Category: New Releases
Creed III: Both sides of the ring
by Matt Ward
Cinema has long had a fascination with the pugilistic poetry of boxing and the legacy of its fighters from On The Waterfront to Raging Bull to the Rocky franchise. While filmmakers have often used the sport to craft their own unique dramas, the genre of boxing movie laid relatively dormant until Ryan Coogler brought back the thrills and chills of cinematic sports with 2018’s … Read More Creed III: Both sides of the ring
Sharper: Deception game
by Matt Ward
Blink and you’ll probably miss the best movie to have been released in the early doldrums of cinema in 2023. While most moviegoers are watching bears on drugs or old women pining for football stars or tiny superheroes, Apple snuck a surprisingly engaging, yet underhanded crime thriller past unsuspecting cinephiles and dropped it on their AppleTV+ streaming service to little fanfare. Helmed by Benjamin … Read More Sharper: Deception game
Ant-Man 3: Big bite, little sting
by Matt Ward
Kevin Feige has some major problems. The longtime head behind Marvel Studios and overseer of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has often felt untouchable, almost invincible in a way due to his cultivation and crafting of a seemingly endless stream of comic book franchises. But at this point, comic book fatigue combined with too much concern for spectacle and laziness in storytelling have left … Read More Ant-Man 3: Big bite, little sting
Your Place or Mine: Where is the love?
by Matt Ward
Valentine’s Day weekends have always been a landing spot for the charming romantic comedy. And while the genre has become all but eradicated from the big screen, streaming services like Netflix, Amazon Prime and Hulu have countless offerings of boy-meets-girl, hijinks ensue until they fall madly in love films. In a pre-pandemic world, there would simply be no reason that a rom-com led by … Read More Your Place or Mine: Where is the love?
80 For Brady: With love for Touchdown Tom
by Matt Ward
Six years ago this week, football crafted a story so unlikely that it felt scripted to the point of movie magic in real life. An column on cinematicconsiderations.com the evening of the game predicted what was to come: Everything about tonight’s incredible, dramatic Super Bowl that saw the New England Patriots rally back from 19 points down to win 34-28 in the first overtime … Read More 80 For Brady: With love for Touchdown Tom
Shotgun Wedding: Romance moving online
by Matt Ward
If there’s one type of movie that hasn’t roared back theatrically after the pandemic, it’s the romantic comedy. For every The Lost City that surprises at the box office, there seem to be a half-dozen or more rom-coms that only find success on streaming platforms like Marry Me, Ticket to Paradise or I Want You Back. In a continuation of this trend, Lionsgate sold … Read More Shotgun Wedding: Romance moving online
Plane: Vintage action for the modern era
by Matt Ward
It’s somehow comforting to know that even as cable channels are fading to obscurity with the rise of streaming services, movie studios are still making films whose future lies on basic cable even before the first ticket is sold. The marginally violent, action-adventure film is a unique sub-genre that typically centers around Jason Statham, Mel Gibson, Liam Neeson or, on occasion, Sylvester Stallone and … Read More Plane: Vintage action for the modern era
The Whale: Fraser’s emotional odyssey
by Matt Ward
Film is often about redemption, the seeking of absolution or, at times, both. There’s tales about comeback kids, underdogs, the forgotten, the unforgiven, the unforgivable, the isolated. In a way, director Darren Aronofsky’s latest feature is a bit of all of this, most notably being a return to stardom for Brendan Fraser with the year’s most committed, devastating performance. Structurally, The Whale tells the … Read More The Whale: Fraser’s emotional odyssey
Babylon: All the glitz and glamour
by Matt Ward
When auteur directors get to the point in their careers where they have established the pedigree to have carte blanche with a studio’s checkbook, it opens all sorts of possibilities. Damien Chazelle – who burst on the scene with Whiplash and is best known for his Oscar winning musical La La Land – dips his toe back in the waters of making movies about … Read More Babylon: All the glitz and glamour
White Noise: Cinematic static
by Matt Ward
It seems as though every year Netflix puts out a film that makes one wonder how it was greenlit into production. Whether it’s an exorbitant budget for a languishing Martin Scorsese epic like The Irishman or an overly sarcastic, nihilistic dramedy like Adam McKay’s Don’t Look Up, the streaming service can’t quite find its footing for an award season contender to draw large audiences … Read More White Noise: Cinematic static
Glass Onion: Whodunnit in the modern era
by Matt Ward
Three years ago, writer/director Rian Johnson wowed audiences with an unexpected, compelling and hilarious take on the classic Agatha Christie-esque murder mystery genre. His Knives Out brought viewers into the world of a rural New England town filled with intrigue, suspicion and family tension while debuting an eccentric Southern detective on par with Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes in Daniel Craig’s Benoit Blanc. The … Read More Glass Onion: Whodunnit in the modern era
Avatar 2: Big waves, shallow depth
by Matt Ward
James Cameron hasn’t made a new film in over a decade. The blockbuster spectacle-creator behind epic movies like Aliens, The Terminator and Titanic last showed his craft on the big screen in 2009 with a technologically revolutionary feature about human colonizers on a space world in Avatar, an Oscar nominee for Best Picture that won several technical awards. Since then, Cameron has long sought … Read More Avatar 2: Big waves, shallow depth
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