Making a Top 10 list is never an easy thing, especially when the year is as cinematically prosperous as 2012 was. Bolstered by an unusually strong spring and knocked out of the park by a magnificent awards season, 2012 was like a candy store for the movie critic inside me, with many films being truly great and a handful of them being astonishingly masterful. In fact, this year was so grand that I was honestly shocked to see that I had given a perfect 10/10 (a score I try to save for the film’s that go above and beyond the extraordinary) to four films, more than any other year in recent memory. With an abundance of great films and only 10 spots to fill, I unfortunately had to leave off a number of special cinematic experiences, from the heartwarming nostalgia of The Perks of Being a Wallflower to the ambitious…
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After earning rapturous praise and instant Oscar buzz after its first screening in New York almost a month ago, Les Miserables, Academy Award-winning director Tom Hooper’s ambitious adaptation of the beloved stage musical, seemed to be succumbing to severe critical backlash during the days leading up to its Christmas release date. Despite some polarizing reviews, our own Mike Murphy loved the film, awarding it an 8/10 and praising it as a rousing adaption, and the film earned a massive $18 million on opening day, the second best ever for a Christmas Day release. Even more positive is the fact that the film received a glowing A CinemaScore, indicating that audiences are truly loving Hooper’s vision of the most successful musical of all time. In our latest podcast, Mike joins Zack Sharf and Harrison Richlin, our Executive Producer here at Reel Reactions, for a candid discussion of Les Miserables; is…
What’s going on with Judd Apatow? After directing smash hit blockbusters The 40-Year-Old-Virgin and Knocked Up (both of which helped turn the R-rated comedy into a critically acclaimed blockbuster genre), Apatow has stumbled as of late, first with the semi-underwhelming Funny People in the summer of 2009 and now with his latest feature, This Is 40. Though our own Zack Sharf found it to be pleasantly funny (he awarded it an average 7/10), the film grossed a middling $12 million this weekend (the lowest of any Apatow directed film thus far) and earned a pretty rough B- CinemaScore, meaning audiences aren’t loving it that much either. In our latest Critical Reaction Podcast, Zack Sharf joins Mike Murphy and James Hausman to break down both This Is 40 as well as Judd Apatow’s career trajectory. Just how funny is his latest? Who is the best out of the rich supporting cast?…
Though major critics didn’t universally love it, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, the first in Peter Jackson’s prequel trilogy to the Lord of the Rings, still did gigantic business at the box office this weekend, grossing nearly $85 million (easily breaking the record for the highest December opening of all time) and earning an glowing “A” CinemaScore. In other words, the critics got it wrong this time as millions of fans returned to Middle Earth and loved every second of it, setting up the film to continue to play well throughout the lucrative holiday frame. At Reel Reactions, our own James Hausman awarded An Unexpected Journey an enthusiastic 8.5/10, and in our latest podcast he joins Zack Sharf and Mike Murphy for an open discussion of everything Hobbit: Is the film worth a trip back to Middle Earth? Just how great does Andy Serkis slip back into…
Just as 2012 winds down and just when you thought you had seen all the best films of the year, enter movie mastermind Quentin Tarantino, whose latest, Django Unchained, hits you like a shock of pure cinematic adrenaline. Even at a whopping 165 minutes, this Blaxploitation revenge western flies by, taking you on a journey that’s rip-roaringly hilarious and unrelentingly gruesome. Honestly, I haven’t had more fun at the movies all year. With a dynamite ensemble and a famed director at the top of his game, Django Unchained is some kind of Christmas miracle, a balls-to-the-walls, bat shit crazy, out of control, and over the top spectacle that kicks your mind and body into manic over drive. Just writing about it here is enough to make me jittery. If you are in any way a fan of Tarantino and his extraordinary work, from Reservoir Dogs to Inglourious Basterds…
Over the past decade, no one has stormed the comedy genre quite like Judd Apatow. Be it films he has produced (the immortally funny Superbad, the masterpiece that is Bridesmaids) or directed (the benchmark The 40-Year-Old Virgin, the outrageous Knocked Up), or even his work on television (the cult classic Freaks and Geeks, the recent breakthrough Girls), Apatow has easily become the king of the modern R-rated comedy, making films that deftly balance raunch and boobs with heart and brains. This trend continues in Apatow’s latest, This Is 40, his fourth feature film as a director and easily his most personal one to date. With a comedic ensemble that only Apatow could assemble, This Is 40 packs the hilarity we’ve come to expect from a movie of this kind, though Apatow also seems to be the film’s biggest disservice as well.
The abilities of the movies are vast and infinite. Many, like ParaNorman, entertain us, taking the imaginative splendor of the movies and filling our hearts and minds with a similar sense of wonder. Few, like The Master, challenge us, forcing realizations of the deep despair of human nature to take root in the mind, no matter how complex and/or uncomfortable. Then there are rare movies that wake us up, that force us to come to terms with and to question who we are and where we are as individuals, as a country, as a global society, as a web of interconnected lives and technologies. In the hands of Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal, the Academy Award winning duo behind The Hurt Locker, plus star Jessica Chastain, Zero Dark Thirty is just this, a powerhouse movie that brings to light the controversial and corrupt ambiguities that have come to…
SHARF @ THE MOVIES 