MOVIE REVIEW: Island Zero

The bloody swirls of cold ocean water where a cute little terrier wearing a fou-fou life vest for his yachtsman owner used to be represents the first pre-credits victim of Island Zero. That pooch is the first of a cavalcade of casualties to come. This indie flick of cheesy gore pierced by a stab at serious science works hard to make the most of is resources to craft an involved little creature feature and paranoid thriller. The shrewdly cleaver Island Zero arrives nationwide on VOD on May 15th from Freestyle Releasing.

2 STARS, 2017, 2018, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, Video on DemandDon ShanahanMay 15, 2018Comment

CAPSULE REVIEWS: Feature films of the 6th Chicago Critics Film Festival

UPDATED: Found within are my capsule reviews of the feature films and documentaries covered by Every Movie Has a Lesson from this year’s 6th Chicago Critics Film Festival. This post will be updated as new films are reviewed are completed, so be sure to bookmark this and come back each day as new offerings arrive. Build your 2018 hidden gem list and see you at the Music Box Theatre in Lakeview!

MOVIE REVIEW: Tully

Academy Award-winning writer Diablo Cody has an unparalleled gift for the sardonic. She knows just the right rhythm of mockery and skepticism to twist mundane circumstances into something both witty and affecting. When combined with director Jason Reitman (Juno and Young Adult) and his sensibilities wired to much the same wavelength, the results are gleefully glorious. With their latest collaboration Tully, the writer-and-director duo have done it again.

MOVIE REVIEW: The Rider

This man is a cowboy. Normally, that’s all you have to say and the portrait of toughness is painted, but therein lies the mystery within the mundane of The Rider. Populated by untrained actors and inspired by true events of these rookie performers, Chloé Zhao’s sophomore feature film stands on that determination only to slowly reveal the internal aches underneath the grizzled exteriors of hat brims, denim, and vices.

2017, 2018, 4 STARS, Film Festival, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, Video on DemandDon ShanahanMay 2, 2018Comment

MOVIE REVIEW: Kings

Take Kings as how a foreigner sees our plights, troubles, and history. Ergüven has talent but comes across as tone deaf when trying for tribute out of this script that she’s been sitting on since 2011. What should be a spike through the heart gets washed away by the time a sunny Motown cover song tries to become a palette-cleansing “everything’s fine” coda and exhale moment in the end credits. Even as pure dramatization, Kings is an irresponsibly aimless one.

1 STAR, 2017, 2018, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, Video on DemandDon ShanahanApril 27, 2018Comment

MOVIE REVIEW: Disobedience

The intensity of the torrid on-screen affair in Disobedience is as strong as the rhetoric of oppression that simmers under the surface of the characters and the community they occupy. Sebastián Lelio’s follow-up to his Academy Award-winning foreign language film A Fantastic Woman teems with deeply stirring passion. Performed to a level of high commitment by Rachel Weisz and Rachel McAdams, the film repeatedly demonstrates that one of the best ways to build passion in a film is to present the implicit unspoken in a manor to outweigh explicit expression.

2017, 2018, 4 STARS, Film Festival, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEWDon ShanahanApril 25, 2018Landmark Century Centre CinemasComment

MOVIE REVIEW: Ghost Stories

Their expansion plan was very sharp and forgoes the thirst to hack and slay mindlessly like most current horror offerings. The shrewd focus of Ghost Stories is scarce on spectacle and firmly rooted in sinister nuance. The over-caffeinated and desensitized segment of genre fans might call it boring, while the veterans who remember effective minimalism will be squeezed by the twisted nerve leading to solid suspense.

2017, 2018, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, Video on Demand, 4 STARSDon ShanahanApril 19, 2018Comment

MOVIE REVIEW: Big Fish & Begonia

These narrative and aesthetic combinations make for a dynamic and sincere film from first-time writers and directors Liang Xuan and Zhang Chun. Big Fish & Begonia is an excellent place for teens to soak in some much-needed empathy against the more mindless American animated offerings. Give them an experience to absorb resonating truths on the powers of faith and love told from a different yet timeless light. They might just be better people for it.

Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, 2017, 4 STARS, Video on Demand, 2018Don ShanahanApril 17, 2018Comment

MOVIE REVIEW: You Were Never Really Here

The weapon of choice of Joe, the gruff contract killer of You Were Never Really Here played by Joaquin Phoenix, is an industrial ball peen hammer from his trusty local hardware store in New York. The film matches the qualities of this repurposed tool as an armament. The instrument and the art prefer the mauling nature of cold steel. Frozen by disturbing memories, the blunt object that is Lynne Ramsay’s award-winning potboiler is far more hulking than a quick death by bullet.

2017, 2018, 4 STARS, Film Festival, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, Video on DemandDon ShanahanApril 17, 2018AMC River East 21Comment

MOVIE REVIEW: Krystal

Fashioning itself as a coming-of-age dramedy, Krystal scratches out frank dialogue emoting on behalf of overly honest hearts. It banks on mixing sentiment built on pleasantries laced with profanity. All kinds of abrupt dysfunction and daffy discombobulation try to be endearing entanglements for entertainment, but the result is a really uneven piece of batty humor and grating romance

1 STAR, 2017, 2018, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, Video on DemandDon ShanahanApril 13, 2018AMC Skokie Village CrossingComment

COLUMN: Sofy.tv emerges as an amazing new platform for short films

Every Movie Has a Lesson has gradually become more and more of an advocate and proponent of the buried treasure that is the short film scene. I'm excited to share this report of a promising new hub named Softy.tv for audiences to experience and enjoy more from this branch of the film medium. Enjoy and learn up on this great viewing opportunity!

2018, Column, Editorial, Film Festival, Independent Film, SHORT FILMS, Social Media, Video on DemandDon ShanahanApril 10, 2018Comment

SHORT FILM REVIEW: The Prince

n concisely thematic way, the award-winning short film The Prince, written and directed by Kyra Zagorsky, is a moving artistic interpretation of one of those such moments. It indeed has a thought-provoking story to tell, and the result creates a resonating effect in short order, the chief goal of a good short film. The Prince’s key to accomplishing its depth is the twin layers it uses to portray and describe its moment.