy feel good quality to it that gets you to sit up in your seat, tap your foot and just generally groove out.
It begins with a bank robbery and a car chase orchestrated to a song chosen by the title character (a getaway driver with pouty lips and baby face). It’s followed soon after by a one take with said character bopping down the street to another song, barely dodging people on the street, and backed by some nice gymnastics (this is important because there comes a time when suddenly he’s bumping into people right and left, signaling a sea change within the character).
Everything is calculated and carefully choreographed to be cool and hip. And it is pretty cool. In fact, the movie is not only pretty cool, it’s fully aware as to how cool it is and revels in this coolness to such an extent that it knows that the audience knows that it knows just how cool it is.
THE FRENCH ARE COMING, THE FRENCH ARE COMING: Movie Reviews of Lolo, Valley of Love and My Golden Days by Howard Casner
Posted: April 5, 2016 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: A Christmas Tale, Arnaud Desplechin, Brigitte Bardot, COLCOA, Cyrus, Danny Boon, Death Valley, Duplass brothers, Gerard Depardieu, Grandvil, Guillaume Nicloux, Isabel Huppert, John C. Reilly, John LeCarre, Jonah Hill, Julie Delpy, Julie Peyr, Kings & Queen, Lola, Lou Roy-Lecollinet, Marisa Tomei, Mathieu Amalric, My Golden Years, Quentin Dolmaire, Seth Rogan, Valley of Love, Vincent Lacoste | 4,222 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
COLCOA, the incredible film festival of new French cinema (as well as some classics), will be starting in a couple of weeks. But while you may be waiting in baited breath for it (well, I am), you don’t have to wait that long to see Gallic cinema. A few films from the land of Truffaut and Godard have opened in Los Angeles in the last few weeks.
They are opening now between the months of January (where the movies are mainly the leftovers from the Oscar noms and those movies the studios wish to bury) and June (or whatever month is the one where the tentpole films will be thrust upon us). Translated, this means the time period when strong, introspective and personal films can make their appearance before they are gulped up and spit out by billion dollar movies as if they were a character in Jaws.
Lola, the new French rom com written by Eugenie Grandvil (a first feature) and the director Julie Delpy, has more than a passing resemblance to the Duplass brothers’ American comedy Cyrus, starring John C. Reilly, Marisa Tomei and Jonah Hill (in the title role). Read the rest of this entry »
GIRLS GONE WILD or THE TWO AMY’S: Movie Reviews of Amy and Trainwreck by Howard Casner
Posted: July 24, 2015 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Amy, Amy Schumer, Amy Winehouse, Asif Kapadia, Bill Hader, Colin Farrell, Daniel Radcliffe, Ezra Miller, Judd Apatow, LeBron James, Marisa Tomei, Norman Lloyd, Randall Park, Tilda Swinton, Trainwreck | 436 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
How you feel about the new documentary on the short life of jazz singer Amy Winehouse, Amy, will probably to some degree depend on how you feel about Ms. Winehouse herself.
For me, she has an amazing voice that will pierce your soul. She is quite a mesmerizing singer.
At the same time, I have to be honest and say that I was not all that impressed by her as a lyricist (Cole Porter, Bob Dylan and Judy Collins she ain’t) and the hooks to her songs never really took me in as I wished they might have.
But if you disagree, and I expect a huge number of people will do just that, then that might help you overlook other issues I think the movie has.
Winehouse led a momentary and unhappy existence. She was one of those singer/songwriters whose every musical creation was a personal revelation about herself and her life. And she was very brave in not holding anything back. Read the rest of this entry »
LOVE AND DEATH AND ALL POINTS IN BETWEEN: Movie reviews of To Be Takei, Jealousy and Love is Strange by Howard Casner
Posted: September 2, 2014 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Alfred Molena, Anna Mouglalis, Arlette Langman, Brad Takei, Caroline Deraus-Garrel, George Takei, Ira Sachs, Jealousy, John Cullum, John Lithgow, Leonard Nimoy, Louis Garrel, Love is Strange, Make Way for Tomorrow, Marc Cholodonko, Marisa Tomei, Marucio Zacharias, Nichelle Nichols, Philippe Garrel, Walter Koenig, Wil Wheaton, William Shatner | 3 Comments »First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
Warning: SPOILERS
Oh, My!
George Takei
I once worked at a movie theater that was frequented by celebrities of every make and model. For some reason, the bigger the name (Queen Latifah, Colin Farrel) the less the effect they had on me. I’d do my job and they’d go on their way with nary an increase in my pulse or heart rate.
It was often the second tier celebrities (for lack of a better phrase) that got me tongue tied and turned me into a flibbertigibbet. I’m not sure why.
They may not have been as great an actor as Marlon Brando, but they just always seemed to give me more joy.
Anyway, for what it is, there it is. Read the rest of this entry »
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