Film and TV Reviews and Podcasts
Who’s Harry Crumb? (1989) Premise: Harry Crumb is a bumbling and inept private investigator who is hired to solve the kidnapping of a young heiress which he’s not expected to solve because his employer is the mastermind behind the kidnapping. Letterboxd Challenge: 30 From 30 – 1989 Movies Watchlist – 1/30 I grew up watching and enjoying a lot of […]
The Great Dictator (1940) Premise: Dictator Adenoid Hynkel tries to expand his empire while a poor Jewish barber tries to avoid persecution from Hynkel’s regime. Immediately after The Great Dictator ended, I rewound the movie and rewatched the five minute speech at the end again. Now, while sitting in the afterglow of my first viewing of the film, I am […]
Stan & Ollie (2018) is a serviceable and delicate depiction of one of comedy’s greatest duos. – 3.5 stars
Escape Room (2019) Premise: Six strangers find themselves in circumstances beyond their control, and must use their wits to survive. Escape Room was a fairly decent thriller for about 2/3s of its runtime. For the other 3rd, it was pretty rote with underdeveloped characters, derivative set pieces, and an ending that felt like a first draft fever dream.
Glass (2019) Premise: Security guard David Dunn uses his supernatural abilities to track Kevin Wendell Crumb, a disturbed man who has twenty-four personalities. I can’t remember the last time I was so invested in 2/3s of a movie only to find myself struggling so hard to hold my interest in its final act. But such is the life of the […]
Split (2017) Premise: Three girls are kidnapped by a man with a diagnosed 23 distinct personalities. They must try to escape before the apparent emergence of a frightful new 24th. When I sat down to rewatch Split, the thing I was most curious about was if the surprise ending was what made the movie great in my mind or if […]
Unbreakable (2000) Premise: An ordinary man makes an extraordinary discovery when a train accident leaves his fellow passengers dead—and him unscathed. The answer to this mystery could lie with the mysterious Elijah Price, a man who suffers from a disease that renders his bones as fragile as glass. It may be easy to forget that M. Night Shyamalan’s follow up […]
Free Solo (2018) Premise: Follow Alex Honnold as he becomes the first person to ever free solo climb Yosemite’s 3,000ft high El Capitan Wall. With no ropes or safety gear, he completed arguably the greatest feat in rock climbing history. I went into Free Solo wondering what could possibly possess a person to climb anything without ropes or harnesses. It […]
The Upside (2017) Premise: A comedic look at the relationship between a wealthy man with quadriplegia and an unemployed man with a criminal record who’s hired to help him. The Upside is a pretty middle of the road comedy that’s fairly inoffensive, if unimaginative in its execution. It’s a remake of the 2011 French film The Intouchables. It premiered at […]
In The Good Dinosaur, Pixar imagines a world where dinosaurs never went extinct and now live alongside humans. The movie follows Arlo, a young cowardly dinosaur who finds himself lost from his family farm and forced to confront his fears to return home. Arlo finds an unlikely companion in a human “creature” named Spot, who acts as Arlo’s guard dog.
Documentary Feature / USA Director: Vicki Abeles Writers: Vicki Abeles, Jeffrey Friedman, Mitzi Mock Featured Subjects: Sir Ken Robinson, Linda Darling Hammond, Yong Zhao, Daniel Pink, Ron Berger This review is part of my coverage of 2015’s Heartland Film Festival in Indianapolis. Click here for more of my coverage of the festival. You can find my coverage of other Indianapolis area film and TV events here. Beyond Measure is Vicki Abeles‘ followup to her 2010 documentary Race to Nowhere. While her last film examined the pressure-filled lives of overworked students, Beyond Measure spotlights alternative learning methods created by students and faculty across the country to combat the outdated data-driven methods.
Narrative Feature / Festival Award Winner / Kosovo, Germany Director: Isa Qosja Writer: Zymber Kelmendi This review is part of my coverage of 2015’s Heartland Film Festival in Indianapolis. Click here for more of my coverage of the festival. You can find my coverage of other Indianapolis area film and TV events here. Isa Qosja‘s Three Windows and a Hanging is an emotionally jarring look into the patriarchal society of a Kosovo village rebuilding after war ravaged their community and its people. When school teacher Lushe tells a reporter that she and three other women from the village were raped by Serbian troops, the male villagers react.
Narrative Feature / Festival Award Winner / USA Director: Sam Kretchmar Writers: Sam Kretchmar, Michael Covino This review is part of my coverage of 2015’s Heartland Film Festival in Indianapolis. Click here for more of my coverage of the festival. You can find my coverage of other Indianapolis area film and TV events here. In Keep in Touch, Colin (Ryan Patrick Bachand) tries to reconnect with a long-lost childhood crush. When he finds out she died in a car accident many years ago, he becomes infatuated with her younger sister, an aspiring musician who bears a striking resemblance to the girl he used to love.
Documentary Feature / USA Director: Darcy Dennett This review is part of my coverage of 2015’s Heartland Film Festival in Indianapolis. Click here for more of my coverage of the festival. You can find my coverage of other Indianapolis area film and TV events here. I have always been a dog person so I write this with the caveat that […]
Narrative Feature / USA Director: Edd Benda Writer: Edd Benda Cast: Paul Stanko, Thatcher Robinson This review is part of my coverage of 2015’s Heartland Film Festival in Indianapolis. Click here for more of my coverage of the festival. You can find my coverage of other Indianapolis area film and TV events here. In Superior, best friends Charlie and Derek set out on a two-week long bike ride around Lake Superior in the summer of 1969. The pair are weeks away from going their separate ways (college for Charlie and Vietnam for Derek), and they’re determined to make their final adventure count.
The Obsessive Viewer 