The Banker Is a Disappointingly Rushed and Paint-By-Numbers Affair

Ever since he was a kid, Bernard Garrett (Anthony Mackie) was all about challenging the status quo. A math genius, Garrett has long harbored dreams of being a real estate broker. That's not an occupation usually filled by Black people in the mid-20th century. But again, Garrett's a rebel and he's not about to let the racist status quo hold him back. Eventually, Garrett, after pairing up with Joe Morris (Samuel L. Jackson), begins to create an empire of real estate, one that most people aren't aware they control. That's because Garrett and Morris have had Matt Steiner (Nicholas Hoult) pose as the owner of their business to white investors and fellow business owners. Steiner is the face of the operation but Garrett and Morris are the ones controlling all the cards.

Seberg Has a Great Kristen Stewart Performance But Little Else to Offer

Seberg is half of a good movie. Anytime it focuses exclusively on its titular character, real-life movie star Jean Seberg (Kristen Stewart), it's not flawless but it's certainly more assured of itself. It's actually rooted in a real person with tangible goals and discernible struggles. But Jean Seberg is not the only focus of the screenplay by Joe Shrapnel and Anna Waterhouse. We also have an FBI agent named Jack Solomon, a fictitious character played by Jack O'Connell. Constantly cutting away from Seberg's storyline to the infinitely less interesting trials & tribulations of Solomon, that's where Seberg really loses its luster.

Half Nelson Tackles Two Troubled Human Beings With Remarkable Levels of Nuance

Dan Dunne (Ryan Gosling) is a good teacher. He's maybe not the best teacher ever but he's passionate about what he teaches his Middle School students, clearly has a dedication to the material he teaches and has some real personality when he's teaching to his students. However, as an everyday human being, Dunne is more of a complex person as he struggles with the sickness of addiction. Cocaine is his drug of choice and he takes it regularly, to the point that one of his students, Drey (Shareeka Epps), catches him in the middle of a drug trip in one of the school's locker room. Believe it or not, this moment leads to an unusual friendship between the two of them, as Dan starts to look out for Drey, who has her own set of problems at home mainly stemming from the sudden re-emergence of Frank (Anthony Mackie), a drug dealer that Drey's brother used to sell for, in her life.

The Hate U Give Is A Thoughtful Character Study Packed With Outstanding Performances

2018's been a good year for the Young-Adult novel film adaptation subgenre, hasn't it? It's nice to see this strain of American cinema having such a banner considering that I've always felt its gotten too much of a bum rap from people always associating it with Twilight and its various knock-off's rather than also considering that the high-quality likes of The Fault In Our Stars or The Spectacular Now also qualify as entries in this subgenre. Twilight isn't good (though the hate for it seems a wee bit overblown at this point), but judging the entire YA-novel film adaptation realm just by it is like judging all of superhero movies on Batman v. Superman. 

Detroit Is An Unflinching Look At The Horrors Of The Past That Echo The Horrors Of The Present

A sentiment I heard from one fellow attendee of my screening of Kathryn Bigelow's Detroit was something along the lines of "And that (that being instances of racially motivated police brutality) still happens to this day!" Which is, tragically, all too true. We still have too many individuals who lose their lives at the hands of officers simply due to the color of their skin. No, obviously not every police officer is evil, far from it, but there are societally ingrained problems in American society that instill the idea of racism into many people occupying a large assortment of occupations, including the role of a police officer. But just because the problem isn't exclusive to the realm of law enforcement officers doesn't mean it shouldn't be recognized, especially since such officers inhabit one of the few jobs where you're given weapons to kill people.

Captain America: Civil War Review

If I had a time machine, ya know where I'd go? Back to March 2003, the month when the pilot for the classic TV series Arrested Development was filmed. Somehow, I'd find a way to talk to the duo directing this pilot, two individuals by the name of Anthony and Joe Russo. I'd take them aside momentarily to tell them that not only would the show they're currently working on would go on to become one of the most prolific TV comedies of all-time, but these two would be responsible for two of the most beloved blockbusters in one of the biggest film franchises ever to exist.

The Night Before Review

Gazing onto the page on Box Office Mojo dedicated to Christmas movies, one might be shocked to see how few massively financially successful films have been released that center directly on this holiday. Films that use the holiday as merely a backdrop (like Home Alone, Die Hard and Iron Man 3) typically find much greater success in the department of dollars and cents compared to its kin that tackle Christmas head on their plots. The Night Before, the newest Seth Rogen comedy, just so happens to fall into that latter type of Christmas filmmaking.

Black Or White Review

A Race To The Bottom

Kevin Costner has had one of the more bizarre cinematic career resurgences I've seen in a while. while someone like Matthew McConaughey has built his comeback on the likes of True Detective, The Lincoln Lawyer, Magic Mike, Dallas Buyers Club and Interstellar, Costner seemed to get a massive boost solely from a Hatfields & McCoys miniseries. After appearing in only two movies from 2008-2012, he's managed to pop up in five different movies over the past year and a half, with two more to come this year. The reason such a comeback puzzles me is because none of the performances I've seen (I haven't watched the aforementioned Hatfields & McCoys miniseries) were that good. I've never seen him give a wretched performance or anything, but two of his 2014 films wound up being among the worst of last year.