Film Review: The Nice Guys (2016)

Copyright: Warner Bros. Pictures

This film tries to follow in the footsteps of those comedy films which try to extract the hardboiled detective and place it into the weird and wacky world of show business. While they’re funny, they also utilize real violence to create a mix most similar to a black comedy, but not quite there when it comes to satire or cynicism (which these lack).

Every couple of years, one or more movies like that come along and replace the previous reigning king. That is why Get Shorty, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and other ones like it always tend to stick around for a somewhat prolonged period of time, mostly by being inflated in value mainly by the audience which digs the violence-fame-jokes mix-up.

The Nice Guys is a perfect representative of this trend and like most, it tries to innovate the form at least a little. In this case, there are two hardboiled detectives, here private investigators, who are working on a case of a missing porn actress in LA in the late 1970’s. 

Film Review: Money Monster (2016)

Copyright: TriStar Pictures

We all got hurt in one way or another by the recession of 2008/09. While reasons for the crash are beyond most of us, many instinctively blamed the trader/broker/banker characters of the world, especially the US.

The same sentiment was founded on numerous elements, but the biggest cornerstone was the idea that those behind the reigns of this failed venture did not suffer when the excrement hit the fan.

Money Monster draws most of its energy on this premise and wants to serve one back to the financial community and at least in this fictional domain, make them sweat for what they have done and continue to do. But, no one can threaten them financially, so here a man decides to move his vengeance to the realm of bodily harm.

Film Review: Green Room (2015)

Copyright: A24

When Jeremy Saulnier made Blue Ruin he showed that he has the chops to make specific and very driven visions which are both familiar and deeply authentic. In Green Room, Saulnier got a chance to try and catch that AAA production wave and make a horror thriller with a great cast and a very original (yet easily relatable) setup.

Immediately, it’s clear that he successfully resisted all the temptations that mostly boil down to dumbing down of his vision. In the process, he didn’t quite make a perfect masterpiece which Blue Ruin (almost) is but still showed that he’s a force for the future of a type that is sorely needed. Often labeled in other reviews and media in general as punks vs. neo-Nazis, Green Room basically is this – after they book a gig at the wrong club in the woods and there open a wrong door, a DIY punk band ends up being under siege by a gang of murdering white supremacists.

Gaby's Revenge Full Season Review (2016)

The thing which impressed me the most about the web series Gaby's Revenge is the ease with which it develops emotional connections. Like a neural network where nodes connect to other nodes and create a dense mesh so does this series place its characters in a living, breathing universe, where every action has a reaction.

Inside of it, the things people experience are not plot devices that simply take place and then disappear. Instead, like in the real world, they interact with each other, expanding a single event into a complex and tragic story of violence, family, and loyalty.

The creator of the series, Jonathan Vargas, pushes a clear vision for the episodes. The series consists of five individual episodes and they all differ greatly in tone, length, and exposition of the key plot elements.

Crowdfunding Push: Lucifer Rising

There are several staples of the horror genre, but one of the most basic one, the idea of the Devil (or some of his many alternative names) was somewhat disregarded over the past couple of years. Now, however, a crowdfunding campaign for a film by P. Vincent DeMartino seems determined to change this and do it with a movie called Lucifer Rising.

Here’s what the official Indiegogo page of the film states about the project and its purpose:

Coming Soon: The Magnificent Seven

As the release date of September 23rd edges closer, the public interest for The Magnificent Seven only appears to grow. Recently praised for a very diverse cast, the film's director Antoine Fuqua played down this idea, saying that everyone simply worked hard on the movie. His last remake, The Equalizer did not fair that well with me, so I'm hoping that he's back to his sharp self with this one.

Check out the official trailer for The Magnificent Seven below.