Blair Witch is 2016’s second hidden horror sequel, joining 10 Cloverfield Lane in utilizing a late-game title reveal to cause a swarm of free internet buzz. Both film franchises are known for their unusual marketing strategies, which makes the tactic a bit less off-putting, but it still elicits fear that the flashy move is a cover for sub-par material. By the time 10 Cloverfield Lane was actually released, most viewers were genuinely surprised by its quality, and I’ve got a feeling that Blair Witch might become a similar shocker.
In the world of the action film, sound and its importance to storytelling are very often overlooked. Usually, it is an afterthought, a surprising enhancement of whatever happens to be on-screen: thus, BOOM.
MixKnowledgy is the brainchild of two up-and-coming entrepreneurs, Erman Baradi and Brandon Waites. Erman Baradi, born and raised in Virgina Beach, is an aspiring screenwriter and multi-tasker breaking into Hollywood from the East Coast. He launched the Rel/Event Series in 2015 which featured panels of established speakers in the entertainment industry, primarily in film and television.
That’s Opportunity Knocking is a short comedy that starts off strong, panders down and then picks back up, written and directed by Charles Pelletier. Starring Satchel André and Moronai Kanekoa, the film recently won “Best Comedy Short” at LAIFFA. Pelletier clearly has a lot to say and harbors strong feelings about the 99% vs the 1%, which is how he opens his film and also is a theme that carries throughout.
We like to remind ourselves that people stood up to the Nazi party. That’s why we get movies like Anthropoid, Valkyrie, and Schindler’s List rather routinely, showing us the brave few who put their lives on the line to stop a massacre. The problem with these movies is that the flip side of history always lingers in the background, with people who put their heads down or actively participated in the genocide filling the screen.
You probably already know what you’ll see in a film noir. Guys who talk out of the sides of their mouths, calling women “broads” and “dames.” Detectives, crime, forbidden love, doomed lives.
Everybody complained about it on Twitter yesterday: It’s already August. 2016 is absolutely flying by.
Bad Moms threatens to turn into a women-centric Seth Rogen movie, and it could easily have fallen off that particular cliff. Fortunately the movie and the audience are spared that fate, largely because the moms aren’t really that bad, and that’s the point of the movie. These women are overstressed, overworked and under-appreciated, but they’re trying.
Film Inquiry compiles a list of the movies that are opening in cinemas every Tuesday. Opening this week: Suicide Squad, Nine Lives, Little Men, Five Nights In Maine and Front Cover.
Post-traumatic stress disorder – abbreviated as PTSD – has been a subject in film as far back as the 1946 John Huston documentary Let There Be Light. Since the Invasion of Iraq, it’s become a prevalent concept. One of the most original to have been made is Martin Scorsese’s 1976 classic Taxi Driver.
As soon as Justus D. Barnes fired point-blank at the audience in Edwin S. Porter’s influential The Great Train Robbery, the idea of violence to control an audience was introduced.
It’s hard not to wince when you see Matt Damon striding down the Great Wall of China. The attempts by American companies to break into China’s growing film market has been a mess so far, plagued by lawsuits, awkward plot detours to the country, and flat-out whitewashing. So while it’s not surprising to see a white actor fighting monsters from the Great Wall, the image still makes people cringe.
The intro to Miss Sharon Jones, likely tacked on by the film’s distributor, announces a standard music bio-doc kind of film, complete with voice-over, performances and talking heads. It was enough to make me roll my eyes at the prospect of sitting through another paint-by-numbers film on an under appreciated musician. Well, that intro was a deft bait-and-switch, as Miss Sharon Jones is anything but typical.
Though film is an inherently collaborative medium, requiring careful cooperation of dozens of individuals, there are two roles that get singled out as being most responsible for the final product. Representing the technical marvels behind the camera and the beauty in front of it, directors and actors are Hollywood’s lifeblood, providing a face for the art that took the efforts of countless unseen. Sometimes, a director/actor tandem proves so gripping or successful, that a personal and professional bond is forged, and the two continue to work together; sometimes it’s a brief burst, while other times it’s a career-long relationship, but often the familiarity working teams have with one another results in a film of elevated artistic achievement.
I was lucky enough to get the chance to interview The Hard Stop’s director, George Amponsah, producer, Dionne Walker and co-star Marcus Knox-Hooke, recently, before watching a screening of the film followed by an audience Q&A with Amponsah, Walker, Knox-Hooke and co-star Kurtis Henville. It was one of the most moving and insightful experiences I’ve had for a long time, and I’m still unravelling the many thoughts and feelings both the film and our conversation inspired. The IMDB description of the film The Hard Stop explains: