MOVIE REVIEW: Dirt Music

For anyone over the age of five-years-old who doesn’t have “The Gravel Foot” anymore, we know not all natural surfaces are easy and lush. The sensation of each pace toughens and prepares the heels and toes for the next one. Such is life as well. The literal and figurative barefoot steps of the characters from Tim Winton’s celebrated novel have tread over the hard grounds of loss and regret. The developed calluses mix with the ever-present dirt for messy lifestyles. Any songs present croon to that lamentation. Alas, the titular melodies advertised to break down the melodrama blow away weakly with the wind.

2020, Independent Film, Home Media, MOVIE REVIEW, Streaming, Video on DemandDon ShanahanJuly 17, 2020Comment

SHORT FILM REVIEW: Farewell Waltz

When no flowery language is flowing to fill our ears, another ambiance is necessary. The sweep of Felipe Tellez’s musical score is astounding. His arrangements were performed by the Budapest Air Orchestra and their lovely strings keep Farewell Waltz soaring with the remembrance and regret of the narrative. One would not readily imagine a 10-minute short film could reach heartstrings so assuredly and effectively, yet this throwback from Levy does so with lingering beauty above films ten times its length.

2020, 4 STARS, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, SHORT FILMS, Streaming, Film FestivalDon ShanahanJuly 12, 2020Comment

DOCUMENTARY REVIEW: No Small Matter

Documentaries often carry a sharp specificity by design. The backers and filmmakers have zeroed in on a pointed topic or singular issue they feel needs a spotlight or, even stronger, a public wake up call. Sometimes, they downright demand it. The challenge of an exemplary documentary is to convince next to its natural aim to inform. Their demands need worth, especially if the subject is too narrow to the point that it is inconsequential. That’s where the documentary No Small Matter lives up to its title. The demand matches the worth.

2020, 4 STARS, DOCUMENTARY REVIEW, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, Video on Demand, StreamingDon ShanahanJune 30, 2020No Small MatterComment

MOVIE REVIEW: Miss Juneteenth

Willed by Beharie’s solid lead, this small film is a gratifying drama fit for the holiday of its namesake. This feature writing and directing debut of Channing Godfrey Peoples (TV’s Queen Sugar) is an absorbing and honorable celebration of traditions, futures, culture, and family free of harsh judgment and wrongly-placed stereotypes that would have come from disingenuous sources. Miss Juneteenth has as much sincerity as it has struggle. The worthy themes ring true for a positive and willing audience that can pause looking down on pageants and see the bigger preparatory importance.

MOVIE REVIEW: The Short History of the Long Road

The title of The Short History of the Long Road is plain, simple, and true. This is but a small jaunt of a bigger journey for this broken family. The flashbacks are just that: flashed for mere seconds. They show enough to throb the heart and that’s plenty. Any extended testimonials and cherished memories come out in small talk and stay small talk without a grand speech in earshot. What’s personal is personal and not for crowds. Big and lofty is the sky above it, not the grounded individual. Once again, that’s the wavelength: plain, simple, and true. Those are fitting and admirable qualities.

MOVIE REVIEW: 7500

There’s just something about “bottle movies” that elevate tension a step or two better than films grander, louder, or flashier sometimes. Their draw comes from the mental mystery of the given confinements, and you don’t have to be a claustrophobe to feel that anxiety. It’s about the imagined suggestions one makes to visualize what they cannot see beyond the setting’s boundaries. Oftentimes our minds paint it worse than it actually is, and that is more than enough to get the pulse rate going oh so very well. The new Amazon streaming film 7500 joins those ranks as a choice little carafe of collywobbles.

2019, 2020, 4 STARS, Independent Film, Foreign Film, MOVIE REVIEW, Streaming, Video on DemandDon ShanahanJune 15, 20207500, Joseph Gordon-LevittComment

MOVIE REVIEW: The Departure

There is an almost teenage-level of absurdity to it all by the time the finger-pointing sparks conflict. Too much torrid steam in The Departure is off-screen and too little rancor coalesces and festers to truly shock. Within its establishing transitions, the film drops a suggestive cover of “Where Did you Sleep Last Night?” but the whole movie is more Leadbelly than Nirvana with dramatic edge and execution.

2020, ADVANCE MOVIE REVIEW, Independent Film, Home Media, MOVIE REVIEW, SHORT FILMS, Streaming, Video on Demand, 1 STARDon ShanahanJune 12, 2020Comment

SHORT FILM REVIEW: Cherish

For swift storytelling in the artistic medium of short films, every word counts. The time to both make an impression and speak the desired narrative is scarce. One must say a great deal with little. To that end, go ahead and count body language as double or even triple the value to dialogue. Cherish, the new Chicago-set short film from the Splatter Brothers filmmaking team of Lionel Chapman and Ira Childs earns strong merit from both the said and unsaid on a multitude of levels.

2020, 3 STARS, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, SHORT FILMSDon ShanahanJune 3, 2020Comment

MOVIE REVIEW: Becky

The tale-of-the-tape of Becky is as preposterous as the promised twisted violence that follows. In one corner, you have the middle-aged comedian Kevin James taking a dare for his first “dramatic role” as the escaped Neo-Nazi criminal Dominick. He’s hulking, tatted-up, bearded, and armed with stern rhetoric and an itchy trigger finger. In the other corner, you have the titular Millennial 13-year-old played by Lulu Wilson of The Haunting of Hill House. She’s angry, mournful over the passing of her mother, and, due to the home invasion circumstances than transpire, motivated for every hell-raising level of vindication possible. Before Bruce Buffer screams into a microphone, who do you got in this cutthroat clash that hits VOD June 5th?

MOVIE REVIEW: The Vast of Night

There exists a wide range of adjectives between the pleasurable place of “thrill” and unpleasant extreme of “terrify” that one could apply to stimulating movie experiences. Just like the films themselves from indies to blockbusters, joys or jitters come in all shapes and sizes. For the festival darling The Vast of Night being streamed on Amazon Prime, the proverbial needle of its excitement amplification lands on a very nifty word: TINGLES.

2020, 5 STARS, Independent Film, Home Media, MOVIE REVIEW, Streaming, Video on DemandDon ShanahanJune 1, 2020The Vast of NightComment

MOVIE REVIEW: End of Sentence

Gosh, that is such a smooth and stirring way to express something profound. Rarely veering to hardest of hard or the ugliest of ugly, there is much more of that homely wisdom to be had in Elfar Adalsteins’ debut feature film. Identifying the “rebels” from the “kind-hearted” is relatively easy. The challenges become to what degree agitation within the malcontent can be healed and where strength can develop next to grace in the kindly. End of Sentence is available on VOD from Gravitas Ventures and it is a worthy dramatic experience.

2020, 4 STARS, Home Media, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, Streaming, Video on DemandDon ShanahanMay 30, 2020End of SentenceComment

MEDIA APPEARANCE: Guest on the "You'll Probably Agree" podcast talking the future for movie theaters

Back in March, I joined Mike Crowley’s You’ll Probably Agree podcast with Ian Simmons of Kicking the Seat and Pat McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com in listing and recommending movies to cope with the COVID-19 quarantine. Now, two months later, society is starting to loosen. Ian, and I return to YPA to look at the damage done to the movie theater business with a prognosticating curiosity towards their possible future. Enjoy this heady and rich conversation of our fears, wonders, and predictions for what could be the new normal or the broad future. Give Mike’s YouTube channel a new subscriber, his Facebook page a like, and his Twitter a follow!