Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)

Mad Max: Fury Road isn’t going to change your life. It’s probably not necessary to clarify that, but I thought it was worth noting in the wake of the torrent of #MadMadFuryRoad hype and hyperbole that has consumed Twitter regarding George Miller’s long-(long)-awaited follow-up to his original Mad Max trilogy. Believe the hype, but don’t…

Scarlett Johansson in Lucy (2014)

Unpacking 2014’s Blockbusters

If you want to talk about the experience of the average moviegoer in 2014, you need to talk about blockbusters. Boyhood might be the recipient of cascades of praise from critics and award bodies alike at the moment, and stands a solid chance of picking up the Best Picture at the Academy Awards. And yet,…

6 Degrees of Separation Blogathon

Sam McCosh from An Online Universe asked me to participate in the 6 Degrees of Separation Blogathon, a blogathon started by Nostra at My Film Views. The purpose of the blogathon is pretty straight forward – connect two actors/directors/movies in six or less steps (most of the recent posts seem to have reinterpreted the task as being…

Scarlett Johansson in Lucy (2014)

Lucy (2014)

Lucy is a deliriously unhinged future cult-classic, a joyously overstuffed treatise on the Meaning Of Life scrawled in Comic Sans and rendered in a vivid mélange of gunfights, car chases and stock footage. Its frankly ridiculous concept – Local Woman Uses More Than 10% Of Her Brain – could have easily produced an enjoyably daft…