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Reviews
SXSW Review: "Arlo and Julie"
- Details
- Parent Category: Film Festivals
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Friday, 21 March 2014 07:45
- Written by Matt Oakes
"Arlo and Julie"
Directed by Steve Mimms
Starring Alex Dobrenko, Ashley Spillers, Sam Eidson, Chris Doubek, Mallory Culbert, Hugo Vargas-Zesati
Comedy
United States
Anyone who's ever put a jigsaw puzzle together before understands the acute stages of puzzle insanity. At first, it's an exciting endeavor, like diving into a new George R.R. Martin tome or deciding that you're gonna start hitting the gym again. After about twenty minutes of turning over white pieces, you already feel the first tinge of frustration, that beading realization of what you've just committed to. Finally, you've put together the exterior, that beautiful border to encapsulate all, fencing in that headless herd of jigsaw madness. Cue feelings of adequacy, and perhaps even ecstasy. Then comes the middle bits, the monotony of a sea of monochromatic shades, so unanimously uniform that you may as well piece them together blindfolded. Eventually, parties become frustrated, tensions rise and deep-seated issues simmer up between you and your in-it-to-win-it puzzle partner. Maybe you shout, cry, give it all up. Maybe even a table gets flipped. But what happens when a puzzle gets so out of control that it takes over your life? That's exactly the question Steve Mimms asks in Arlo and Julie.
SXSW Review: "Fort Tilden"
- Details
- Parent Category: Film Festivals
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Thursday, 20 March 2014 00:40
- Written by Matt Oakes
"Fort Tilden"
Directed by Sarah Violet Bliss and Charles Rogers
Starring Bridey Elliott, Clare McNulty, Neil Casey, Becky Yamamoto, Desireé Nash, Peter Vack, Jeffrey Scaperrotta
Comedy
95 Mins
United States
Remember when tying your shoes was an impossible chore? When you could only get places at the discretion of your mom's minivan? When you didn't know how to cook yourself a meal so you relied on someone else's feeding hand so that you wouldn't starve? These, among others, are lessons that Fort Tilden's anti-heroines never seemed to learn.
SXSW Review: "Space Station 76"
- Details
- Parent Category: Film Festivals
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Tuesday, 18 March 2014 00:47
- Written by Matt Oakes
"Space Station 76"
Directed by Jack Plotnick
Starring Patrick Wilson, Liv Tyler, Matt Bomer, Marisa Coughlan, Jerry O'Connell, Kylie Rogers
Comedy, Drama, Sci-Fi
93 Mins
United States
The 1970s were an age of looking towards the stars. From Star Wars to Star Trek, it was a decade of endless possibilities, a time that saw instant dinners, laser weaponry and hovercrafts around every corner. It witnessed the culmination of the space race, the end of the Vietnam War, and the birth of a new unchartered epoch in the suburban trenches of Americana. Mimicking the uneasy blend of conservatism and forward-looking gung-ho-manship that defined the generation, with his tongue planted firmly in his cheek, Jack Plotnick has made Space Station 76 a soapy space opera; a smartly satirical smoothie of 70s manifest destiny - ripe with the impractical hopes of intergalactic expansionism - cut with the tedium of suburban ennui.
SXSW Review: "The Raid 2"
- Details
- Parent Category: Film Festivals
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Monday, 17 March 2014 07:47
- Written by Matt Oakes
"The Raid 2: Berandal"
Directed by Gareth Evans
Starring Iko Uwais, Julie Estelle, Yayan Ruhian, Donny Alamsyah, Oka Antara, Tio Pakusodewo, Arifin Putra
Action, Crime, Thriller
148 Mins
Indonesia
R
To try to boil down what is so sublimely excellent about The Raid 2: Berandal is a futile exercise in tilting at windmills. It's like boxing a griffin, outthinking a Sicilian, or KY-Jelly wrestling an anaconda. Instead of trying to describe the irrepressible satisfaction this balls-to-the-walls, smarter-than-your-dad actioner elicits, instead conjure up what it felt like to lose your virginity, if you lost your virginity in a ten-on-one man brawl in a pit of mud.
