Review: You're Gonna Love "Michael" Despite What I Say About It

By Ben Miller

As I left my screening of Antoine Fuqua's Michael, I heard a woman exclaim, "That was exactly what I wanted!" This is the overall goal of this film. You will learn absolutely nothing about Michael Jackson the man, but you will get every hit song with loud and vibrant performances.

Frankly, Michael is critic-proof. No matter how much I go on about my multitude of problems, you just won't care. It looks like Michael Jackson on screen, using his actual music, inspired by his performances, and completely glosses over any issues that might make anyone uncomfortable. It's the most kid-gloves film I can remember seeing in some time. No chances are taken, nothing is learned... and it's going to make a lot of money.

Click to read more ...

Review: Shouldn't "The Gorge" be more fun?

by Nathaniel R

My invite arrived in February. So what if I finally walked in? I'm late to the party, true, but it's doesn't appear to be much of a shindig and it's still going on over at Apple TV+. Party planners director Scott Derrickson and screenwriter Zach Dean have done the bare minimum and way too much, respectively, to prep for their big event...

Click to read more ...

Nicole Kidman Tribute: Rabbit Hole (2010)

by Cláudio Alves

For a while, I thought that loss would lead to tears, a general sadness that consumes you whole and leaves behind a husk. Much art and media made it seem so to my adolescent self. The piteous melodrama that the mainstream loves to sell was a convincing lie, and so were the beatific visions of bereavement from which a person learns and grows stronger. But life doesn't obey narrative rules, nor does it seek to satisfy in the ways a Hollywood producer might. The tears do come - and they did - but there was more to it. More that wasn't aligned with ideas of beautiful suffering or an education of the soul. When I found grief, I found anger, too.

Why must it hurt so much? Why must it isolate so strongly? Why does it seem like no one understands? Why must joy prevail in the world? It's obscene, it feels wrong, and it stokes the fires of fury inside. Yet, there's no clear target for the flame. You find yourself full of emotion, wanting to wield it like a weapon and hurt something, anything, maybe yourself, or maybe nothing at all. There is no reason in grief and nowhere to go from there. Often, one finds no path out or through, no answers whatsoever. In this solipsism, recognition may lead the way. If not in the company of others, then in the mirror of the screen – in works like that of Nicole Kidman in Rabbit Hole…

Click to read more ...

Split Decision: Top Gun: Maverick

No one feels the same way about any film. Thus, Team Experience is pairing up to debate the merits of each of the big awards season movies . Here’s Chris James, Travis Cragg and Cláudio Alves duking it out over Top Gun: Maverick.

CHRIS: I couldn’t think of a better movie to have reignited the box office this summer than Top Gun: Maverick. The sequel arrived 36 years after the first became a blockbuster in 1986. Personally, I never loved the original. Despite fun, pop-culture defining moments, it often felt like a scattershot action movie with nauseating jingoism. My expectations for the sequel were low, but the film blew past them like a fighter jet passing Mach 10.

Central to my enjoyment of Top Gun: Maverick is the renewed focus on character over spectacle...

Click to read more ...

Yes, No, Maybe So Top Gun: Maverick

by Murtada Elfadl

It’s been almost 34 years since Top Gun (1986) made Tom Cruise one of the biggest stars in Hollywood history. And now he’s back in Top Gun:Maverick. We don’t know if anyone was asking for this very belated sequel but it’s coming in 2020. Apparently this time he is the trainer, training a new batch of Top Gun fighter pilots and mentoring his friend’s son (Miles Teller). Yep Teller is playing the son of Anthony Edwards and we assume Meg Ryan. Will they make a cameo? 

Let’s give the trailer the Yes, No, Maybe So treatment...

Click to read more ...