Derek Cianfrance’s The Place Beyond the Pines is a viscerally pensive film and an enthralling multi-generational drama. As equally well-crafted as his highly received Blue Valentine, Pines is a complex and engrossing film that takes a look at legacies and what we leave behind for our kids. Further it shows us that those legacies, whether we want them or not, can sometimes make life choices for us without our say in the matter. It’s an ever-escalating, multilayered, emotionally bold familial drama that has all the makings of an instant classic. Cianfrance’s sophomore effort tells a sobering story about love and family and further one that despite the best of intentions may all end in a dismal trail of…
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G-S-T Review…Evil Dead
There’s a caveat that needs to be applied to any review of Fede Alvarez’s remake of Evil Dead, Sam Raimi’s unassailable 1981 horror staple: the new version isn’t as good as the old. The good news is that it doesn’t have to be, because nobody should reasonably expect genre remakes to live up to or exceed the masterpieces that spawn them. The better news is that Alvarez actually has a great movie on his hands- perhaps one that’s not capable of creating the same lasting, resonating impact within its categorical boundaries as Raimi’s original movie did, but certainly one that brings the blood-soaked goods with the sort of unhinged, fearless…
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G-S-T Review…Gimme the Loot
Who knew a street-centered narrative could be so sweetly buoyant as Adam Leon’s Gimme the Loot? Modern storytelling tends to look only at one side of a life lived in the hood, wading through the mud to capture and romanticize the difficulties inherent to an existence where simply getting by day to day proves to be a Herculean feat. Gimme the Loot almost feels like a response to those cliches, except that Leon actively chooses not to follow the polar opposite tract by indulging in straight-up fantasy about the world his protagonists, Malcolm (Ty Hickson) and Sofia (Tashiana Washington), inhabit; he instead aims for balance, harmony between exuberance and struggle…
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G-S-T Review…Beyond the Hills
What’s most impressive about Romanian filmmaker Cristian Mungiu’s morally complex drama, Beyond the Hills, may well be his insistence upon remaining firmly in the grey rather than taking sides. Another filmmaker might have examined this tale, based on a real-life exorcism, and turned it into an anti-religious parable in which science- and only science- possesses the sense and rationality necessary to make sense of and survive in the modern world. That’s hardly the point Mungiu’s making, of course, but some might draw that precise conclusion regardless of his efforts to make nearly every character in his film culpable in its central tragedy. Just like in life, though, there are no easy…
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G-S-T Review…Drafthouse Films’ WRONG
It doesn’t matter what side of the bed you wake up on when the alarm clock gets you up at 7:60 every morning. In Quentin Dupieux’s Wrong, everything in the main character Dolph Springer’s world is just that, and further a bizzare journey into the absurd. At nearly every corner of this dreamlike film there is a story line and likable characters somewhat reminiscent of the very off-kilter nature of Wristcutters: A Love Story and Dog Tooth topped off with Terry Gilliam’s surreal shooting style and sense of humor. Wrong is more than a bit askew but also funny, easily more accessible than Dupieux’s Rubber and is best described as being an odd delight. There’s an aloofness and complacency to the absurdity that…
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G-S-T Review…G.I. JOE: Retaliation
We at GoSeeTalk are but some of the few out there who really enjoyed Stephen Sommers’ G.I. JOE: The Rise of Cobra (read our review from way back); even if it was a mess it was still a lot of fun. In this highly anticipated follow up Jon M. Chu, known for his strong visual style and over-the-top action, ups the ante and makes G.I. JOE: Retaliation bigger and a little more believable than its comic origins. The sequel (penned by Zombieland writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick) embraces the JOE namesake yet only finds a few characters/plotlines returning from Sommers’ popcorn fueled romp. Retaliation embodies some of the more cartoon elements but goes about telling its story…
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G-S-T Review…The Host
Stephenie Meyer’s post-Twilight film The Host is a highly ambitious sci-fi yarn. It’s the tale of an alien invasion, a benign one at that, and as much as there is the potential to be a great story about rebellion and survival it’s really about life in the aftermath of said invasion. In short, they’ve won so what story is there to tell? It has a complex set-up/backstory, one with fantastically grand world-building yet we only see a very small portion of it. So how can that be engaging? Enter Andrew Niccol, director of equally simple sci-fi films like Gattaca and In Time. Here he lends his visually simple but elegant creative muscle to Meyer’s story and…
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G-S-T Review…Spring Breakers
Spring Breakers‘ audience will be divided into two groups of people: those who get the joke, and those who don’t. Of course, Harmony Korine’s new film operates on such blatant, overt levels of exploitative debauchery that it’s difficult to imagine how anyone could miss the point (subtlety isn’t his forte). If some still see 1999’s Fight Club as an endorsement of its ideas and behaviors rather than a rejection, though, then anything is possible. But Spring Breakers practically invites mainstream viewers to fumble with its meaning while Korine sits on the other side of the camera smirking; he’s almost daring his patrons to take up his film’s central mantra and leave…
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G-S-T Review…The Croods
It’s not odd or unusual that to find timeless advice which benefits our future we should look to the past. However it is odd that we should find sage-like advice and a timeless tale about family values in an animated film about cave men. Yet here we are getting a “Father Knows Best”, rather thinks he knows best life-lesson in the form of this charmingly witty and heart-warming tale from DreamWorks Animation. The plot of The Croods is standard familial fare; a young girl Eep (Emma Stone) yearns for the freedom beyond the confines of her house (in this story, a cave) and the conservative restraints put upon her by her over-protective father Grug (Nic Cage).…
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G-S-T Review…Olympus Has Fallen
Time has not been kind to Antoine Fuqua. Over a decade ago, he became an Oscar-caliber filmmaker (for whatever that label is worth) after Training Day vaulted him into mainstream prominence on the back of its gritty violence, no-nonsense artistry, and mesmerizing performances; in between then and now he’s output nothing but a handful of mild hits (Brooklyn’s Finest) and flops both small (Shooter) and large (King Arthur). Is his fall from grace an example of success eating a director alive? Was Training Day just an anomaly in an otherwise middling filmography? Giving credit where it’s due, Fuqua’s descent isn’t really due to lack of trying, but the trajectory of his career…
