Month: December 2013

It’s almost a shame that human nature finds comfort in threes. The modern trend toward telling stories in trilogies seems to ignore the fact that some of them benefit from simplicity and compression. Director and co-writer Peter Jackson’s film version of The Hobbit is a case in point. This second episode, The Desolation of Smaug, has all the elements of a good action movie, but as the middle peg in a trilogy, it just isn’t a superlative one.

Read the rest of my review at Oakville.com – click the title link.

I’ve long been of the opinion that Matthew McConaughey is one of Hollywood’s most underrated actors. Variously dismissed as a dim-witted pretty-boy or a shirtless, bongo-playing surfer – images that haven’t been helped by a string of poor romantic comedies – he has recently built an impressive array of performances in smaller dramas. With Dallas Buyers Club, he gives one of the best of the year, coupled with another by the equally underrated Jared Leto.

Read the rest of my review at Oakville.com – click the title link.

We think of “holiday movies” as tales of families coming together. Philomena is most definitely not a holiday movie, but its portrayal of a family torn apart and a search for answers warms the heart nonetheless. It’s worth your time this Christmas.

Read the rest of my review at Oakville.com – click the title link.

As we’ve seen with so-called “Reality TV” competitions like Survivor and The Amazing Race, producers often have to re-jig the rules of their own games in order to maintain the interest of their audience. In The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, the fascist overlords of Panem do the same to their gladiatorial exhibition, in an attempt to quell a resistance movement. The film itself, however, doesn’t change things up too much from its previous instalment. But in this case, that’s a good thing.

Read the rest of my review at Oakville.com – click the title link.

As a film reviewer with a mandate to serve Oakville and its neighbouring citizens, I’ve become more and more frustrated by a lack of variety in our local theatres. Movie programming is determined by studio accountants and corporate projections, loading the high-profile, big-budget movies into more theatres to pump box office numbers. Outside of the big cities, this practice freezes out “smaller” pictures that don’t always have large distribution budgets. They may not necessarily be better, but they definitely add diversity, and some are genuinely deserving of larger audiences. I really don’t want to sound like a film snob, but surely a 10-theatre Oakville multiplex has room for more options than running Thor: The Dark World in 4 of its halls.

I caught one such “smaller” movie recently, and if you have the opportunity to get into the city, it’s worth the trouble to seek it out. All is Lost is a riveting survival tale, as much notable for what it portrays as for what it doesn’t.

Read the rest of my review at Oakville.com – click the title link.