Author: Ian D.

There is so much to admire about the Furious franchise (or is it the Fast franchise?) When Director Justin Lin injected fresh NAS into the series with Fast 5 the film embraced all of the original’s silliness and doubled down on the absurdly fun action. It was the kind of over-the-top cheesy goodness that Michael Bay could only dream of.

Its official, Neil Blomkamp is the new king of the B-movie in Hollywood. Give this man a bad script (or allow him to write it) and he will direct the shit out of it – filling every nook and cranny of the film with more allegorical nonsense than an 8th grade book report on The Great Gatsby. Does any of it work? Not really, in fact most of it probably won’t. Then why – oh why – did I end up enjoying Chappie so much?

No matter how hard Matthew Vaughn’s new movie Kingsman: The Secret Service tries to lampoon James Bond, British high-culture and martinis it never strays far from Austin Powers. In fact the final third of the film takes place in a Dr. Evil underground lair that I’m 90% sure was lifted directly from the old Mike Meyers-sets.

In many (some completely obvious ways) Clint Eastwood and sniper Chris Kyle are kindred spirits. They have both fancied massive “lone gunmen cowboy” personas – two men who play by their own rules. In a world of good and evil, Eastwood and Kyle dish out their unique form of vigilante “Dirty Harry-esque” justice. In American Sniper Eastwood has an opportunity to tell Kyle’s story (adapted from his memoir of the same name,) contradictions and all. What comes of it is a worthy tribute to Kyle’s hefty legacy that is also maddening white-washed and simple.

On Monday Paul Thomas Anderson joined Marc Maron on his wondrous podcast WTF. In the nearly two-hour interview Marc grills PTA on literally every film in his catalog – often asking him point blank – “what the fuck is THIS movie about?” It’s hilarious and completely sophomoric but it’s clear that PTA doesn’t get a question that pointed very often. It throws him, makes him wonder aloud what each film in his cannon has to say. The surprising thing is most of the answers are just as simple as the question.