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

MOVIE REVIEW: The High Note

Each time Maggie’s employers, the fictional world-renowned recording artist Grace Davis played by Blackish’s Tracee Ellis Ross and her manager Jack Robertson played by Ice Cube, summarily dismiss her to stay in her lane or fetch some inconsequential thing, The High Note gets better because the real talent is allowed to emerge. To love underdog moxie, or any moxie for that matter, you have to have it. The flimsy Dakota Johnson doesn’t. She, and the movie, would be better served by her getting out of the way just like her shunned Maggie.

MOVIE REVIEW: The Lovebirds

Here’s the rub though. For “hi-jinks ensue” to work and live up to its promise, you need strong and effective events to come before and after when that phrase is planted. Have a weak setup and the absurdity of hi-jinks after can feel like a jolting improvement or tail-spinning crash. Have a great setup and the hi-jinks that follow can either evolve or devolve the auspicious start. This “one wild night” romp of The Lovebirds has about half of each measure in that balance.

2020, 3 STARS, ADVANCE MOVIE REVIEW, Home Media, MOVIE REVIEW, Streaming, Video on DemandDon ShanahanMay 21, 2020The LovebirdsComment

MOVIE REVIEW: Scoob!

One of the classic catchphrases of the old Scooby Doo franchise is the vocalized signal, often from the eager mouth of their de facto leader Fred, of “looks like we’ve got another mystery on our hands.” The new CGI reboot Scoob! now on VOD platforms answers that rhetorical realization with both possible extremes. The movie doesn’t have one and the canyon-sized narrative hole because of it leaves us more perplexed than satisfied with a shoulder shrug and a chin rub of our own.

2 STARS, 2020, Animated Film, Home Media, MOVIE REVIEW, Streaming, Video on DemandDon ShanahanMay 17, 2020Comment

MOVIE REVIEW: Capone

That name brings forth a gusher of overplayed stereotypes and caricatures. If you think you’re going to see the decadence of the historical figure’s prime, you’ve come to the wrong movie. If you think you’re going to see another Ben Gazzara or Bob De Niro galavanting as the king of his own court, you’ve come to the wrong movie. If anything, Josh Trank intentionally and subversively pushes back against the romanticized urban legend of “Scarface,” “Big Al,” “Big Boy,” “Snorky,” and “Public Enemy No. 1.”

2020, 3 STARS, Home Media, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, Streaming, Video on DemandDon ShanahanMay 13, 2020Capone, Tom Hardy, Josh TrankComment

MOVIE REVIEW: Arkansas

Let’s just say it. The subgenre of redneck crime films is a messy place. The “black hat” is almost always a crazy SOB engaged with a less crazy SOV “white hat.” Slickness is replaced by stains. Dazzle is replaced by dinge. Calling any of them “sagas” is too much credit and heft. Unless you’re the Coen brothers (and even if you’re them too), spicing up this slow-and-low movie barbecue takes some of that absent slickness and dazzle injected into either the filmmaking or storytelling departments, or both.

2020, 3 STARS, Film Festival, Home Media, MOVIE REVIEW, StreamingDon ShanahanMay 10, 2020Arkansas, Clark Duke, Vince VaughnComment

MOVIE REVIEW: Working Man

Movies becoming timely is almost always an accident. They’re made months in advance and can never reliably predict the future they will enter when released. The right match of content and happenstance can elevate a film’s mystique, even that of a tiny little indie that normally wouldn’t carry much of one at all. The award-winning Working Man, filmed in and around Chicago last year, debuts on VOD services today to a sheltered public facing jobless claims that topped 30 million in two short quarantined months. The distinctive part about this movie is that it displays a sense of workplace fulfillment that would still work if that bellwether statistic was zero. Timeliness only makes it better.

2020, 4 STARS, Home Media, Independent Film, MOVIE REVIEW, Streaming, Video on DemandDon ShanahanMay 5, 2020Working ManComment

MOVIE REVIEW: Extraction

Call this a meandering musing, but it’s a tad quizzical how far apart the definitions of “mercy” and “mercenary” are despite their beginning spellings. There is not harming someone you have power over versus a soldier paid to fight for money. You won’t find those two words supporting the old “one hands washes the other” expression. Nonetheless, here in the new Netflix Chris Hemsworth vehicle Extraction one could wring a towel dripping with the unexpected mix of blood and suds. That makes for a messy and albeit entertaining proposition on the wiggle room to have mercy in a mercenary.

2020, 3 STARS, MOVIE REVIEW, StreamingDon ShanahanApril 24, 2020Extraction, Chris HemsworthComment

MOVIE REVIEW: True History of the Kelly Gang

In true western, or in this case, bushranger movie fashion, the edgiest and most intense moments in Justin Kurzel’s True History of the Kelly Gang come in the moments when someone is being held at gunpoint. Drama properly peaks with the potential power released by one little curved metal lever hinging a mechanism of murder and mayhem. The action itself to squeeze that trigger is easy. The decision and ramifications, as we well know, are not.

MOVIE REVIEW: Trolls World Tour

Adding more weight from the original movie’s message of finding internal happiness and not changing for others wouldn’t take much. With equal simplicity and symbolism, the felt of this dreamy universe for the sequel Trolls World Tour is upped to include heavy quilts, denim, leather, satin, velour, vinyl, and more. The multiplication of said textiles matches an appreciated boost in weightier themes. What is ready and primed to delight can also move body parts other than your hips and toes.