One could say melodramas take preposterous human mistakes and play them for dramatic effect. They challenge the audience to interpret how you would act defiantly or morally differently in the same situation. These films do so while still compelling you watch in hope for any semblance of a happy ending. To understand “The Light Between Oceans” is to understand melodrama. The themes of melodramatic journeys are meant to be arduous. In the medium of film, the clinchers that aid in the ability to embrace and appreciate a melodrama are its tone and the acting performances. “The Light Between Oceans” flourishes to accomplish both benchmarks.

ADVANCE MOVIE REVIEW, 2016, MOVIE REVIEW, 5 STARSDon ShanahanAugust 31, 2016World War I, The Place Beyond the Pines, life lessons from films, Donald Shanahan, Epic, The Lobster, 2016 Fall Movies, Every Movie Has a Lesson, David Lean, movie review, The Danish Girl, Malborough, New Zealand, life lessons, 12 Years a Slave, The Light Between Oceans, Oscar contenders, Adam Arkapaw, Tim Dirks, Alexandre Desplat, Bryan Brown, Cinematography, Oscar hopefuls, Don Shanahan, Youth, Jack Thompson, AMC, Alicia Vikander, Macbeth, Ingrid Bergman, melodramas, life lessons from movies, 2016, Oscar race, life lessons from film, Blue Valentine, Shame, Awards bait, Oscar bait, movie commentary, Michael Fassbender, Filmsite.org, Derek Cianfrance, film commentary, movie melodramas, Rachel Weisz, film review, Cape Campbell Lighthouse, M.L. Steadman, Filmsite, Daniel Day-Lewis, Steve Jobs Comments

ADVANCE MOVIE REVIEW: The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

With the arrival of "The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies," we have made it to the payoff. This big story gets its ending, its tidy bow, and its cherry-on-top. Even if you think the movie studio was milking you for three movie tickets over three years out of a book that probably could have fit into a single film, you now get to see your patience rewarded and your virtue justified. You will realize it was worth it. You will feel like you stuck around to see "Superman" save the world, you survived the walk down those basement stairs in "Psycho," and you partied with the Ewoks and spirit Jedis in "Star Wars."

2014, ADVANCE MOVIE REVIEW, MOVIE REVIEW, 4 STARSDon ShanahanDecember 8, 2014The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, The Hobbit, The Hobbit: There and Back Again, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Peter Jackson, Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, Evangeline Lilly, Orlando Bloom, Movie trilogies, Guillermo del Toro, Smaug, Benedict Cumberbatch, J.R.R. Tolkien, Luke Evans, Gandalf the Grey, Ian McKellan, Lee Pace, Cate Blanchett, Christopher Lee, Hugo Weaving, Manu Bennett, WETA Digital, WETA Workshop, Performance capture, Oscar hopefuls, Oscar nominations, Oscar winners, Howard Shore, io9, Fantasy films, Fantasy genre, Every Movie Has a Lesson, Don Shanahan, Donald Shanahan, movie commentary, Movie review, film commentary, film review, film music, life lessons from films, life lessons from movies, life lessons from film, Film music, Cinematography, movie reviewComment

MOVIE REVIEW: Tracks

In 1977, a single woman named Robyn Davidson, along with her dog and four camels, decided to trek on foot across that barren desert landscape from Alice Springs to the Indian Ocean. The route was over 1,700 miles and would be about the equivalent of walking from Omaha, Nebraska to the Pacific Ocean. In this country, that's a matter of following a few highways and crossing all sorts of populated areas. In Australia, that journey is unmarked, dangerous, isolated, and devoid of almost any human help or settlement.

OSCAR PREDICTIONS 2014: The visual and artistic categories

It's time to make my formal predictions. In this post, we look at the visual and artistic technical categories that include cinematography, costumes, makeup, editing, visual effects, and editing. Let's go!