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The Classics Shelf: Billy Wilder | That Shelf
The Classics Shelf is an ongoing retrospective of classic cinema produced monthly by writer Bil Antoniou in collaboration with other writers in the That Shelf stable. This months edition is a celebration of the work of the great Billy Wilder, a director who made more than his share of outright classics. I contributed short reviews for two films: 1953’s Stalag 17 and 1957’s Witness for the Prosecution. Stalag 17 is a broad, zany comedy featuring the antics of a couple of class clown-type characters and a World War II wartime drama about men in captivity, and how a community can turn…
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Brotherly Love Is a Balm in ‘A Real Pain’ | Exclaim!
Everyone has someone in their life they oscillate wildly back and forth on whether they love or hate them. That person’s their complete opposite, but someone they’re inextricably connected to because, in some perverse way, they complete one another. The strengths of one are the weaknesses of the other and vice versa — and they’ll be there for each other no matter what. In A Real Pain, cousins David and Benji Kaplan (Jesse Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin, respectively) grew up as close as brothers and fit this archetype to a T. In the wake of their grandmother’s death, they travel to Poland,…
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Giallo! | Contra Zoom
For our Halloween special this year we decided to fill in some horror blind spots and check out the Giallo collection that is available to stream on the Criterion Channel. We review Blood and Black Lace, Don’t Torture a Duckling and Deep Red. Joining the show is Matthew Simpson, one half of the Awesome Friday podcast. Listening Links
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Woman of the Hour & Don’t Move | Awesome Friday Podcast
Greetings programs! This week on the show we are reviewing Anna Kendrick’s directorial debut Woman of the Hour, a based-on-real-life thriller about the time a serial killer went on The Dating Game, and then a new Netflix thriller called Don’t Move. We have a lot to say about each and we hope you join us! Listening Links: On this weeks patron bonus episode we talk about areas of film history we’d like to explore more which leads to talk of Giallo and Hammer Horror, and then we move on to endings that had a serious effect on our view of…
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A24 Retrospective – Mojave | Contra Zoom
We continue our series going through the entire catalog of A24’s films. On this episode we are looking at 2015’s Mojave, directed by William Monahan. The film stars Garrett Hedlund as Tom, a depressed director who goes into the desert and ends up coming across Oscar Issac’s drifter Jack where they have a confrontation that continues back in LA. Joining the show is Matthew Simpson, one half of the Awesome Friday podcast. Listening Links:
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Speak No Evil & The Wild Robot | Awesome Friday Podcast
Greetings programs! This week on the show, we’re talking about two new-to-home video releases. First up, Speak No Evil is a remake of a 2022 Danish film starring James McAvoy. Then we dive into the world of The Wild Robot, a lovely new film from Dreamworks Animation starring the vocal talents of Lupita Nyong’o, Pedro Pascal, and more! Listening Links In this episode of your bonus show, we’re talking about animated films inspired by our coverage of The Wild Robot on our main show this week. What are your top three animated films of the 2020s? We’d love to hear! …
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Cascadia Critics Top 10 Picks From VIFF 2024 | Cascadia Critics
This year’s Vancouver International Film Festival ran from September 26th to October 6th, and many Cascadia Film & Television Critics Association members were in attendance. We decided to put together a top ten list to celebrate the festival and all the great films we saw. I had the privilege of writing the blurb for what became our number 2 pick: Edward Berger’s Conclave. For all its aura of holiness, the Catholic Church is made up of the same thing that every other political body is made up of: people. Conclave -named for the ceremony in which the cardinals of the church elect…
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‘Shrinking’ Rises to Its Tall Order in Season 2 | Exclaim!
A great television season is hard to pull off, but following it up with another comes with added pressure to stick with the core ideals that made it good in the first place — which is exactly what the cast and crew of Shrinking have with their second season. Picking up shortly after where Season 1 ended, our characters are where we left them. Jimmy (Jason Segel) is dealing with the consequences of his radical interventionist approach to counselling. Grace (Heidi Gardner) is in jail following her actions in the last season’s finale, and Jimmy visits regularly. Sean (Luke Tennie) opened a…
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Drag Me To Hell | The LAMBCast
A close vote determined the MOTM this October, but the last minute submission by Matthew Simpson of the “Awesome Friday Podcast” won out. Matthew selected Sam Rami’s 2009, PG-13 horror film, “Drag Me to Hell” and it goes to show that a PG-13 rating does not have to indicate a bad horror movie. On the contrary, this film manages to scare the audience and make us laugh at the same time. Christine Brown tries to show a little backbone as a loan officer in a bank, and it all goes south immediately. Her boyfriend is supportive of her but has…
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VIFF 2024: Rumours & The Apprentice | Awesome Friday Podcast!
Greetings programs! This week on the show, we’re looking at the last of our VIFF 2024 coverage with a discussion of Guy Maddin’s surreal political satire Rumours and, following that, a look at the new Donal Trump biopic The Apprentice. Both of these films are challenging to the viewer, for entirely different reasons, and we hope you enjoy the conversation. Listening Links This week on your bonus show, Simon asks about the horror movies that get under our skin and make us squirm in our seats, and then Matthew asks about our favourite horror TV series. Link: https://www.patreon.com/posts/october-14th-tv-114009414
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‘The Substance’: A Singular and Unapologetic Piece of Cinema | Movies We Texted About
I have been staring at a blinking cursor for several minutes now, failing to find a place to start discussing Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance. This is, to be clear, not a complaint. The audacious and unrelenting film is one of the most singular works of cinema I have seen this year, anddebatably in any other. It’s a laser-focused satire of society’s toxic beauty standards. Set in a surreal fever-dream world, the film examines how far one might be willing to go to stay ahead of those standards, takes that simple idea to its further logical endpoint, and then keeps going. Demi Moore stars as Elisabeth, an older…
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VIFF 2024: ‘Bonjour Tristesse’ Says Hello to a New Canadian Talent | Exclaim!
There’s something about a lazy holiday. Lounging around on long afternoons and warm nights make for easy days. It’s easy to get lost in these moments, especially for the 17-year-old just starting to figure out their individual wants and desires. There’s freedom but also a touch of melancholy in these times, as they are among the best we may have — but, as all things are, they’re destined to end. On the idyllic south coast of France, Bonjour Tristesse finds Cecile (Lily McInerny), a 17-year-old on vacation with her father Raymond (Claes Bang) and his girlfriend Elsa (Naïlia Harzoune) enjoying a holiday…
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VIFF 2024: ’40 Acres’ Is a Tried-and-True Post-Apocalypse Story | Exclaim!
It is interesting to chart our vision of what the post-apocalypse might be. The shortage is never the same, but the outcome always is: we run out of something, people get desperate, and then the rest of the movie happens. R.T. Thorne’s 40 Acres follows this formula, with the shortage being food. The film takes place sometime in the near future, 14 years after all the animals in the world died and some 10 years after the resulting civil war fought over the remains of the resources. Hailey Freeman (Danielle Deadwyler) is an ex-soldier and the descendant of freed Black slaves who…
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VIFF 2024: Mongrels | That Shelf
It is more difficult than most of us know to pull up roots and move to another country. The costs involved aren’t simply monetary. You give up community, culture, and your entire network of friends and family, but you do it in the spirit of finding a better life for yourself and your children. Mongrels, Jerome Yoo’s debut feature, tells the story of one such family that came to rural Canada in the 1990s. Sonny (Jae-Hyun Kim) and his children, Hajoon (Da-Nu Nam) and Hana (Sein Jin), are each struggling not only with their new place in the world, but with…
I am a Rotten Tomatoes-approved, freelance film & television critic and podcast host from Vancouver, Canada! I am a co-founder of the Cascadia Film & Television Critics Association and a voting member of the International Film Society Critics, Pandora International Critics, and the Online Film & Television Association.
I maintain bylines at Exclaim!, Awesome Friday!, That Shelf, ForReel, Movies We Texted About, KeithLovesMovies, and I can be heard regularly on the Contra Zoom Podcast and The LAMBCast.
