Straight to Video Steve presents: Evil Dead

Posted in Movies, Reviews with tags , , , , , on April 8, 2013 by Sarah

Our resident horror expert, my big brother Steve, is back with a review of the new remake of the 1980’s horror classic Evil Dead. This movie has been pretty divisive with fans and critics, but Steve, a seasoned viewer of horror cinema, loved it. He even went so far as to demand it be seen in theaters, saying it creates the kind of fear-frenzy that makes watching horror movies so fun.

evil_dead_2013Being somewhat of a horror nerd (Sarah: Read—he’s a huge horror nerd), I’ve watched numerous documentaries on the genre where guys like Tom Savini, Wes Craven, and John Carpenter describe the atmosphere at the original screenings of their movies.  The mood is electric.  Nervous tension runs rampant.  Screams and flying popcorn litter the air…the audience is genuinely scared.  This is the experience I want to have when going to a horror flick and Fede Alvarez’s version of the Sam Raimi classic, Evil Dead, delivers just that. Read more »

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The end of an era, Roger Ebert 1942-2013

Posted in Uncategorized with tags , , on April 4, 2013 by Sarah

The first exposure I had to thinking about movies as more than just pure spectacle was watching Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert flay each other over who liked what movie and why on their weekly television show, Siskel & Ebert. The cultural impact of Siskel & Ebert is enormous–just think of how saturated “two thumbs up” is in our pop-culture lexicon–but Roger Ebert had a more personal resonance to me as a film writer working on his turf in Chicago. Read more »

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Spring Movie Preview: March

Posted in Movies, Previews with tags , , , , , on March 1, 2013 by Sarah

We leave behind the bone yards of January and February for the doldrums of March. Things get marginally better this month, thanks largely to the first round of festival pickings from TIFF holdovers and Sundance premieres, but the mainstream offerings remain decidedly slim. This is the stuff that wouldn’t cut it in the more competitive summer months, like “Gerard Butler saves the White House” and “G.I. Joe but with Bruce Willis and The Rock this time” and “Please like this as much as you liked Twilight”. March is always a weird month to me because there are genuinely good movies on offer, but there’s a lot of studio dross, too.

March 1

21 and Over

Half as grown up as The Hangover and twice as funny as Project X. Just once I’d like to see a young Asian character in a movie NOT trying to get into med school.

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Stoker. Is. BANANAS.

Posted in Movies, Reviews with tags , , , , , , , , on February 27, 2013 by Sarah

stoker posterPark Chan-Wook’s Stoker was on my “most anticipated” list for 2013 because I was curious to see how the South Korean director, best known for his action/revenge “Vengeance” trilogy, would translate not only in English but also when working in the slower, subtler medium of the Southern Gothic family drama. I thought if nothing else Stoker would be lovely to look at because Park is a composition man, capable of framing beautiful shots. Well Stoker is certainly a beautiful looking film. It also happens to be COMPLETELY AMAZING IN EVERY RESPECT.

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Best & Worst of the Oscars 2013

Posted in Celebrities, Event with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , on February 25, 2013 by Sarah

That show felt really, really long, right? In actual running time it was average (around three and a half hours) but it felt like it took all year to watch. I’m putting it down to the horrible direction. That was a really, truly, terribly directed telecast. No sense of rhythm or pace and not nearly enough cutaways to the audience to make it worth our time. We watch for the cutaways as much for anything else. We want to see George Clooney’s face when someone makes a joke about his younger girlfriends. We want to see Joaquin Phoenix bitchfacing the host to death when he hopes Phoenix is “on his meds”. I, personally, wanted to see some cutaways to Academy bigwigs when Robert Downey, Jr., plainly annoyed, snapped, “Biggest movie of the year, but only got one Oscar nomination”.

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The Second Annual Ethel Awards

Posted in Movies with tags , , , , , , , on February 21, 2013 by Sarah

ethelA semi-annual tradition here on Cinesnark, the Ethel Awards are our chance to time travel and fix the more egregious of the errors committed by the Academy. In the first Ethel Awards we went back and straightened out the 71st Academy Awards, held in 1999 for movies released in 1998. That was the year Shakespeare in Love beat Saving Private Ryan for Best Picture, but really it should have been The Thin Red Line. For the second Ethels, we’re revisiting the 72nd Academy Awards, held in 2000 for films released in 1999. That’s the year that contains one of the single greatest Oscar blunders of all time. It’s also the year that everyone ran wild over American Beauty and The Cider House Rules, two films that have not aged well, and thought The Insider got screwed. But you know what two movies were released in 1999 that were barely a blip on Oscar’s radar? Fight Club and The Talented Mr. Ripley. Hoo boy, do we have some fixing to do. Read more »

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Handicapping the craziest Oscar race in recent memory

Posted in Event, Movies with tags , , , , on February 20, 2013 by Sarah

academy-awardsThe last couple years I’ve actually done fairly well with my handicapping, but this year I am not at all confident in my picks. Too many races are too close, but there’s also a wide disparity between the movies that will win versus the ones that should win. I enjoyed Argo, I like Ben Affleck as a filmmaker and I think he’s developing into one of the most consistent and entertaining American directors, but Argo was not the best movie of 2012. It won’t even go down as the best movie of Affleck’s career. But the politics, they matter this year, even more than usual. With no clear masterpiece to lead the field and critical tastes too evenly spread over too many movies (primarily Argo, Lincoln and Life of Pi) and with Harvey Weinstein shoving Silver Linings Playbook down our throats like it’s something other than a rote, if well-acted, romantic comedy, the Oscar race turned into a dog fight. But it’s almost over. The Oscars are on Sunday, so it’s time for final predictions. Read more »

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