Last year, my wrap up consisted only of Independent films, so in keeping with that tradition I’ve mostly limited my list of films for the 2013 Wrap Up to indie titles as well. 2013 was not only a good year for award worthy narrative features – 12 Years a Slave, American Hustle and Fruitvale Station, to name a few – but also for documentaries. This year was arguably one of the best for both the quality and quantity of docs that gained mainstream attention including Blackfish, The Act of Killing, and Stories We Tell. It should also probably be noted that 2013 was a great year for women in film, in part due to the increased…
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G-S-T Year In Review – Grady’s 2013 Wrap Up
Every year there are seasons of movies that have certain expectations tied to them. During the summer we have big budget blockbuster hits that make hundreds of millions of dollars. Over the holiday season, November/December, we see a lot of Oscar contenders as well as family friendly films. In January we see movies that usually can’t compete with the summer blockbusters or holiday season movies. The point is, we as moviegoers have certain expectations and this year it feels as though we had less movie choices or maybe just less movies that were actually good. Don’t get me wrong, there were some great movies, but there didn’t seem to be…
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ALL PASSES CLAIMED – Advance Screening Passes to Spike Jonze's ‘HER’ in DALLAS, TX
Attention: CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED – All passes have been claimed. Thanks for your interest in Warner Bros. Pictures’ HER. ———————————————————————————————————————————— Go,See,Talk is partnering with Warner Bros. Pictures to give Dallas area film fans FREE passes to a special “Advance Screening” of HER starring Joaquin Phoenix, Amy Adams and Scarlett Johansson. This screening will take place in DALLAS, TX on Tuesday, January 7th at 7:30 PM. So how do you claim/win them?? Simple. Click the poster above to get your PRINTABLE GoFoBo pass…but it’s first-come, first-served so act fast!! Be one of the first people to register for your ticket and you may get to see HER before it opens on January 10th. Little…
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G-S-T Year In Review – Andy’s 2013 Wrap Up
Another year, another wrap up. I want to use this preamble space to touch on statistics; I saw more films on 2013’s release slate than any other year since I started this whole crazy film critic’s journey (at least within its lifespan). How many more? Well, permit me to abstain from specifics, because that would just be bragging, but I’ll say “a lot” and leave it at that. Henceforth the final tally will be a secret that haunts your dreams for life. Okay, that’s going a wee bit far. But there is a good reason for me bringing up math: after poring over the trusty (highly classified!) Word document I’ve been using…
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Off the Shelf…’Starter For 10′ (Not-So-Secret Santa Edition, #2)
(Note: as with my vicious, no-holds-barred takedown of the appallingly bad Showdown in Little Tokyo, this Off the Shelf entry is extra special. That’s because it’s also part of the Cinematic Katzenjammer’s Not-So-Secret Santa Swap blogathon, which this time around is a bit more seasonally appropriate. For my swap, I was given the chance to talk about Starter For 10, a movie which did not make me want to pour boiling gravy into my eyes; it’s charming and fun, plus it has all the British people in it. Thanks to the illustrious Nick Powell for setting this whole thing up.) You’ve probably seen Starter For 10 before. By that I…
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G-S-T Quick 5 – 2013’s Underseen Gems
Well, well – we’re back here again, are we? The biggest difference between that post and the one you’re about to read, though, is that 2013 has been nothing but gravy through and through, boasting an absolutely absurd number of high quality films of all makes and models; if the early going was slow, things picked up in a big way in late Spring, and that momentum stuck for pretty much the rest of the year following that. Whether you were hitting the big multiplexes or your local arthouse establishment, 2013 had a slew of wonderful movies worth your patronage. Inevitably that means some of them fell through the cracks;…
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G-S-T Review…Lone Survivor
Director Peter Berg sure does fancy his modern day war themed films. And why wouldn’t he? Barring Battleship, he has a knack for these heart-felt but hard-hitting and gritty stories. His true talent seems to be in these dense fish-out-of-water narratives focusing on a few key players set in a world they struggle to comprehend. With many parallels to his 2007 film The Kingdom, Lone Survivor, whether or not it was a true story (which it is), is a passion project for Berg and can almost be viewed as a companion piece. Lone Survivor, adapted from a novel of the same name (keeping the name of the book is a…
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G-S-T Review…The Wolf of Wall Street
After sitting through three hours of unrelenting, unrepentant debauchery, your first query regarding The Wolf of Wall Street might be one of genesis. How in the blue hell did this thing get made? Yes, yes, there’s a realistic and tangible answer to that burning question, and it’s only five words long: Leonardo DiCaprio and Martin Scorsese. (Credit should go to Red Granite Pictures, too.) But none of that makes for satisfactory explanation as to how a mainstream Hollywood movie could be this explicit, this over the line, and this unapologetic all at the same time; most shamefully of all, it’s also a total blast, though you’ll probably want to take a…
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G-S-T Review…Her
Stop me if you’ve heard the one about Leonard Hofstadter falling in love with Siri; sometimes, reaching for low-hanging fruit proves too much of a temptation, though by now that joke has already passed its expiration date. In fact, you may be more familiar with Her, the latest film from Spike Jonze, through overuse of the aforementioned wisecrack than actual studio promotion. But punchlines about pop culture and technology don’t do full justice to Jonze’s picture, a wholly unique work that’s peppered with humor but is more meaningfully shaped through its examination of human relationships in a culture grown overly reliant on precious gadgetry. That’s the most surface level of…
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Of Horn & Ivory: The Odyssey Of ‘Inside Llewyn Davis’
For an ostensible, totally loose biopic about Dave Van Ronk, Inside Llewyn Davis leans rather heavily on an incredibly serendipitous allusion to The Odyssey, and more than a decade after releasing O Brother, Where Art Thou?, to boot. A story about one man’s navigations through the choppy waters of New York’s 1960’s folk music scene might be the last place anybody would expect to find references to Homer’s ancient epic; leave it to Joel and Ethan Coen to subvert expectations, then, because their film practically hinges on a synchronized collision between hoary fiction and the more recent, very real history of Van Ronk and the folk revival movement he contributed to – at least as far…
