Regina Hall stars in this social thriller/horror about an elite New England university that’s as old as the country itself and has just as many dark secrets. Hall plays Gail Bishop, the school’s new headmaster and the first Black person to hold the position. A Black student, Jasmine Moore , arrives as a freshman and is soon subjected to anonymous racist attacks that she is convinced are being done by an ancient presence from the school’s past — turns out the school was built on the site of some Salem-era witch trials. As Gail and Jasmine learn to navigate the school’s elite politics and privilege, they uncover the truth about the school and just how tied to its past it really is. There are very few films as old as this 1939 classic on Prime Video.
The story structure and narration only make it that much more titillating as we figure out what really happened behind a heist gone horribly wrong. In the soft shadows of The Gaslight Cafe, folk singer Llewyn Davis croons that he “wouldn’t mind the hanging.” Leave it to the Coen Brothers to oblige him. Two of America’s most mercurial filmmakers, the Coens have approached both grim tragedy and madcap comedy in their films, sometimes at the same time. Inside Llewyn Davis falls on the bleaker end of the spectrum, following Davis as he attempts to get his music career on track in the wake of his musical partner’s suicide. His finances are not the only part of his life falling apart; his former lover, Jean , pregnant with a child that is likely his, wants nothing to do with him.
This Peter Jackson-produced sci-fi-action flick made a big splash at the box office, in part due to a viral marketing campaign that played up its found-footage format to create a sense of “what-if” realness. The aliens, belittlingly referred to as “Prawns,” are segregated into a camp known as District 9 where their fate is controlled by a multinational corporation, who are preparing to relocate the colony away from the city. Wikis van de Merwe is the man on the ground in charge of the task, but everything he knows about the aliens, the company, and his life is challenged when he is exposed to an alien substance that transforms him forever. One of the best movies about the War on Terror, Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt Lockeris smartanda brilliant white-knuckle action movie.
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Smart and action-packed, this film really paved the way for hundreds of imitators. One of the best horror films of all time is Jonathan Demme’s classic The Silence of the Lambs, a winner of Best Picture, Director, Actor, and Actress Oscars. Demme’s adaptation of the Thomas Harris novels created a legend in Hannibal Lecter, a character instantly put on the Mount Rushmore of movie villains. People like to point at ‘80s movies and say they were ahead of their time, but this may be most true about Paul Verhoeven’s 1987 masterpiece, a film that foretold how technology would impact law enforcement in ways that took decades to come true. A brilliant action satire, this is the story of a Detroit cop who is murdered and revived as the title character, a superhuman cyborg enforcer. It’s even more riveting and relevant over three decades later.
It encompasses the mood and the way of life for the period the film chooses to represent. In actress Regina King’s excellent directorial debut, she takes Kemp Powers’ screenplay of his own stage play and turns it into a riveting drama. One of the most emotionally powerful films of the late ’80s, Dead Poets Society has since made its way to the favorite films of all-time lists of many a lad growing up in the era.
Troop Zero : Best Underdog Scout Revenge Story
Casey Affleck stars in this post-apocalyptic film about a father, a daughter, and a world where almost all of the women have died off. It may not be as stylish asThe Road,but Affleck gives a powerful performance. Mel Gibson directs this thriller about the Mayan kingdom, and the days when it went from a world power, to just starting to crack at the seams. A violent, clear-eyed look at an oft-forgotten part of history. A loaded cast has a lot of fun with this very funny, at times cringe-y look at adulthood, parenthood, relationships, and the sacrifices we make as we get older. With Jon Hamm, Kristen Wiig, Maya Rudolph, Adam Scott and more.
Taking place 30 years before those events, Prometheus could be construed as a cautionary tale for humanity that perhaps discovering the origins of our species isn’t such a good idea. When scientists Elizabeth Shaw and Charlie Holloway (Logan Marshall-Green) discover an ancient map on Earth that they think is inviting them to a distant planet to meet our maker, a crew traverses the cosmos in the USCSS Prometheus to get there. Upon arrival, their discoveries are, well, not what they’d hoped for. The remnants of an ancient advanced civilization of “Engineers” is found, and their intentions toward humankind — and connection to a certain stomach-bursting, nasty alien — are horrifying. From the brilliant writer and director John Sayles, 1992’s Passion Fish is a drama about a soap opera star who has been paralyzed after being hit by a cab.
After Carrie is bullied at school and the students involved are punished with detention, the main perpetrator, Christine , and her boyfriend, Billy , plan sinister revenge to embarrass Carrie at the school prom. But Carrie has a supernatural secret of her own, and everyone who’s wronged her is about to find out about it. Peter Bogdanovich passed away in early 2022, cutting a tie between new and old Hollywood that can never be replaced. Honor him by watching one of his most popular films, this 1973 comedy about a father and daughter during the Great Depression, played by real parent/child Ryan and Tatum O’Neal, who won the Oscar and became the youngest Academy Award winner in history. Few Sundance comedies made the cultural impact as much as this 2004 character study from Jared and Jerusha Hess.
One of the most important documentaries ever made, this film’s conceit has been copied many times over, but none of the copycats ever had its impact. It is, quite simply, a movie about the worst people in the world, and how our nation has come to view them as people that should be idolized and imitated. Jonah Hill directs this gritty, wonderful look at young manhood, and the skate park culture that defined so much of the 1990s.
Christopher Nolan co-wrote and directed this 2006 gem about two magicians battling for supremacy in 19th century London. Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman do some of the best work of their careers in the central roles, but this is mostly remembered for Nolan’s technical and screenwriting wizardry, especially a last-act twist that’s unforgettable. James Gray may be the most underrated American filmmaker, what with The Immigrant, Two Lovers, and this period piece about obsession starring Charlie Hunnam and Robert Pattinson. This is not your typical explorer movie as Gray seeks to present something more challenging about why men seek the unexplored and commit themselves long past the point of sanity to seemingly impossible tasks. His latest is the 2021 drama about a man who finds a lost handbag while out on a leave from his stint in a debtor’s prison.
While “Parasite” was the first South Korean film to receive Oscar recognition , “Burning” had made strides in the right direction the year prior. Though it wasn’t ultimately selected as a contender for Best Foreign Language Film, it was the first from South Korea to make the nine-film shortlist for the category. Inspired by Norse mythology, How to Train Your Dragon was an instant hit with kids, adults, and movie critics. Now that more than a decade has passed since its release, we can officially call this movie a classic. Jeremy Laukkonen is automotive and tech writer for numerous major trade publications. When not researching and testing computers, game consoles or smartphones, he stays up-to-date on the myriad complex systems that power battery electric vehicles .
Bruce Willis became an icon for his performance as John McClane, a New York police detective who is estranged from his wife, Holly Gennero-McClane . John visits his wife in Los Angeles on the same night that terrorists led by Hans Gruber seize control of Nakatomi Tower and take Holly hostage along with her co-workers. Suddenly, John has to step up and be a hero, even though he has to do it without backup or even a pair of shoes.
When Lt. Hart travels back in time to warn the people of Earth about an alien invasion, she also reveals that humanity is losing the war. Recruits are badly needed to come back to the future and fight the alien horde. Chris Pratt’s Dan Forester is one of many who answer the call to action, but he’s not the only member of his family who gets roped into the war.
Hereditary (89%) – One of my favorite horror films of all time, the disturbing imagery is not for everyone, but this is a haunting film that is one of the most unsettling in the genre. Naomi Watts stars as an investigative journalist who stumbles across a VHS tape with a deadly history. “Garden State” follows Andrew, a struggling actor, who returns home for his mother’s funeral.
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