Every film is someone’s baby, even if it’s a baby manufactured in a lab by committee. It is first desired, then conceptualized, then conceived; it’s carried and then born, and placed in the hands of caregivers – the parents, pediatricians, teachers and child care providers – who in turn endeavor to give it a healthy […]
Dagger Movie Night: “Murder on the Orient Express” — Another Stab at Agatha Christie
The film making process sucks, particularly when shooting on location. There are so many things that can and will go wrong, and even the most organized production is a logistical nightmare. So when mounting an adaptation of Agatha Christie’s “Murder on the Orient Express” – a novel that yielded a film version by Sidney Lumet […]
Dagger Movie Night: “Thor: Ragnarok” — MCU Hammered
Few would argue that the previous “Thor” films have been among the weaker entries in an otherwise strong Marvel cinematic universe. Statistics and graphs seemed to indicate that the God of Thunder’s chief selling point to unfamiliar audiences consisted of standard fantasy tropes; these were repackaged for viewers spun up on “Lord of the Rings” […]
Dagger Movie Night: “Kingsman: The Golden Circle” — Take Me Home, Country Roads
Don’t ask why, because it’s a Shaggy Dog story and really doesn’t matter beyond setting up a punchline; but midway through “Kingsman: The Golden Circle,” super-spy Eggsy Unwin (Taron Egerton) is tasked with inserting a tracker into a woman’s vagina. Said tracker is introduced to said orifice via the wearing of a finger sheath that […]
Dagger Movie Night: “IT” — It floats
The most enduringly memorable elements of Stephen King’s most enduringly memorable novel involve seven pre-teen outcasts uniting to battle a shape shifting creature they collectively refer to as It. Each child possesses a perceived weakness, handicap, or social deficiency that ostracizes them from his or her peers, and yet these character traits are what ultimately […]
Dagger Movie Night: “Atomic Blonde” — The Visual Poetry of Excessive Violence
About halfway through “Atomic Blonde,” our heroine, MI6 super-agent Lorraine Broughton (Charlize Theron) is suddenly faced with getting her wounded informant “Spyglass” (Eddie Marsan) to safety. They’re caught in the middle of a crowded Berlin protest march and a sniper is trained on them from a window somewhere high above the street. Ducking into the […]
“A Ghost Story” — No Light at the End of the Tunnel
Ladies and gentlemen, allow me this unique opportunity to offer a brief (and thoroughly simplified) lesson on cinematic aspect ratios and their historical significance. This is an important topic if we’re going to talk about “A Ghost Story.” You see, in the long-ago era of early televisions, the screen roughly approximated what you’d see in […]
Dagger Movie Night: “Spider-Man: Homecoming;” Marvel Spins a Joyously Fun and Funny Web
Sometimes we need to put our differences aside and admit when we’re wrong. Sony did this last year, when they swallowed their pride after their (disastrous) attempt to reboot the crown jewel in the Marvel empire. The frantic attempt to maintain control of the “Spider-Man” license before it could revert to Marvel Studios resulted in […]
