With each year of PR and press access, I’ve been diving deeper to experience more and more of what this art form and entertainment source has to offer. For the second year in a row and on the heels of the Oscars putting a bow on all things 2017, I wanted to share a list of personal recommendations of hidden gems from last year. Even these 17 are but drops in a larger bucket. There so many little gems that I have yet to see.
Read MoreAll of the tea leaves on my 2018 Awards Tracker have been read. The analysis and breakdown. My seven editorial columns of detailed picks are complete using my head more than my heart. These aren't my personal choices of what "should" win. It's what I think "will" win because you and I have got Oscar pools to dominate! Here's my complete and master list of predictions for the 90th Academy Awards.
Read MoreThroughout the awards season, I’ve been tallying the minor and lead-up award winners in all of the Oscar categories on the 2018 Awards Tracker as a big source of my prognostication data. In this seventh post, we look at the race for Best Picture. As I say every year, stick with me and I will win you your Oscar pool!
Read MoreDirector Matt Ruskin’s Crown Heights presents a true story incarceration as it happened to an innocent man. Just when you think two undue years awaiting trial are shameful enough, it turns into twenty over the course of four presidencies and 99 tidy minutes. To tell the story of Colin Warner is to tell a story shared by too many thousands of other wrongfully incarcerated people within the U.S. prison system.
Read MoreI'm beginning to love making this annual halfway point list. For me, 2017 has been a year for immense volume. Since January, I've reviewed 64 films, 58 of which were 2017 releases and not carryovers from a late 2016 awards season. Thanks to some film festival and advance press access, you can add 16 short films and four more feature films pending the windows to publish reviews. True to my website's hook, I present each film with its best life lesson from my review.
Read MoreFellow Chicago Independent Film Critics Circle co-founder and co-director Jim Alexander of The Movie Blog and The Young Folks recently started his own personal website dubbed Reel Talker. He has fired up a weekly podcast where he reviews current theatrical films, new Blu-ray and home media releases, and the hot movie news and trends of the week. Jim invited me to guest on his second episode.
Read MoreWhen standup comedians come to the big screen, they tend to stay with what works, extending their personas and bits into feature-length material within their comfort zones. Most lack creativity to make something unique out of their individuality. That is not the case with Demetri Martin making his impressive feature writing and directing debut with Dean. In 87 breezy minutes pushing against the grief of its characters, his film squeezes earnest sweetness out of bleak material that would never play on his comedy club stages.
Read MoreTo come right to the point, “Get Out” is an 104-minute living embodiment of a slow-burning WTF moment that just keeps growing with every new detail. And it’s glorious for being that very thing. More psychological thriller than the spattered horror it’s being billed to be, Jordan Peele’s directorial debut is subversively edgy and devilishly clever.
Read MoreThis past week, I was honored to be a guest on the CinemaJaw podcast, hosted by Matt K. and "Ry the Movie Guy" and ran by the "Best in the Biz." Since 2009, the Chicago-based trio of Matt Kubinski, Ryan Jagiello, and engineer Eliaz Gonzalez have put together one of the best and entertaining movie podcasts in this or any city. I'm a big fan of their work and you should be too.
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