michael's movie reviews
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reviewed 2023.07.13
After a long day's errands, hiking, and fishing, I spotted this underappreciated classic on Netflix and watched it for what must have been the third or fourth time...
Everything Everwhere All at Once
reviewed 2022.09.11
On the surface, this is a sci-fi movie about a woman in her fifties that is asked by an other-dimension version of her husband to join an epic struggle to save the multiverse...
reviewed 2022.01.08
Today my son and I watched the first of the Bond movies to feature Daniel Craig. He agreed that it was by the best of the five we watched together, and had none of those moments when he wondered, "Why did they do that?"I've reviewed this movie in the past, but I have come to realize something in watching it this time...
reviewed 2020.12.12
This film was a recommendation from a friend, and I was completely blown away...
reviewed 2019.07.10
I watched this again after several years, and I think I've belatedly come to realize that this movie had quite an effect on me when I first saw it twenties years ago. Specifically, I suspect it had a part in kicking my butt to start doing something more with my life than paying the bills. Because within a year I was living on the other side of the world.Anyway, it's taken on something of cult st..
reviewed 2018.03.31
Despite the many times I've seen this film over the years, I realized with a start today that I've never written one of my capsule reviews for one of my favorite flicks. So let's do this!This is an animated movie that tracks what I would argue is the imaginative response of an eleven year old to what she perceives is a close call with losing her mother to an unspecified illness...
reviewed 2018.03.19
This is a surprisingly excellent story of a wildlife officer who becomes involved in the investigation into the murder of a friend's daughter...
reviewed 2017.07.23
This is a superb animated movie featuring a certain fox that decides it's time to return to old ways of pilfering the odd chicken from the farms in the area. He believes he's too good to be caught and carries on despite the misgivings of his wife and his friend (and partner in crime).Of course, he's not too good to be caught and the local farmers strike back with an escalating campaign of violen..
reviewed 2017.05.02
I loved this movie...
reviewed 2016.12.04
Jon and I went to the local cinema to watch this sci-fi flick about first contact with aliens...
reviewed 2016.11.20
This is an excellent animated movie about an anthropomorphic, talking bear who decides to travel to London to find a home after being pushed out of his own by an earthquake...
reviewed 2016.11.13
This is a lovingly-made animated story about a boy who sets a monstrous spirit loose on the world and must walk the path of his ancestors in order to set things right. It's stop-motion and looks so good you wonder what on Earth everyone else is up to. The voice-acting cast is excellent. The plot and pacing is superb, and the whole thing is far smarter than I would have imagined.If you must sit i..
reviewed 2016.03.15
This is a dramatic telling of real events that happened during the Great Financial Crisis...
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
reviewed 2015.09.27
I thoroughly loved this story, based on an old poem, about a day-dreamer who is forced by a crisis at work to embark on a global adventure to track down a very larger than life photographer...
reviewed 2014.12.01
Before I write this, I'll clarify that I think there's a good chance that the director of this movie faked the original moon landing on behalf of the US government during the Cold War competition with the Soviets...
reviewed 2014.09.24
This is a movie telling of a story book as read by a grandfather to his grandson who is home sick...
reviewed 2014.04.30
I really enjoyed this animated rendition of the old "Tintin" comic books...
reviewed 2013.08.12
I enjoyed this movie more than I expected to...
reviewed 2012.10.15
This is a story of two young people falling in love in a tiny island community...
reviewed 2012.09.18
This is a dramatic telling of the implosion of an investment bank during the (totally over) Great Financial Crisis...
reviewed 2010.10.18
This is a movie about an Army veteran who receives word that his son has gone missing from an army base in the US. Believing his son to be in Iraq, he at first challenges this assertion but is told the son's unit has been returned. He tries to contact the young man, but failing to reach him decides to investigate for himself.The veteran was an MP (and retains the rank of Sergeant) so he decides ..
reviewed 2010.07.24
This is an excellent sci-fi piece about a fellow who has a three-year solo work assignment on the "far side" of the moon. When some equipment breaks down he calls for assistance but it looks bad; he's stranded alone, the only person on the planet working for this mining concern. The communications satellite isn't working and no one even knows he's in trouble.He later awakes from stasis to be gre..
reviewed 2010.01.26
If a perfect animated movie is possible, this is it...
reviewed 2008.09.05
This is an excellent movie about a family that decides to take their young daughter to a beauty contest in California...
reviewed 2008.03.10
This is a sci-fi pick about a world without (human) pregnancies...
reviewed 2007.06.22
I love this film. It's like a redneck Jaws, and I mean that two ways. Obviously, it has a man-versus-monster theme. But moreover it is a triumph of character-driven, high-impact story-telling. This might take a bit of explaining, but here goes.It features two yahoos in some dusty patch of the western US...
reviewed 2007.03.10
I showed Mari this old favorite of mine...
reviewed 2007.03.07
I finally got around to seeing this movie (or any movie!) and I'm glad I made the investment. It's about a fellow who's not exactly living life to its fullest, drifting along in a dead-end job with nothing else to speak of. Through some comedic events, he's locked up in a cryochamber like Walt Disney and he disappears into the future.The future, it turns out is not too bright...
The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada
reviewed 2006.12.04
This is a heart-breaking story of an itinerant worker who dies in the US...
reviewed 2002.10.07
This is a Japanese animated movie of outstanding art work and brilliantly original storytelling...
reviewed 2002.09.28
I seem to see this movie fairly regularly; this is at least the third time...
reviewed 2002.04.02
This is a movie about three guys who go out to hunt down a shark that's been terrorizing the waters of their small resort town...
reviewed 2001.09.29
This is the second time I've seen this, and aside from a couple of movie making shortcuts I noticed this time around, I still think it's an outstanding movie from the points of plot, cast, setting(s), and pacing. It just hooks you in.The casting in particular was genius...
reviewed 2001.06.24
This is a Cohen brothers flick, which means it finely blends a tight plot, a host of surreal characters, and substantial philosophical meanderings.It's the most ambitious of their movies from the standpoint of the narrative and montages that slide in from out of left field from time to time, but it works quite well.One part that remains funny after the years since it came out is how closely Je..
reviewed 1999.11.19
This is a movie in which a wretched puppeteer discovers a strange gateway that allows you to experience the life of John Malkovich, the actor...
reviewed 1999.03.10
Seeing this again reminded me of just what a slick piece it really was. The scenes with Tarantino (or Travolta, for that matter) never really worked, but what a fine gangster movie indeed. It's a pity that the bullet holes were in the wall ahead of the shooting by the kid in the can, but then miracles aren't real.I've heard rumors that Marcellus Wallace sports a Band-aid in this flick because he..
reviewed 1998.03.29
This is a movie about a cop who sends off a killer, when he attends his execution. The killer really lays it on, coming across like Satan himself, reveling in all he's done. The cop thinks it's over, no one as thoroughly inhabited by that evil could not have been the killer and now the deaths are finished.Only, they aren't over and what's worse various other characters surrounding the cop seem ..
reviewed 1998.03.07
Thanks to a friend, I now own a copy of this video...