Movie Review Acid Test

Acid Test 

Directed by Jennifer Waldo

Written by Jennifer Waldo

Starring Juliana Destefano, Brian Thornton, Mia Ruiz

Release Date November 21st, 2021

Acid Test is a coming of age drama set in 1992. It’s about a teenager on the brink of a future that includes Harvard, a good job, and a career. Of course, she begins to question this path and that question provides the plot of the movie. It’s a journey of self discovery that will take the main character, Jenny, played by Juliana Destefano, from straight A student to Riot Grrrl feminist willing to experiment with psychedelics as an escape from her troubles. 

Jenny’s father, Jack (Brian Thornton) has had Jenny on track to go to Harvard for years. Jack himself is a Harvard graduate and that makes Jenny a legacy, and more likely to be able to get into the school on a scholarship. Jenny however, as she’s grown up she’s grown disillusioned about whether Harvard is her dream or her father’s dream. Jenny finds a new path via a trip to a concert where she hears the punk rock of a band of Riot Grrls and has an epiphany about being able to make choices for herself.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Classic Movie Review Universal Soldier

Universal Soldier 

Directed by Roland Emmerich

Written by Richard Rothstein, Christopher Leitch, Dean Devlin

Starring Jean Claude Van Damme, Dolph Lundgren, Ally Walker

Release Date July 10th, 1992 

Why write about something as silly and seemingly random as Universal Soldier? It goes back to being a teenager who fell in love with the movies while on an adventure with friends. When I was 16 years old on a June day in 1992, myself and three friends decided to see a movie. We intended only to see Batman Returns, the sequel to 1989’s blockbuster Batman starring Michael Keaton. Once we saw that film however, we hatched a sneaky idea.

The theater was extremely busy. Batman Returns was selling tickets fast and the staff was harried and distracted. When we finished Batman we noticed that the baseball movie A League of Their Own starring Tom Hanks was about to start. We decided, we were going to sneak in and see another movie. This sneaky teenage capering (which I am aware is akin to stealing, forgive my aimless, amoral youth) led us to try and make it three movies in a day. We chose the Eddie Murphy comedy Boomerang which had the extra benefit of being R-Rated.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Classic Movie Review A Little Princess

A Little Princess 

Directed by Alfonso Cuarón

Written by Richard Lagravanese, Elizabeth Chandler

Starring Eleanor Bron, Liam Cunningham, Liesel Matthews

Release Date May 10th, 1995 

A Little Princess was written by Frances Hodgson Burnett in 1905 as an expansion on a series of novellas Burnett had written for St. Nicholas Magazine. The movie industry found A Little Princess for the first time in 1917 as a silent picture starring Mary Pickford in the role of Sara Crewe and Zasu Pitts as her friend Becky. Most notably, the silent A Little Princessfeatured a screenplay by Frances Marion, one of the first women to write for the movies.

Then in 1939 A Little Princess received it’s most iconic film rendering with the legendary Shirley Temple in the role of Sara Crew the daughter of privilege whose life is upended by her father’s tragic death leaving her penniless and at the mercy of the cruel boarding school headmistress, Miss Minchin played by Mary Nash. The 1939 version of A Little Princess was produced in ‘glorious Technicolor’ by master showman Daryl F. Zanuck.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Movie Review Thor Love and Thunder

Thor Love and Thunder

Directed by Taika Waititi

Written by Taika Waititi

Starring Chris Hemsworth, Christian Bale, Tessa Thompson, Natalie Portman, Russell Crowe

Release Date July 8th, 2022

What is it about the Guardians of the Galaxy that no director other than James Gunn can get the voice of the Guardians right? The Guardians of the Galaxy show up in the opening act of Thor Love and Thunder and they appear, for some inexplicable reason, like off brand versions of the characters we love. I had the same feeling about the Guardians of the Galaxy as they were directed by the Russo Brothers in Avengers Infinity War and Avengers Endgame, the Guardians just never sounded right. 

Why am I opening my review of Thor Love and Thunder by wondering about the off-brand version of the Guardians of the Galaxy? Probably because Thor Love and Thunder didn’t give me anything more memorable than this Guardians tangent. Thor Love and Thunder is deeply mediocre compared to the lively, exciting and well crafted Thor Ragnorak. Thor Love and Thunder fails to figure out how to balance heavy drama involving Christian Bale’s villainous Gorr The God Butcher and Thor’s mostly comic adventure.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Movie Review Crimes of the Future

Crimes of the Future 

Directed by David Cronenberg 

Written by David Cronenberg

Starring Viggo Mortensen, Lea Seydoux, Kristen Stewart

Release Date September 8th, 2022 

Crimes of the Future is yet another example of David Cronenberg’s favorite theme, bodily autonomy, the right of people to do what they want with their own bodies. In his 1975 feature, Shivers, Cronenberg examined how outside forces take bodily autonomy away from individuals by force. In Crimes of the Future, the sides are a little more even. In this strange Cronenbergian universe, the war between those who want bodily autonomy and those who want government control over how humanity is evolving has reached a boiling point. 

Caught in the middle of this ideological war is performance artist Saul Tenser (Viggo Mortensen) and his performance partner, a former surgeon named Caprice (Lea Seydoux). Together this duo performs an act in which Saul is operated on by Caprice and has an organ removed. Something the film calls accelerated evolution has led to Saul being able to grow new organs which may or may not have a function. He, and everyone else in this strange future, have also evolved to no longer feel physical pain. Saul and Caprice's art is a live surgery followed by Saul tattooing the new organ and displaying it all for the paying crowd.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Classic Movie Review The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez

The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez 

Directed by Robert M. Young 

Written by Victor Villasenor, Robert Young

Starring Edward James Olmos, James Gammon

Release Date August 19th, 1983 

The tragic story of The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez remains legend in Texas more than 100 years later. A simple error in translation between a sheriff and a man accused of stealing horses led to multiple deaths and the largest manhunt in Texas history at the time. Director Robert M. Young adapted the story of Gregorio Cortes with the help of star Edward James Olmos in a lovely, muted fashion that underlines how remarkable tragedy can arise simply from our inability to communicate effectively.

Gregorio Cortez (Edward James Olmos) was a quiet farmer in Gonzales, Texas until the day a sheriff arrived and accused him of stealing a horse. The events from then on are retold from multiple perspectives with details that change via the man telling the story. The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez unfolds in the familiar style of Akira Kurosawa's Yojimbo and turns importantly on the way perspective and bias can affect the truth.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Movie Review The Forgiven

The Forgiven 

Directed by John Michael McDonagh

Written by John Michael McDonagh

Starring Jessica Chastain, Ralph Fiennes, Matt Smith, Caleb Landry Jones, Christopher Abbott

Release Date July 1st, 2022

The Forgiven was made as a combination of the rich people ennui of The Great Gatsby and a moralist critique of the shiftless 1% wasting away on their vast fortunes while callously victimizing the disenfranchised. The film comes up short on both accounts. Written and Directed by John Michael McDonaugh, The Forgiven is sweaty, tired and unfocused outside a few genuinely emotional moments involving a grieving father and the man who killed his son. 

The Forgiven stars Ralph Fiennes and Jessica Chastain as a deeply bored and drifting apart married couple. He’s a doctor and she’s a children’s book author. As a couple they have plenty of money but very little joy. As we meet David and Jo Henninger they are traveling through Morocco and on their way to a distant location in the African desert. There, a long time friend of the couple, Richard (Matt Smith) and his partner Dally (Caleb Landry Jones), are throwing an old school bacchanal of rich people excess.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Movie Review A Working Man

A Working Man 

Directed by David Ayer 

Written by Sylvester Stallone, David Ayer

Starring Jason Statham, Michael Pena, David Harbour

Released March 28th, 2025 

Published April 1st, 2025 

A Working Man stars Jason Statham as Levon Cade, a construction worker who used to be an English Special Forces operative. When the daughter of his boss, Jenny, played by Arianna Rivas, is kidnapped by human traffickers, Levon’s boss, played by Michael Pena, asks Levon to use his Special Forces skills to get her back. He’s reluctant to jump in as he is in the middle of a custody battle for his daughter with her grandfather who cares for the child in the wake of her mother’s suicide. That said, the premise of the movie has Jason Statham brutally murdering human trafficking scum, his hemming and hawing won’t last long. 

Entering the bleak world of human trafficking, Levon needs all of his skills from torturing drug dealers to pretending to be a drug dealer. He’s a natural detective with the chameleonic abilities of an undercover cop and the physical gifts of a Navy Seal. It’s wish fulfillment male revenge fantasy nonsense that hand-wringers like myself cannot criticize for fear of being accused of siding with the human trafficking scum. Thus, populism bullies us into just pretending that A Working Man is good because human trafficking is bad. Working outside the law, subverting the justice system is good, and the rule of law is useless.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Classic Movie Review Tommy Boy

Tommy Boy 

Directed by Peter Segal 

Written by Bonnie Turner, Terry Turner 

Starring Chris Farley, David Spade, Brian Dennehy

Release Date March 31st, 1995 

Published April 1st, 2025 

Tommy Boy is now 30 years old and watching it again with wizened eyes, I noticed something about Tommy Boy that I’d never noticed before. Tommy Boy contains, almost unintentionally, a concept that I am calling ‘Utopian Capitalism.’ What is Utopian Capitalism? It’s the kind of capitalism that we were sold in school, a notion of capitalism where profits are important, but not as important as helping people keep their jobs. Callahan Auto, the fictional auto parts company at the heart of the plot, is an American company with many employees and is saved by Tommy through hard work and a dedication to people before profits. 

Tommy Callahan (Chris Farley) is the dopey scion of a multi-millionaire businessman, Big Tom Callahan (Brian Dennehy). Big Tom has run a great company funded by his ability to sell people on the quality of the products made in his Ohio plant. When Big Tom dies, the company falls into Tommy’s hands and to say that he’s not ready for this responsibility is a grave understatement. Tommy spent seven years trying to graduate from Marquette University and his major appears to have been being as drunk as humanly possible.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media

Documentary Review Accepted

Accepted

Directed by Dan Chen 

Written by Documentary 

Starring T.M Landry College Prep

Release Date June 12th, 2021

Accepted is a harrowing story, one that begins triumphantly and slowly devolves into an ambiguous sort of tragedy. Director Dan Chen endeavored to explore the incredible success that was T.M Landry College Prep in Louisiana. This factory school that sent low income kids to Ivy League schools was a viral sensation in 2017. That year, the school uploaded a series of videos showing their students reacting to getting into the college of their choice. 

Every news outlet from Fox News to CNN to entertainment outlets such as The Today Show, The View, and Ellen, picked up the story of inner city kids blasting open the doors to the Ivy League. It indeed was a great story and with the charismatic showman Michael Landry at the helm, it appeared there could be an entirely new educational paradigm on the rise. T.M Landry, the T.M is for Tracy and Michael Landry, did not have textbooks or a set schedule or classrooms.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Movie Review Big Hero Six

Big Hero 6 

Directed by Don Hall, Chris Williams

Written by Jordan Roberts, Robert L. Baird, Daniel Gerson

Starring Scott Adsit, Ryan Potter, Daniel Henney, Jamie Chung

Released November 7th, 2014 

On June 29th, Disney is bringing back Baymax! The hero of the 2014 animated movie, Big Hero 6, is getting his own 6 episode series and fans are excited to have Baymax back. The voice of Baymax, Scott Adsit is returning as is Ryan Potter as the voice of Baymax's best friend, Hiro. And, Maya Rudolph is reprising her role as Hiro's aunt. There is no indication that the Big Hero 6 mech team will be back, they had their own series which just ended its run last year. With Big Hero 6 returning as a series, I decided to reflect on the 2014 movie which was a surprisingly thoughtful and dramatic kids adventure with some big themes regarding death and grief. 

At its core the animated movie Big Hero 6 is a story of grief and recovery. Our hero, Hiro, has lost his brother in a tragic fire. The villain, Dr. Robert Callaghan, has lost his daughter in the tragic pursuit of science and profit. These stories intersect because Dr. Callaghan's attempt at revenge leads to the death of Hiro's brother Tadashi. Hiro's journey dealing with this loss leads him to battle Dr. Callaghan's grief with the love and support of a new surrogate family.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Movie Review Clara Sola

Clara Sola

Directed by Nathalie Álvarez Mesén

Written by Wendy Chinchilla Araya, Daniel Castaneda Rincon

Starring Wendy Chinchilla Araya 

Released July 21st, 2021 

Clara Sola is a bold, strange and mysterious movie about faith, sexuality, and the senses. It’s the story of a childlike woman of about 40 years old who may or may not be a healer. The woman’s mother believes that her daughter is the living embodiment of the Virgin Mary but the woman, Clara, would prefer to live a normal life, one unencumbered by her mother’s expectations and the requirements of a virgin healer/savior. 

Clara is played by dancer turned actor Wendy Chinchilla Araya, in her first acting role. It’s an unusual and rather brilliant performance that captures both the childlike desires of a stunted intellect and the adult desires of a grown woman. Clara is a dichotomy and her alien-like presence immediately grabs and holds your attention. It’s a captivating performance even as there doesn’t appear to be much of any story going on.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Classic Movie Review Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

Who Framed Roger Rabbit? 

Directed by Robert Zemeckis

Written by Jeffrey Price, Peter S. Seaman

Starring Bob Hoskins, Kathleen Turner, Charles Fleischer, Christopher Lloyd

Released June 22nd, 1988 

Detective Eddie Valiant (Bob Hoskins) stands framed by a tunnel leading him to a physical and emotional destination. On the other side of the tunnel is the place where he needs to go to save his new friend, Roger, but it is also the place where, years earlier, his brother and partner was killed. The conflict weighs heavily on him as he ponders his fate, past and present colliding in a whirlwind of emotions.

I could be describing a 1940’s detective movie directed by John Huston or Jules Dassin with a story by Daschiell Hammett and starring Gene Tierney or Robert Mitchum. Instead, the movie I am describing in the opening of this review is Who Framed Roger Rabbit, the iconic live action-animated feature from visionary director Robert Zemeckis. The comedy comes from the remarkably brilliant clash of animated storytelling and Zemeckis' love of classic detective stories.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Movie Review Marcel The Shell With Shoes On

Marcel the Shell With Shoes On

Directed by Dean Fleischer Camp

Written by Dean Fleischer Camp, Jenny Slate, Nick Paley

Starring Jenny Slate, Rosa Salazar, Thomas Mann

Released June 24th, 2022 

Marcel the Shell with Shoes On bursts forth from the imagination of Jenny Slate and her creative partner, Dean Fleischer Camp. The story of a lonely little shell with shoes on and the documentary filmmaker who briefly lives with the shell and makes a movie about him, Marcel the shell with Shoes On is a wildly inventive and genuinely lovely movie. Vibrant, strange and endlessly beautiful, Marcel the Shell with Shoes on is one of the reasons we love going to the movies. 

Marcel, voiced by co-creator Jenny Slate, has lived a lifetime in the last two years. It’s been that long since most of Marcel’s family of fellow shells disappeared. Since then, it has only been Marcel and his grandmother, Connie (Isabella Rossellini). Together, they’ve invented ways to survive on their own as one person after another moves into and out of their suburban, multi-bedroom home. What was once the home of a loving couple has become a permanent Air B & B.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Movie Review Prey

Prey 

Directed by Dan Trachtenberg

Written by Patrick Alson 

Starring Amber Midthunder, Dakota Beavers, Michelle Thrush 

Release Date August 5th, 2022

When it’s good, the Predator franchise is arguably the best action movie franchise going. As my proof of that claim, I give you the new Predatorprequel Prey. Debuting on Hulu, Prey is a gorgeous looking movie that also happens to be a badass, blood and guts action movie. Everything you’ve enjoyed about the Predator franchise, aside from Arnold Schwarzenegger, can be found in Prey making it a must see for fans of the franchise and just a really terrific action movie. 

Prey stars Amber Midthunder as Naru, a young Comanche woman in 1718 who dreams of being a hunter like her late father. Being a young woman she is underestimated by everyone, including her older brother, Taabe (Dakota Beavers), a beloved young warrior and leader in the tribe. When what they believe is a lion begins to lurk near their settlement, Taabe is part of the hunting party to catch and kill the beast. Naturally, Naru tags along in hopes of getting her chance to prove herself as a hunter.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Movie Review Saw 6

Saw 6 

Directed by Kevin Greutert

Written by Patrick Melton, Marcus Dunstan

Starring Tobin Bell, Costas Mandylor, Betsy Russell, Shawnee Smith

Released October 23rd, 2009 

Since the series debuted in 2004 I have been trying to convince people of the insidious brilliance of the Saw movies. Not merely another torture porn horror series, the Saw movies have a theory behind them. The lead character Jigsaw, aka John Kramer, played by Tobin Bell, believes that he can teach those who have taken their lives for granted to appreciate the gift of life. Jigsaw’s 'tests' are designed not merely to put these people in life and death situations but to reveal their true selves, their inherent nature, morality and character. Each is given a chance to reveal who they are through the choices they make and in doing so save their life or doom them.

The latest in the series, Saw 6, took this theory of death, this dark experiment, and teamed it with a ripped from the headlines plot that, at the time, gave the series a new juice. Jigsaw is long dead by Saw 6 but his game continues with the help of his minion, Detective Hoffman (Costas Mandylor). Why Detective Hoffman turned from good guy cop to willing accomplice of Jigsaw is woven through the past four “Saw” movies. In this game, Detective Hoffman captures an insurance guy named William (Peter Outerbridge). William's job for years has been finding ways to keep his company from paying claims. With his team that he calls 'the dog pit' William figures he can find some way to deny just about any claim.

Find my full length review at Horror.Media, linked here. 

Movie Review Sharp Stick

Sharp Stick

Directed by Lena Dunham

Written by Lena Dunham

Starring Kristine Froseth, Jon Bernthal, Scott Speedman, Lena Dunham

Release Date July 29th, 2022

Sharp Stick is an utterly bizarre and deeply off-putting new movie from writer-director Lena Dunham. Now, before you start on the assumption that I am one of those people who hate anything related to Lena Dunham, I assure you that is not the case. I, like most others, found Dunham through her HBO series Girls, and I have been a fan of her sharp, and offbeat work since that series began and ended. 

I’ve been eagerly awaiting Dunham’s next project as Girls showed a lot of potential for the growth of her talent as a writer. I’ve also not paid much attention to her social media where I am told she’s made many unfortunate statements that I am not eager to investigate. Bottom line, I didn’t go into Sharp Stick with a negative opinion of Dunham but I did come away with a very negative opinion of this film.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here. 

Classic Movie Review Reservoir Dogs

Reservoir Dogs

Directed by Quentin Tarantino

Written by Quentin Tarantino

Starring Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, Steve Buscemi

Released October 9th, 1992

It seems hard to believe now, but in the early 1990's Harvey Keitel was having a hard time finding work. While his close friends Martin Scorsese and Robert Deniro were scoring bigger and bigger films, Keitel was turning away stereotypical thug roles that played too much off his legendary character from Mean Streets. Keitel hadn't worked in a couple years when a hyperactive, young, writer-director named Quentin Tarentino accosted him. Tarentino offered Keitel the role of Mr. White in Reservoir Dogs after writing the role with Keitel in mind. What might have happened had he said no? Thankfully we will never know.

In a diner on the outskirts of Los Angeles a group of similarly dressed guys sit around a table and discuss the true meaning behind Madonna's song “Like A Virgin” and the various reasons to tip and not to tip. Mr. White (Harvey Keitel), Mr. Brown (Tarantino), Mr. Orange (Tim Roth), Mr. Blonde (Michael Madsen) and Mr. Pink (Steve Buscemi), have been called together by Joe Cabot (Lawrence Tierney) to rob a jewelry store of a couple million dollars worth of uncut diamonds.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here.