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Showing posts with the label oscars

LIFE OF PI - REVIEW

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Based on a novel by Yann Martel,  Life Of Pi  was directed by Ang Lee, who won the Best Director Oscar that year. It was a significant commercial and critical hit back in 2012, banking on its impressive 3D visuals and unusual scenario. The plot sees a Canadian journalist (Rafe Spall) meet a man called Pi Patel (Irrfan Khan) who has a wild story to tell that might be worth writing about. He describes his childhood and how he wrestled with various faiths throughout, from Christianity to Hinduism. His father eventually decides to leave India with all the animals from his zoo so the family, including a teenaged Pi, sets off on a long boat trip. One night, a storm suddenly sinks the boat and only Pi appears to survive. He sails off on a lifeboat with a couple of animals, one of which, we eventually find out, is a tiger he calls Richard Parker who turns out to be both the biggest liability and the one thing keeping Pi alert and alive. While the first act of the film sets the main theme

THREE BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING, MISSOURI - REVIEW

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Review now available on the new website .

THE SHAPE OF WATER - REVIEW

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Review now available on the new website .

THE BIG REWIND: OSCARS & BEANS - PODCAST

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I n this 81st episode of  The Big Rewind , we discuss the Oscar winners and review  Black Panther . Email us if you have any questions, requests or contributions:  bigrewindpodcast@gmail.com Or simply comment below :) Oh and you can also find us on  iTunes ,  Stitcher ,  Soundcloud  and  Player FM  where you can subscribe to the podcast and download every episode thusfar, like a boss. @TheRetroCritic #TheBigRewind retrocriticblog.blogspot.com thebigrewind.blogspot.com youtube.com/TheRetroCritic youtube.com/Cablogula

WHY ARE THE OSCARS SO BAD?

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I rant about The Oscars for... far too long.

THE BIG REWIND: CLICK - PODCAST

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I n this poor-sounding 80th episode of  The Big Rewind , we discuss the Oscar nominations and review Downsizing .   Email us if you have any questions, requests or contributions:  bigrewindpodcast@gmail.com Or simply comment below :) Oh and you can also find us on  iTunes ,  Stitcher ,  Soundcloud  and  Player FM  where you can subscribe to the podcast and download every episode thusfar, like a boss. @TheRetroCritic #TheBigRewind retrocriticblog.blogspot.com thebigrewind.blogspot.com youtube.com/TheRetroCritic youtube.com/Cablogula

THE BIG REWIND: THE WORST REWIND - PODCAST

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I n this 72nd episode of  The Big Rewind , I review   La La Land , Bruce Lee movies and talk Oscar nominations. CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE EPISODE Email us here if you have any questions, requests or contributions:  bigrewindpodcast@gmail.com Special thanks to Will Walker (@Forgeyboy) and  @digituba for their answers! Oh and you can also find us on  iTunes ,  Stitcher ,  Soundcloud  and  Player FM  where you can subscribe to the podcast and download every episode thusfar! @TheRetroCritic #TheBigRewind retrocriticblog.blogspot.com thebigrewind.blogspot.com youtube.com/TheRetroCritic youtube.com/Cablogula

MY TOP 25 BEST FILMS OF 2016

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Time once more to look back at another year and figure out what our favourite movies were!  2016 may have been the most disappointing cinematic year in a while but let's be positive... for now. Here are my Top 25 Best Films Of 2016 . Feel free to share your favourites in the comments! 25 THE HUNTSMAN: WINTER'S WAR While an inferior, extremely derivative sequel in which Snow White is mysteriously absent, The Huntsman: Winter's War was a fun blockbuster with lots of creative visual effects and a likeable cast. Completely unnecessary, somewhat messy yet enjoyable. 24 THE MONKEY KING 2 This sequel may not have starred Donnie Yen but fans of the timeless Journey To The West story should have had fun with The Monkey King 2 regardless. A refreshing alternative to Hollywood blockbusters, this one starred Gong Li as an evil witch and it was very entertaining. 23 DEADPOOL Certainly one of the most overrated films of 2016, Deadpoo

LA LA LAND - REVIEW

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After a year peppered with cinematic disappointments, the Academy quickly jumped on musical comedy La La Land  hailing it as an Oscar favourite when it was released in late 2016. The film swept the Golden Globes and it looks set to win many more awards. Emma Stone is Mia, an aspiring actress who spends her time working in a coffee shop and running to auditions. She meets jazz pianist Sebastian, whose dream it is to start his own jazz club, and they hit it off. As their respective dreams start going off track, so does their relationship. Director Damien Chazelle, who impressed a few years ago with the excellent, low-key drama  Whiplash , this time tries his hand at an old-fashioned Hollywood musical complete with romance, tap-dancing and fancy sets, charming the pants out of everyone effortlessly. This is a stylish, gorgeous-looking movie packed with fantastic music, great performances and snappy writing. Even the casting of Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling is inspired as their singing

NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN - REVIEW

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Back in 2007, The Coen Brothers swept the Oscars with No Country For Old Men , the bleak tale of a man who finds a briefcase full of money only to then be hunted by a madman. Based on Cormac McCarthy's novel, this was a return to darker territory for the Coens after a couple of more light-hearted efforts. An exploration of young and old, good and evil, right and wrong, No Country For Old Men was maybe Ethan and Joel Coen's most serious and dense film since Miller's Crossing . It stood out mostly thanks to a chilling performance by Javier Bardem as Anton Chigurh, the psychopath with twisted morals who toys with innocents and kills people with an oxygen tank. Tommy Lee Jones' Texas Sheriff Ed is our good guy who desperately tries to make sense of this new unpredictable brand of evil that has landed on his doorstep and Josh Brolin's everyman Llewelyn is the one in the middle of it all who meant well but doomed himself and others by taking something that didn't

SPOTLIGHT - REVIEW

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The Best Picture winner at this year's Oscars, Spotlight pretty much set the tone for that particular awards ceremony as it talks about a serious issue as earnestly as possible. The film follows a group of Boston Globe investigative journalists as they try to shed some light on systemic sexual abuse at the hands of Catholic priests in the early 2000's. Based on a true story, the main goal of Spotlight seems to be to celebrate the hard work and determination of these reporters while reminding the world how easily that kind of recurring problem can be covered up. With a solid cast that includes Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Liev Schreiber, Rachel MacAdams and Stanley Tucci, the film is well made and the performances are all very strong so it's easy to see why it did so well at the Oscars. Another great thing about it is it doesn't glorify its characters too much as most of them are flawed in some way and sometimes even get in the way of the investigation. Unlike Z

MYSTIC RIVER - REVIEW

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Clint Eastwood directs this grim, Oscar-winning thriller from 2003 about an investigation following the death of a young girl in a Boston neighbourhood. It stars Sean Penn, Tim Robbins and Kevin Bacon as three friends who each have a connection to the case in some way. The film is essentially a murder mystery with Bacon and Laurence Fishburne as the detectives and everyone else as the suspects. We're first introduced to the main characters as children and learn that one of them was abducted and abused by two strangers for four days in a dark basement once, which makes for not exactly the most uplifting start to the proceedings but which becomes an important plot point later. We then catch up with the grown up kids years later: Dave (Robbins), who was abused, is now married and has a child, Jimmy (Penn) is an ex-thief with a family and dodgy connections and Sean (Bacon) is a cop. When Jimmy's daughter is found killed one morning, everyone's world is turned upside down a

AMERICAN BEAUTY - REVIEW

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To say that American Beauty was a hit back in 1999 would be an understatement. Not only did it kill at the box-office but it swept all the big Oscars including Best Director, Best Actor and Best Picture thereby putting director Sam Mendes on the map. The film's plot was pretty simple: a married man goes through some kind of mid-life crisis and develops a crush on his daughter's school friend (played by Mena Suvari). But the combination of Alan Ball's sharp script, the slick cinematography, rose petal motif and Thomas Newman's stand-out score elevated the film to something more visually striking and deeper than expected. The whole thing was a satire of American middle-class values and suburban life, with the idea of beauty being contested and erratic family dynamics explored. Kevin Spacey is Lester Burnham, the loser-turned-liberated (and pervy) father and husband who one day decides to get out of the rut he's in and change his life around with the ultimate g

THE REVENANT - REVIEW

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After the runaway (and deserved) success of Birdman , director Alejandro Iñarritu is back with yet another Oscar-nominated effort, this time taking on a bigger project following a mad journey of survival and revenge from legendary frontiersman Hugh Glass (Leonardo DiCaprio). Set in the early 1800's, The Revenant is a grim, bloody, cruel piece of work set in beautiful snowy, frozen backdrops which makes for an interesting contrast. Quentin Tarantino's The Hateful Eight also went for a wintery feel but it's hard to call Iñarritu's film a Western since it really feels like something else entirely. The first big sequence involves a large group of frontiersmen being overrun by Native American opponents: it's an epic scene in the old sense of the word complete with arrows piercing through people's faces, horses getting sliced-up and bones breaking left and right. It's an extremely detailed battle filmed in such a sweeping, steady way that it all feels lik

THE BIG REWIND: EPISODE 49 - PODCAST

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In this 49th episode, Adam (aka The RetroCritic) and fellow film buff Jamie discuss movie news, review Foxcatcher  and talk retro stuff. CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE EPISODE CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE EPISODE Email us here if you have any questions, requests or contributions:  bigrewindpodcast@gmail.com Or simply comment below :) Oh and you can also find us on  iTunes  and now  Stitcher  where you can subscribe to the podcast and download every episode thusfar! @TheRetroCritic #TheBigRewind retrocriticblog.blogspot.com thebigrewind.blogspot.com youtube.com/TheRetroCritic youtube.com/Cablogula

GOOD WILL HUNTING - REVIEW

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Taking a break in between Kevin Smith movies, Ben Affleck and Matt Damon wrote and starred in Good Will Hunting , the film which not only earned them an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay but put them on the map as actors to look out for. Of course, they would both go on to star in "Good Will Hunting 2: Hunting Season" (see Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back ) and one of them is now Batman but that's another story. The film sees a brainy yet volatile janitor solve a complicated equation on an MIT chalkboard before a professor notices his impressive capabilities and encourages him to become his protégé. Unfortunately, young Will Hunting (Matt Damon) has just been arrested for assault and he's showing no improvements in his personality. Therefore, Stellan Skarsgård's professor makes him see a therapist in order to stay out of jail and perhaps live up to his full potential eventually. After going through a bunch of ineffectual doctors, Hunting meets Dr. Sean Mag

THE BIG REWIND: EPISODE 30 - PODCAST

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In this 30th episode, Adam (aka The RetroCritic) and fellow film buff Jamie discuss movie news, review two recent releases ( Non-Stop and The Grand Budapest Hotel , this time) and rewind back to more retro cinematic topics. CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE EPISODE CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE EPISODE If you know whether Arnie LIED or not in new Big Game "I Lied" , you can email us your answer here:  bigrewindpodcast@gmail.com Or simply comment below :) Oh and you can also find us on  iTunes  where you can subscribe to the podcast and download every episode thusfar! @TheRetroCritic retrocriticblog.blogspot.com thebigrewind.blogspot.com youtube.com/TheRetroCritic youtube.com/Cablogula

MY TOP 10 BEST FILMS OF 2013

I take a look back at 10 of my favourite films of 2013 and some honourable mentions.

OSCARS 2014 - VERDICT

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So the Oscars happened. And, barring a couple of slight surprises, it pretty much went down as you'd expect. On that note, let's take a look at the main winners of this year's ceremony as I share my thoughts about the Academy's decisions with y'all: BEST PICTURE 12 YEARS A SLAVE Not a huge surprise but it's good to see 12 Years A Slave win for Best Picture nonetheless. Gravity winning this one would have really been a kick in the pants for a superior film that was actually about something. Steve McQueen's film was one of the best of last year, for sure, and, although it was a tough watch, it was so well made and performed that it never got preachy or dull, instead keeping us captivated throughout, worried for Solomon Northup's (and Patsy's) well-being. Powerful, brilliantly acted, boldly directed, 12 Years A Slave contained some of the most powerful images in any film from last year and the raw cruelty depicted certainly got it

12 YEARS A SLAVE - REVIEW

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The new film from increasingly impressive director Steve McQueen, 12 Years A Slave follows a free man's heartbreaking story as he is kidnapped and sold into slavery. Chiwetel Ejiofor plays Solomon Northup, whose personal account of what happened to him the movie was based on, and we sit there and chew on our popcorn guiltily as he is beaten, hanged, given cruel, impossible tasks and whipped over and over again. It's certainly a tough watch but how could it not be? That said, the idea that a man everyone tried desperately to rid of his humanity still managed to keep that and his dignity intact even after 12 years of hell is a quietly promising thought. After being beaten, dragged to New Orleans and given a random name, Paul Giamatti's soulless slave trader sells him to Benedict Cumberbatch's plantation owner. The latter immediately realises Northup's potential and even offers him a violin but, when things turn really sour as Paul Dano's petty, jealous worke