It’s finally here! The biggest film awards show in America goes off live in just under 90 minutes and I will be bringing you the action live. You can also follow on my Twitter feed if you prefer, as I…
The 85th Annual Academy Awards go live tonight, putting a nice button on 2012′s mainstream filmmaking (the Saturn, Nebula, and Bram Stoker Awards are still to come to wrap up the year in horror, sci-fi, and fantasy). I will be…
If a thriller is purely an intellectual exercise in misdirection but contains no tension or actual excitement, can it still be a successful thriller? Side Effects is an interesting experiment in a genre that, at least in America, seems to…
Warm Bodies is a romcomzom (that’s a romantic comedy zombie film for those not in the know) focused on the comedy. It’s a wise choice since the romance happens between a living girl and a zombie boy. If the film…
Aside from a bunch of big budget blockbuster animated features, 2012 had a surprising amount of voice over performances in film. It seems like voice overs are back in a big way. This does not mean that films are lazily…
Movie 43 is an anthology comedy film with an odd framing device. A man walks into a film studio and demands to have his pitch for a new film heard. The studio executive agrees, becoming more and more disgusted and…
These are the one or two scene wonders or ensemble performers who really stand out. The films wouldn’t be the same without them, but they sadly do not have a lot to do. They’re the could-be heroes and villains of…
How far would you go to provide comfort and care for the person you love most in the world? Would you sacrifice your own independence to take care of them full time? Would you go against the will of your…
I watched a lot of films to put together my best of 2012 lists. There’s only so much time in the day to spend with these features and still be able to function in the real world. As such, I’m…
Not to be confused with Best Use of Music in Film, Best Film Songs is about those little musical diversions that actually take center stage in a film and leave an impression. The origin doesn’t matter. A cover song used…
Forget about original or adapted. I’m once again condensing categories for 2012. A good screenplay is a good screenplay regardless of the source material. The only use in considering the source material when looking at the film is either for…
Mama is hard to describe because the film itself doesn’t know what it wants to be. Is it a horror story about a ghostly presence taking over a young couple’s lives or a fantasy about defining family? Is it a…
For better or worse, the Paranormal Activity series helped launch a new wave of found footage and home haunting horror films. This is in spite of extremely low production values, poor acting, and narratives that don’t actually arrive until the…
Instead of trying to parse out original scores from musical scores (thanks for that distinction, Academy) from adapted song-scores, I’m just going to look at the best overall use of music in film. 2012 had a wide variety of approaches…