JASON BOURNE Review — Enough Already!
I need to preface my Jason Bourne review by telling you that I am not a fan of the franchise, nor the style of director Paul Greengrass. That handheld shaky cam makes me seasick, and the incessant two second cuts give me an eye strain headache. I am a fan of character development and dialogue, however, both…
STAR TREK BEYOND Review — Pretty Damn Fabulous
STAR TREK BEYOND Review – by James Mandell The thing about all those overblown special effects blockbusters is there’s only so much real estate you can appropriate when battling super villains and destroying multiple metropolises on Earth. So the folks at Bad Robot, after what can only have been exhaustive rounds of gathering focus group…
BAD MOMS Review — They Could Be Worse
Bad Moms Review by Lisa Johnson Mandell If the filmmakers behind Bad Moms really wanted to poke fun at Tiger Moms, Helicopter Moms and any other perfection obsessed matriarchs out there, and if they really wanted to make the rest of us feel it’s okay to be a Bad Mom, they wouldn’t have cast Mila Kunis…
ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS Review – Fab or Flub?
Absolutely Fabulous Review by Lisa Johnson Mandell @HomeInHollywood Sweetie Darlings, if you don’t mind being called by that unique term of endearment, and if, in fact, it elicits fits of giggles and sends you running to the fridge for some bolly (champagne), you’re going to love this film. If you’ve spent any time in Great Britain during…
GHOSTBUSTERS Review — Busting Makes Me Feel Good
Ghostbusters Review by Lisa Johnson Mandell @HomeInHollywood I so don’t get the controversy over this film. The 1984 original did indeed become iconic, but it’s certainly ripe for a reboot after 32 years. Don’t Batman, Superman and Spiderman get a little work done and then come back to plague us three or four times a decade?…
PETE'S DRAGON Review — Same Old, Same Old
Pete’s Dragon Review, by Lisa Johnson Mandell I think the number of sequels and remakes we’ve seen lately is rivaled only by the number of Disney movies that begin with the parents dying and the child being left alone. That’s not a spoiler, it happens in the first five minutes of the film, and I think…
THE INFILTRATOR Review — Best Film of the Year So Far
The Infiltrator review by Lisa Johnson Mandell I love a film that is so intense I have to remind myself throughout, “it’s only a movie, it’s only a movie–these are actors, and their lives are not really at stake.” I also found it necessary to remember that the movie is based on a published memoir, so at…
THE BFG Review — Beautiful for Generations
The BFG Review by Lisa Johnson Mandell with help from Julian Dans I can tell you that The BFG, Steven Spielberg’s first big screen collaboration with Disney, is magical and wondrous and a total delight, but not being a member of the film’s intended demo, I think the words of my nine-year-old friend Julian Dans,…
MIKE AND DAVE NEED WEDDING DATES Review — Book It
I know what you’re thinking when you start to read my Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates review: This is going to be another raunchy Neighbors-type film, seeing that it stars Zac Efron, and is written by the same screenwriters, Andrew Jay Cohen and Brendan O’Brien. “How could it not be the same ole, same ole?” I was wondering…
THE LEGEND OF TARZAN REVIEW — He Swings, He Misses
The Legend of Tarzan review, by Lisa Johnson Mandell I was prepared to give The Legend of Tarzan the benefit of the doubt, because, hello? Alexander Skarsgard swinging through the wet and wild jungle, shirtless and with pants so perilously low-slung they’re they’re constantly threatening to fall off. And for the guys there’s the plucky…
