04 Oct 2010

Friendship Bytes: "The Social Network" and "Across the Sea of Time 3D"

By Mike Schulz

Jesse Eisenberg and Justin Timberlake in The Social NetworkTHE SOCIAL NETWORK

You may have heard that a lot of critics, in their reviews of the film, have been comparing the Facebook saga The Social Network to Citizen Kane. So before this turns into one of those inaccurate, Al-Gore-says-he-invented-the-Internet sort of myths, let me clarify: They're saying that in terms of its storyline, themes, and protagonist, director David Fincher's and screenwriter Aaron Sorkin's movie is more than a bit reminiscent of Orson Welles' 1941 untouchable. No one, to my knowledge, is saying that The Social Network is as good as Citizen Kane.

Having said that, The Social Network is as good as Citizen Kane.

19 Mar 2008

Tyler-san: "Never Back Down," "The Bank Job," and "Doomsday"

By Mike Schulz

Sean Faris and Djimon Hounsou in Never Back DownNEVER BACK DOWN

Watching the so-silly-it's-almost-fun mixed-martial-arts melodrama Never Back Down, I felt instantly transported to the summer of 1984, when my friends and I saw The Karate Kid the first time around. Fight Club was still 15 years away, so we weren't yet treated to this film's bone-crunchingly "kinetic" violence, nor to the sight of shirtless brawlers pummeling each other with their pants buttoned 12 inches below their navels. (Nor, for that matter, to topless teenage lesbians making out in a jacuzzi.) But Never Back Down is still pretty much Karate Kid redux, and the experience of watching it felt like time-travel for another reason: The movie's high-schooler lead is played by Tom Cruise.

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