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Spencer
(2021)
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David G. Hughes
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It's easy to cheer the assertion of autonomy that is the film's chief moral. But it's too easy. And for that reason the movie is cheap, cashing in on maudlin, binary, and oftentimes outright ridiculous sentiments.
Posted Dec 20, 2021
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Crazy Samurai: 400 vs 1
(2020)
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David G. Hughes
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Crazy Samurai is, up until now, the pinnacle of this undesirable and artless trend in single-take action filmmaking. It displays very little authorial shaping of reality. Yet its sui generis excess wore me down and then won me over.
Posted Jun 27, 2021
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Muscle
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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A fraught, honest, and self-scrutinising working-out (quite literally in this case) of the ambivalence that many men have towards their own sense of manhood, agency, and self-worth.
Posted Dec 06, 2020
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Another Round
(2020)
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David G. Hughes
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Vinterberg is having fun with the striking contradiction between the Danish fondness for inebriation and its image as a healthy, well-functioning society. So he blends the two and ironically pushes it to its logical conclusion.
Posted Oct 25, 2020
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Unhinged
(2020)
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David G. Hughes
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The politically-incorrect sight of an unkempt, mad-eyed villain causing havoc behind the wheel in pursuit of an innocent got me emotional and starting to think: hot damn, this is a movie!
Posted Aug 20, 2020
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Greyhound
(2020)
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David G. Hughes
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While generally considered a sin by today's standards, the aestheticisation of war remains one of art's most fruitful endeavours-a tradition Greyhound is happy to partake in.
Posted Jul 15, 2020
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John Wick: Chapter 2
(2017)
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David G. Hughes
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As phlegmatic assassin John Wick, Reeve's svelte and photogenic demeanour is paraded with grace and pride. Director Chad Stahelski loves his leading man, understands his appeal and shoots him accordingly as a killer on a catwalk.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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Avengers: Infinity War
(2018)
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David G. Hughes
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Infinity War marks a new level of storytelling maturation for the production company: it has gone beyond the laughs and even beyond the ideas - it has stripped the armour and produced the tears.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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A Private War
(2018)
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David G. Hughes
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In mythology, an eye-patch or blindness is often symbolic for the burden of seeing - attaining (unwelcome) knowledge. Marie Colvin is a real-life Odin, affected by the terrors of the world and burdened by the knowledge.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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Vice
(2018)
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David G. Hughes
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Vice believes in little but the greed of monsters, but its nihilism is betrayed in its need to believe in functioning power structures, no matter how conspiratorial it is.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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Dragged Across Concrete
(2018)
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David G. Hughes
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As the film comes to a bloody climax, the horrid pathos of men abandoned and tossed asunder resonates tragically. Regret, despair, stoicism and injustice all chime as the bell tolls and the bullets ricochet. It's operatic.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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John Wick: Chapter 3 -- Parabellum
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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Few, if any, franchise has objectified its central figure so gloriously, so effectively, as to make a statement about human form itself.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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Mr. Jones
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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A captivating depiction of mid-century Soviet authoritarianism that feels suitably old-fashioned in all the right ways.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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The Kid
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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D'Onofrio has woven a neat take, with each male character serving a symbolic role in a story about the choices a boy must make in order to become a man.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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Nomad: In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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Herzog is showing us that we do not live in what is fashionably termed a "post-truth" world, but an ever-present pre-truth with ecstasy within grasp, should we be willing to walk into it.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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Terminator: Dark Fate
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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It cherrypicks 'topical' concerns for a thin veneer of 'urgency' that liberally-minded critics lap up, but underneath is an endoskeleton of unpleasant and cynical opportunism swirling into the creative void.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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Hail Satan?
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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The emotional appeal of the film is a narrow spectrum, falling mostly under mild liberal bemusement, which speaks to the lack of sincerity on the part of the Satanists who themselves admit to being in it for the "fun".
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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The Irishman
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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Extraordinarily ambitious, dealing with the biggest questions: death, and the attempt to work it out. To watch this figuring-out is a devastating privilege and the film a monumental artistic achievement.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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VFW
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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As grindhouse cinema, it's solid and pleasing, but it is also saying something about the value of human connection and communitarian solidarity as the best treatment to collective malady, contra the fracturing pharmaceuticalisation of everyday life.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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Disturbing the Peace
(2020)
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David G. Hughes
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It fails to deliver on anything more than the rugged veneer of its leading man.
Posted Jun 20, 2020
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The Hunt
(2020)
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David G. Hughes
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It's outré-ness is entirely performative, which isn't at all surprising in this climate. In an economy based on what people say rather than what they do, this trend in cinema has been on the cards - it's Twitter writ large on the screen.
Posted Jun 18, 2020
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Planet of the Humans
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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The Malthusian impulse comes to the fore, and one feels Gibbs is not beyond his own brand of moralism. But Planet of the Humans makes some valuable steps towards an actual reckoning of specious dogma.
Posted Jun 18, 2020
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Villain
(2020)
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David G. Hughes
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A motion picture of folk-art integrity and conviction of sensibility, done by a band of outsiders with something to prove - a debutant out to make a mark and a leading-man showing that, sure, he can crack a skull, but he can break a heart too.
Posted Jun 17, 2020
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Rambo: Last Blood
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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The film's greatest sin: taking its trusting audience for granted. For a populist filmmaker like Stallone, this is a grave mistake.
Posted Jun 17, 2020
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The Ground Beneath My Feet
(2019)
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David G. Hughes
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First-rate Austrian drama is a damning diagnosis of the neurosis at the heart of contemporary society.
Posted Jun 17, 2020
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