Taking the basic idea of the United States Government covering up a scandal by starting a fake war, but changing the events and the scandal from Larry Beinhart’s novel, screenwriter David Mamet‘s 1997 darkly humorous satire casts Robert De Niro as governmental fixer Conrad Brean hired to steer media coverage from reports away from the President sexually assaulting a young girl in the Oval Office long enough for him to win re-election.
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Throwback Tuesday takes us back to the year 2000 and the adventures of a moose and squirrel. Adapted from the 60s cartoon, The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle brought Rocky the Flying Squirrel (June Foray) and Bullwinkle J. Moose (Keith Scott) into the real world to stop the latest nefarious plot by Fearless Leader (Robert De Niro), Natasha Fatale (Rene Russo), and Boris Badenov (Jason Alexander) to use television to take over the world. Their guide on their journey through the real world is plucky young FBI Agent Karen Sympathy (Piper Perabo) who needs to get the two beloved 60s cartoon characters from Hollywood to New York in time to foil the villains’ plot.
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The Puntastic Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle Read More »
In honor of the passing of Val Kilmer, this Flashback Friday takes us back to 1995’s tour-de-force crime drama Heat. Unquestionably Michael Mann‘s best film, Heat splits its focus between a crew of armed robbers led by Neil McCauley (Robert De Niro) and the cops out to stop them led by LAPD Lieutenant Vincent Hanna (Al Pacino). No film has played both sides so well, although if I have a complaint it’s that a more ambiguous ending that faded to black on the gunshot in the weeds on the edge of Los Angeles International Airport allowing the audience to determine the winner of the pair’s struggle would seem to be more fitting.
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The opening episode of Netflix’s Zero Day introduces us to former President George Mullen (Robert De Niro) who after a cyber attack is tapped by the current President (Angela Bassett) and given extraordinary powers to uncover those responsible. Presenting Mullen as the last politician who successfully bridged the two parties, the political thriller early on feels like a cautionary tale of the potential of abuse of power even in the best hands, with the problems of Hollywood not knowing how technology works and relying on “something bad happening involving computers” to be our boogeyman. Presenting Mullen as an unreliable protagonist in the first episode who is either being gaslight or is suffering from early-stage dementia (or possibly both) simply muddies the water before the show ever gets off the ground to very mixed results.
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Zero Day – Episode 1 Read More »
2012 turned out to be a pretty darn good year at the movies. There were two films which I gave perfect scores to this year, one of which the majority of the country won’t be seeing until early next year. I’m breaking my own rule of including it on the list, but we’ll get to that in a moment. Between these two films, which naturally open and close the list (as it’s presented alphabetically), are eight other films rounding out the class of 2012.
Cutting down my list to ten means I need to speak for a moment on films that barely missed the cut. John Carter was the year’s most under-appreciated film, The Cabin in the Woods turned the horror genre on its ear, Ang Lee delivered an amazing journey with Life of Pi, Wreck-It Ralph was this year’s best animated feature, Safety Not Guaranteed was a terrific little sci-fi flick almost no one saw, and Moonrise Kingdom was director Wes Anderson‘s best film since The Royal Tenenbaums.
Enough with what didn’t make the list, let’s get down to discussing what did:
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From A to Z – The Top Ten Movies of 2012 Read More »
