My Top 10 “Under the Radar” Films of the Past 10 Years

 I’m all about the past ten years all of the sudden. I’m also all about lists. I love top 10′s, can you tell? Anyway, here’s a list of 10 movies that I thought haven’t gotten enough love and I want to point them out and maybe generate some renewed interest. They may not be the greatest films ever but I enjoyed them for what they were and thought they undeservedly went through the box office with nothing more than a whisper.   Note: I understand some of these films... Keep Reading...

Introspective: “Kids” (1995) Vs. “Dazed and Confused” (1993)

I have no idea where this came from. Maybe I was just thinking of teen movies and these two popped into my head randomly. It happens. But it got me thinking of the stark differences of the film “Kids” released in 1995, directed by Larry Clarke and written by then 19 year old Harmony Korine; and “Dazed and Confused” released in 1993 written and directed by Richard Linklater. OK, obvious thing jumps out first: one is a comedy, a retrospective piece of nostalgia; the other is... Keep Reading...

My Top 10 Favorite Movies of the Past 10 Years

*DISCLAIMER* This isn’t about the BEST 10 movies of the past 10 years. I probably haven’t seen the best 10 movies of the last 10 years. I’m sure I’ve missed out on some great obscure foreign film I’ve never heard of, or some documentary that I skipped over or something…this is just my list of 10 movies that I could watch over and over again and that I adore personally. Your lists will differ, I’m sure. But mine’s clearly the best. #10: The Descent (2005)  Written & directed... Keep Reading...

Idiocracy

Mike Judge, the prolific animator and voice talent turned filmmaker, took H.G. Wells’ envisioning of the future and turned its on its head in 2005. The release was a small one, and therefore the film has been re-discovered as a kind of cult classic in the past few years. The idea he works with is…what if 500 years from now, the world gets dumber and dumber to the point where everyone is stupid? And they still procreate just as much, if not more. So instead of the Eloi and Morlocks, we... Keep Reading...

The Goonies – 25 Years Later

“Ye…intruders beware…crushing death and grief…soaked with blood…of the trespassing thief.” How many times have you said this, in that totally awesome Fakey British Accent just like Corey Feldman as “Mouth” in “The Goonies”? If you grew up between the years 1985-1990, you know these words by heart. You probably know half the movie, if not all of it, by heart. It was a defining “kids” movies of the mid 80’s that still lives on as one of my favorites of all time. What sets... Keep Reading...

The Balcony Is Closed: A Look Back On “At The Movies”

Growing up, I loved movies. I guess that’s evident here. I’ve been “reviewing” movies since 1989–something I didn’t realize till a few years ago when I dug up my old journals from elementary school and found that the unused pages in the binder were dedicated to reviewing movies such as “Arachnophobia”, “Willow”, and “The Abyss”. I used a star system, 1-4. It was hard being a critic at age 11, I found. I pretty much liked everything... Keep Reading...

“The Sims”: Ten Years Later

February 4th, 2000. I was working at Amazon.com, and I had a really awful day shift that had me working on Saturdays. Since I was typically bored on Saturday nights because I had no real social life that comes to mind immediately, I would head out to the Christiana Mall in Christiana, Delaware (a real tourist trap). Truth be told, I would splurge. Once I got a DVD player later that year, it’d be worse. But for now, I had a Dreamcast, I had a fairly decent PC, and I had extra cash since I never... Keep Reading...

The Blair Witch Project: 10 Years Later

It was sometime in late April of 1999 that I first heard about this film. At that time, it wasn’t really known as a “film”; it was just known as “footage”. A guy at work told me, “Dude, there’s this movie coming out and all it is is this found footage of these kids who try to find a witch.” I wonder if that is exactly the same way it was pitched by directors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez. Of course, the film was independently produced, and didn’t... Keep Reading...

Martini Take – Summer Movies 2008

With the forthcoming weather getting decidedly cooler, and the box office draws becoming decidedly weaker, it’s time to realize that we are entering autumn, one of my favorite times of the year–and, one of my least favorite times of the year. Well, as a filmgoer, at least. I’m sure I’ve chimed in more than once about how much I hate September for movies, and October doesn’t get much better. In fact, things really don’t start getting good until November and December... Keep Reading...

License to Drive – 20 Years Later

Dean teaches Les about the finer things. I still remember the hot summer day back in July of 1988, my twin sister and I were 9 years old, and our mom took us to see a movie called “Mac and Me”, a cheap rip-off of the ever successful “E.T.”, that I don’t recall either my sister and I ever asking to be taken to. At the time, of course, we had already seen “The Lost Boys” on VHS, and my sister was heavily instituted into the Corey Haim Crush. I just thought... Keep Reading...