Happy New Year! Here's to 2023

As you may have gleaned these past several months, 2022 was a very difficult year for your host here. I was out of comission a few times. Feeling hopeful about 2023, though, so to those of you who are still with us, just know that I appreciate you now more than ever. I'm still trying to climb back onto this long running horse. Considered putting this beautiful beast out to pasture but reconsidered. Would rather go out with a big win than a what-just-happened? disappointing finish. Should we make like Cher and announce a Farewell Tour... that goes on indefinitely? Anyway, the point is: onward. The year is young. Mere hours young!

Coming in January: The Oscar nominations and all the stuff that comes with that, "Split Decisions" where the team debates movies they disagree on, more Year in Review lists plus nominations for the annual Film Bitch Awards. And the return of the Smackdown.

P.S. Can you think of any movies with great New Year's Eve scenes aside from When Harry Met Sally? 

Dozen Best Movie Posters of 2022

Our "Year in Review" continues. Let the List-Mania commence... 

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by Nathaniel R

Movie posters are not what they used to be. This is not an aesthetic  "everything was better in the past" complaint but a fact; they aren't as present an advertising force as they were when one tall rectangular image and tagline would do the bulk of the advertising work to define a film. Now that work is dispersed in multiple shapes and images and visual modes, the old school poster included. Posters aren't quite a lost art but they are in Big Hollywood which prefers to make every poster a hideous inhuman collage of movie stars, think Frankenstein's Monster if Dr Frankenstein, had eschewed body parts and just used hundreds of faces in mismatched sizes to build his undead "man".

But enough complaints. Let's celebrate the posters that did right by their movies this year...

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Review: "Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance With Somebody" Is a Lovable Mess

By: Christopher James

No one loves their cliches more than the biopic genre. However, no music biopic has blown through every cliche with such quick and reckless abandon as Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance With Somebody. That’s not necessarily an insult.

Few pop culture icons loom as large as Whitney Houston, “The Voice,” who holds the record for seven consecutive number one singles atop the Billboard Top 100. By virtue of also being a modern celebrity, most people have some concept of Houston. Thus, the biopic spends less time educating people on who Whitney Houston is. In fact, it’s a crash course through her Wikipedia. Unfortunately, it misses out on her soul and motivation - what drove Whitney Houston from the biggest star in the world to death at 48?

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Awards Season Catchup: The Bad Guys

By Abe Friedtanzer

One of this year’s most successful contenders for Best Animated Feature was released way back in April. It hasn't been as present on the awards circuit as its success and generally positive reviews would suggest. Whatever prizes it ultimately wins would only add to the fact that this family-friendly caper comedy, based on Aaron Blabey’s book series, is highly enjoyable and very much worth seeking out.

Wolf introduces audiences to his team of notorious thieves, who commit major heists and other crimes as regularly as possible. They do it partly for the big takes, but also for the specific joy from getting away with it...

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Review: Will Smith's Oscar hopeful "Emancipation"

please welcome new contributor Ankit Jhunjhunwala...

Will Smith stars in "Emancipation"

by Ankit Jhunjhunwala

It is arguable that all movies benefit from a theatrical experience - though some do more than others. The benefits are not merely technical (superior audio & video quality) but also behavioral. A paying public in a cinema is a captive audience and usually sticks with a film to the bitter end. At home, on streaming platforms, abandonment is easy and, by all accounts, frequent. This latter practice is likely to hurt Emancipation, which concludes with a sensational Civil War action set piece that is sure to rouse audiences. Only they have to get through 90 minutes of airless tedium to get to it.

Emancipation is a project undoubtedly born out of noble intentions. The infamous Whipped Peter photograph, showing the horrifically lacerated back of a Black man, remains a powerful contemporaneous record of the unimaginable cruelty suffered by Black Americans at the hands of white slave owners...

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