One of the more divisive, underwhelming followups to a landmark Hollywood trendsetter was the 2003 two-part sequel to the original Matrix (1999). The first Matrix remains one of the defining science-fiction action films of new millennium cinema, holding up to this day as a thinking-man’s high-concept, big-budget genre film, and arguably the most original mainstream … Continue reading
What is cinematic merit? I am searching for a word or phrase that indicates how readily something is to be cinematic. Perhaps a more precise term would be “cinematic inclination,” or the likelihood of an entity possessing attributes of or carrying out actions that are cinematic. The term, cinematic, itself means “relating to” or “having … Continue reading
Are you a cat or a dog? You don’t need to be a sociologist or a researcher of artificial selection to know that the domesticated cat and dog (Felis catus and Canis lupis familiaris, respectively) are humanity’s most important, if not most favorite, pets throughout our history. Before you anticipate this post devolving into a … Continue reading
I recently wrote about my affections for the sitcom television show and pop culture phenomenon that is The Big Bang Theory (2007-present), a show I feel is both overrated and underappreciated by different audiences. In many respects, however, the prism through which I view The Big Bang Theory (henceforth, BBT) and have viewed most every … Continue reading
The Big Bang Theory is one of the most popular television sitcoms of the late 2000s and 2010s. Like similar modern shows such as How I Met Your Mother (2005-2014) and Modern Family (2009-present), it represents a shift in mainstream television portrayals of modern America, including its emphasis on pop culture references, scientific research, higher … Continue reading
In light of Michael Bay’s fifth (5th!) upcoming robot-sex movie, Transformers: The Last Knight (2017), I thought it appropriate to look back on Bay’s previous work on the franchise that has become synonymous with big, loud, brain-dead Hollywood blockbuster filmmaking, as well as obnoxious product placement and blatant, shameless international pandering. I have made my … Continue reading
I am not the biggest fan of AMC’s popular zombie-drama, The Walking Dead, but I wasn’t always a critic of it. When the show first aired in its abbreviated, six-episode debut season, I was one of its early converts, impressed by its production values, epic scope, and excited by the prospect of a long-running television … Continue reading
Amidst the cultural backlash, civil war, and whirlwind that was 2016, filmmaking soldiered on as usual, featuring a plethora of comic book-adaptations such as Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016), Captain America: Civil War (2016), X-Men: Apocalypse (2016), Doctor Strange (2016), and the sidestream rebuttal, Deadpool (2016). It was a good year if you … Continue reading
With the upcoming release of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016) upon us, I decided it was time to look back at the Harry Potter film megafranchise that birthed the modern Young Adult (YA) novel-adaptation craze, giving us everything from Twilight (2008-2012) to The Hunger Games (2012-2015) to Divergent (2014-present) to Maze Runner … Continue reading
The bigger the cinephile you become, the more specific and technical your filmmaking preferences and opinions grow. Movie-buffs become more nuanced in their evaluations of their favorite and least favorite films, picking out distinct filmmaking techniques that they notice, time and time again, which can either elevate a film’s material or drag it down into the … Continue reading
