In the spectacular finale of 2012’s Pitch Perfect, the girls, the “Barden Bellas”, sing a mash up of several songs. Yet one in particular actually transcends the film and appropriately describes what’s being set up in the sequel. Thinking of those Jessie J lyrics in the context of Pitch Perfect 2, “everybody look to their left, everybody look to the right“, this sequel is about the girls finding strength by looking to the Bella standing beside them. This sequel is indeed that sappy, but it’s not the whole story either. Elizabeth Banks takes the helm, and makes sure there’s plenty of irreverent glee in this follow-up effort. It’s absurd, self-aware, and insensitive,…
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G-S-T Review…The Age of Adaline
Is there such a thing as the one? One person who causes us to let our guard down, and then turns our world around? If you’re lucky, you find that person in your lifetime. But contrary to the words of the philosopher Jagger, time is not on our side. Adaline however has that envied yet double-edged luxury, only she uses her borrowed years to stay away from love. Not out of fear of her own heart breaking…but those of whom she meets. Lee Toland Kreiger’s The Age of Adaline is a charming and endearing love story, one that has all the makings of a modern classic. It’s also not the…
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G-S-T Review…Man From Reno
Editor’s Note: This review has been republished. It originally posted with the rest of our reviews and coverage at Fantastic Fest this past September. Even though it’s a slow-boil mystery, Man From Reno is film that engages quickly and keeps you transfixed. Like the hard-boiled detective films, and noir fiction which inspired it, Dave Boyle‘s involving story is layered with sly, pensive and effective reveals. Further, it’s punctuated by just the right amount of wrong elements that help keep us in suspense for the duration. In San Francisco, hugely popular Japanese novelist Aki (played by Ayako Fujitani) becomes caught up in something more elaborate than one of her best-selling books. On…
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G-S-T Review…It Follows
Editor’s Note: This review has been republished. It originally posted with the rest of our reviews and coverage at Fantastic Fest this past September. The darling hit of the 2014 Fantastic Fest, the overly pensive and highly original stalker film, It Follows, is sure to pick up fans wherever it screens. In an effort to stay progressive, and put a one-of-a-kind stamp on the horror genre, David Robert Mitchell actually gives us a story that feels somewhat like a throwback. The last time we were at the Fest, writer Robert Cargill and director Scott Derrickson told us that the genre had been dumbed down to mindless teen slashers. Well, they set out to help fight…
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G-S-T Review…My Life Directed By Nicolas Winding Refn
Editor’s Note: This review has been republished in conjunction with the theatrical and the VOD release on February 27, 2015. It originally posted with the rest of our reviews and coverage at Fantastic Fest this past September. When a filmmaker sets out to tell a story, their goals are simple: get the ideas they have in their head on to the screen, and have the audience enjoy it. Seems straightforward enough, but there are a multitude of challenges to achieve either goal. Really, the odds are stacked against every filmmaker simply because we the audience are becoming increasingly tougher to satisfy. A lot of it comes from how much content is…
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G-S-T Review…Kingsman: The Secret Service
When it comes to Matthew Vaughn, high energy director of Kick-Ass, X-Men: First Class, Layer Cake and Stardust, the man is a genre unto himself. That said, his latest effort, Kingsmen: The Secret Service, is all out excitement, a sly comedy and self-aware nod to the vintage spy thrillers. It is also Vaughn’s third foray into the comic world and, if it wasn’t clear by now, this is the guy to bring big heroes, and big action to the big screen – it’s fast paced, fast food cinema but not junk food. Matthew Vaughn’s irreverence is so finely tuned and abundant that his work is unparalleled in cinema. If, as they…
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G-S-T Review…Black Sea
Not your typical January fare in the least, Kevin Macdonald’s Black Sea is an intense, claustrophobic, and exhausting ride. It’s not often we get submarine films and this one is, very easily, among the best of them. Blending heart-pounding tension with a fair bit of humor and wit, the story is a high-seas heist film that echoes Aliens about much as it does Ocean’s 11. But be prepared, this is not a rollicking adventure, it’s a pensive thriller. This British film will leave you both shaken and stirred. Further, admission gets you the whole seat, but you’ll only need the edge. Even at the bottom of the sea, with things, at times, going…
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G-S-T Review…Virunga
To start this off, and put things in context, it’s probably best to steal a line from Edward Zwick’s Blood Diamond, “Throughout the history of Africa, whenever a substance of value it is found, the locals die in great number and in misery”. What makes the story of Virunga National Park so disheartening, and yet engaging, is that the events are so current that most of it happened in real time. And things don’t get better once the credits roll. The park is, and has been, in a state of constant conflict. Virunga is home to some of the few hundred remaining mountain gorillas left in the world. They are…
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G-S-T Review…Finding Vivian Maier
Some people get one shot at greatness. If you happen to be as lucky as Vivian Maier however, one of the 20th century’s greatest street photographers, you can get 100,000 of them. The late Ms. Maier, a mysterious nanny with a passion for observing and capturing people at the most banal points in their day, is the subject of this amazing documentary. One of the many bizarre, yet dazzling facts in this eclectic woman’s life is that her work went almost entirely unseen, even by Maier herself. Finding Vivian Maier is a compelling story of discovery that really began as a fluke (you really need to check out the trailer below)…
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G-S-T Review…Whiplash
The film industry is a funny animal. In the name of mainstream entertainment, whether we want it or not, we are constantly bombarded with iterations of a story we saw only a decade earlier, marginally worthless reboots (a filmic term that has only been in existence in the last ten years) and a slew of unflattering, unremarkable sequels. With all the derivative drivel out there, it is easy to lose hope. But once in a great while we get to see something new and exciting that really raises the bar for the industry, and also makes for an exceptional time at the cinema. Whiplash, in many ways, is a horror story reworked to…
