Review: The Emoji Movie

By Sean Donovan

The internet has spent the past few days savagely ripping apart The Emoji Movie, the animated film about sentient emojis and the adventures they have within your smartphone. This is a film made specifically for children of the internet, who might gaze upon this Sony vertical integration monstrosity of app references and infomercials for about a minute before heading back to their own smartphones. It’s tough to review The Emoji Movie, because it’s tough to take its lack of creativity and basic construction seriously when such cynicism and apathy burns off the screen. It singes your eyebrows. No one cared about making this movie; I can’t imagine anyone coming up with a criticism the filmmakers would even protest. The Emoji Movie is the unadulterated heart of capitalism pumping out disinterested beats, an infomercial for WeChat here, a paid ad for CandyCrush there, Sony everywhere you look...

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Would you rather...?

WOULD YOU RATHER

...model rompers with Taika Waititi?
...pay tribute to Antonio Banderas with Miguel Angel Silvestre?
...soak up some sun with Elizabeth Banks?
...study a screenplay with Saîd Taghmaoui?
...have a peroni with Zoe Kravitz and Karl Glumsan?
...appreciate your sycophantic base with Charlize Theron?
...eat a slice with Laura Dern and Jim Sturgess?
...or do some facepainting with Paul Bettany?

Photos are after the jump to help you decide...

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Tweetweek: Aunt May, His & Hers Emmy Nods, Everything Being James Franco's Fault

Readers... I'm back from my critics retreat (which featured such spotty internet that I finally gave up on the internet altogether but the ability to focus without it was kind of amazing -- try it sometime) Regular posting will begin again Monday. Tonight please enjoy this roundup of amusing tweets as I try to catch up on news, emails, and social media. Yours truly, Nathaniel...  

Just realized that all four stars of #Ghostbusters were nominated for #Emmys this year! #SNL pic.twitter.com/NoFTHDD35v

— Jarett Wieselman (@JarettSays) July 13, 2017

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Emmy Reactions: Our Favorite Nominations!

Since the Emmy nominations announced today, some celebration is in order! We polled our lively Team Experience for their thoughts on today's results, starting with their favorite nominees across any of Emmy's umpteen categories. Before we bemoan what got left out, let's pop a cork and spend some time on the many exciting nominees that made the cut:

What nomination made you the happiest?

JASON - LAURA DERN, OBVIOUSLY. I mean what am I, an animal?

LYNN - B.D. Wong as Guest Actor in a Drama Series (Mr. Robot). While Emmy voters cooled on Mr. Robot this year - a shame, since I maintain the second season was actually stronger than the first - I'm happy to see they did recognize one of its standout turns: B.D. Wong as the enigmatic White Rose.  Whether appearing as the female leader of the Dark Army or the male Chinese Minister of State Security, he was always absolutely mesmerizing to watch, offering glimmers of insight but never full access to the character's agenda and putting a slyly subversive spin on the old trope of the "inscrutable Oriental."

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Wonder Women: Cheryl Strayed

Let's get Wild, everyone, and start cheering on "wonder women" in our lives! 

By Spencer Coile

As writers we are told to write about what we know. For many, this includes film, television, or anything pop culture related (hello, everyone). For Cheryl Strayed, what she knows best is her own life. Growing up in a home with her two siblings, mother, and abusive father might have been enough, but it was only after her mother's death in 1991 (as Strayed calls it, her "genesis story") and eventual spiral into drugs and promiscuous sex that she chose to trek from Mexico to Canada on the Pacific Crest Trail, a journey of 1,100 miles. 

Fear not, for those wishing to experience this quest with Strayed! It is all detailed for us in her masterful 2012 memoir, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail and its 2014 film adaptation film starring Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern...

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