Brightburn (2019)
Brightburn uses a cunningly simple premise – what if Superman, but evil? – to chillingly simple effect.
The Hyper-Masculine Incoherency of Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice is neither the hero the superhero genre deserves nor the villain it dreads. This is a film about two superheroes waging war with one another that’s similarly at war with itself, riven between competing narratives, commercial concerns and an overarching ambition that sees it striving for meaning before collapsing…
Canon Will Eat Itself: Alien and Other Modern Icons
District 9 director Neil Blomkamp kicked up a fuss yesterday when it was reported that his upcoming Alien sequel would break continuity from the last two films of the franchise, Alien3 and Alien: Resurrection. Blomkamp has since stepped back from that assertion – “I’m not trying to undo Alien 3 or Alien: Resurrection, I just…
The Lego Movie (2014)
In an era where blockbuster movies direct their immense budgets towards overcoming the restrictions of cinema, The Lego Movie succeeds by embracing its limitations. Those limitations are found in its animation; computer-generated, sure, but constructed from Lego blocks in their millions. Directors/screenwriters Phil Lord and Christopher Miller get a lot of mileage out of their…
The Usual Suspects (1995)
So, spoilers: The Usual Suspects is actually pretty shitty. It has a good reputation in a many quarters, launching the career of Bryan Singer (who went on to direct some good X-Men films and a critically-reviled Superman reboot) and featuring lynchpin performances from Kevin Spacey and Gabriel Byrne. It’s mostly remembered for that twist, one…
