Posts By Mike Gray
Like no other genre, science fiction in film has the capacity to create situations, characters, and narratives that can stretch the limits of what can be done in a narrative. Untethered to any responsibility of reflecting reality, sci-fi can travel to the ends of the galaxy, create beings out of whole cloth, and allows for the inexplicable–if not impossible–to occur…. Read more »
October is a month made to watch horror films: with Halloween at the end of the month and the days growing shorter (and chillier) in the Northern Hemisphere, there’s just something about the atmosphere of the month that makes it a perfect time to settle in and watch a good horror film. Thanks to streaming services, there has never been… Read more »
It’s difficult to discern the “best” of anything. What’s the best song? Or the best country? Or the best historical period? Quantifying anything is bound to lead to disagreement, after all. So it is with “Best” lists in general: they are, more often than not, based on opinion. Perhaps by providing a few qualifiers, however, at least some can be… Read more »
The 2000s saw a vast amount of films produced, perhaps more than ever before. Seemingly recession-proof, the film industry around the world kept making films, for good or ill, hoping to snag a few (even more) hard-earned bucks from consumers. But in this flood were some real clunkers that swept up along the way, somehow produced even though they should… Read more »
Fiction is one of the most powerful inventions in human history. Humanity’s ability to create out of whole cloth entire separate realities and worlds that function either on the rules of our own reality or one constructed on separate complex rules has introduced the world to concepts that would otherwise never have existed. This has led to inspiration, invention, and… Read more »
There are simply too many movies streaming online. It’s almost impossible to know which are good or bad by the short summaries these services provide, and scrolling endlessly through the available titles separated by genre can frustrate the movie fan who just wants to find something good to watch for the evening. To spare the film fan from wasting hours… Read more »
The action genre, which had become a blockbuster enterprise in the 1980s, took the 90s by storm. Hollywood, realizing that the genre could make them potential billions, began to produce hundreds of action films while also experimenting with the genre’s conventions. With a rising influence from Japan and Hong Kong productions, who reinvented the action film with even more intense… Read more »
By its very nature, the sci-fi genre is relatively complex: the short stories, novels, TV series and films that comprise speculative fiction necessitate detailed expository passages to build its far-flung futures, reality-bending premises, and stories set in a galaxy far, far away. Whether the story is set on an alien world populated by creatures markedly different from human beings, in… Read more »
Streaming services have replaced video stores as the new secondary market for films to find their way into people’s homes in the 21st century. With all the convenience and ease of just turning on your television and scanning through rows of virtual box art, audiences have never had more immediate access to entertainment in history. Through its enormous success, Netflix–currently… Read more »
After making one of–if not the–most influential horror film of all time, where’s a director to go from there? Tobe Hooper, who passed away on August 27, seemed to spend the rest of his career pondering just that question. After 1974’s The Texas Chainsaw Massacre–Hooper’s first narrative feature film–changed the horror genre forever onscreen, it seemed the rest of his… Read more »
Steven Soderbergh is an incredibly prolific director: with his first feature film, sex, lies, and videotape, becoming a literally game-changing indie hit in 1989, Soderbergh has had a wildly successful career as both an indie and mainstream director, having produced 27 films since then and still directing–despite adamantly insisting that he’s retired. Soderbergh is a one-man production team, working as… Read more »
The 1990s was a big, gloriously successful decade for much of the Western world. In particular, the US was going through somewhat of a cultural renaissance, and with a strong economy numerous films were made despite their artistic merit, being funded by venture capitalists who were sure they were investing in the next big quirky hit that audiences would respond… Read more »
The 1980s may have perfected the action movie genre: with censorship having been relaxed throughout the 70s and audiences becoming more accustomed to darker and edgier content in their films, action movies of this decade took a decidedly more violent turn. Although this decade produced some of the most beloved action films of all time–Die Hard, Lethal Weapon, and Rambo… Read more »
A sort of American Andrei Tarkovsky, Gus Van Sant’s films are characterized by long tracking shots, stretches of unbroken silence, and drifting dream-like cinematography that makes seemingly everyday events something unique and special. Often depicting characters that live on the edge of society–either due to their sexual orientation, purposeful defiance of norms, or from being misunderstood–Van Sant has enjoyed success… Read more »
Listen: everyone likes a good movie. When a film stirs your emotions and makes you think, it’s a great experience. But nobody likes a bad movie–one that moves like molasses, features terrible dialogue and loathsome characters, and is filmed like the cinematographer went blind before every scene. But then there are movies that are considered so bad, they’re good: The… Read more »
For those that remember, the 2000s were a relatively dark and difficult decade: with terrorism on the rise, large wars on multiple fronts occurring across the globe, and a financial crisis that crippled economies across the globe, things were looking grim. And appropriately enough, in this environment this decade produced a number of pretty great dark comedies. It seemed that… Read more »
