The Silencing – A Conditional Recommendation
If you’re struggling to find anything worth watching on Amazon’s Prime stream, you could do a lot worse than “The Silencing”. It’s a tight little thriller about a former badass tracker whose daughter went missing a couple of years back. Since then he has tried to become the man...
Take Shelter
Not sure I can recommend this flick, but it’s worth talking about why. First, the good news: It’s one of the most interesting character study films I’ve seen in a while. For those who don’t know, a character study is a film whose overt plot is just an excuse...
An Eerily Good Show
The good stuff. Back in the early 1990’s director Joe Dante (Matinee, Gremlins) made a little low-budget anthology show called Eerie, Indiana, that deserves a lot more love than it gets. The simple premise is that 14-year old Marshall Teller’s family drags him from New Jersey to a small town...
Confederacy Ascendant
Been thinking about A Confederacy of Dunces a lot lately. For those who haven’t read it, this picaresque novel by John Kennedy Toole is about a bona-fide dyed-in-the-wool gamma male who bumbles his way through life. He is the kind of guy who goes to movies specifically to hate on...
Counterpart: An Early and Hesitant Recommendation
You guys might like this one. The marketing kind of kills a big reveal – suprise! there’s an alternate earth and our main character’s double shows up in “our” timeline to wreak havoc. J. K. Simmons plays two very different Howard Silk’s – one casual and friendly if a...
True Detective Season Three: One Final Thought
Most of Hollywood’s offerings are dismissive affairs, driven in part by a desire to hack away at the roots of Western Civilization. And then you have True Detective. The third season features one of the most profoundly pro-Christian messages ever shown on TV. One of the threads that runs through...
True Detective: Season Three
True Detective is an anthology series – a rarity in American television – and each of the three seasons produced…to date. Everyone loves the first season, a gripping delve into weird sex cults and powerful pedophile rings down in the bayou. Most people hate the second season, a look...
A Testament to True Detective
There is a strange thing about the show True Detective that I haven’t seen anyone mention before, and it’s a good thing. These shows – each season represents a self-contained 8-10 hour movie than one episode in an on-going narrative – are at their heart mysteries on tow orders:...
True Detective: Season Two – Better Than They Say
The much maligned second season of True Detective (SPOILER ALERT) makes for better watching than you’ve probably heard. The critics and the masses loved the first season and demanded more of the same, but different. They got it, and complained heavily about a sophomore slump. While it is true...
Glen Cook and Fishing For Stars
Oh, Glen Cook, I wish I knew how to quit you. Last of the Dinosaur Published authors to command my allegiance, Glen Cook is a modern master. He is everything that George Rape Rape Martin’s fans wish that fat old pervert was. With the Starfishers Trilogy, Cook paints a broad...