11 Jan 2015

For King and Country: "Selma," "Inherent Vice," and "Taken 3"

By Mike Schulz

David Oyelowo in SelmaSELMA

Movie violence is so prevalent - be it in horror films or action franchises (see Taken 3, if you must) or the PG-13 pummelings of every Marvel entertainment ever - that it's shocking to see one whose brutal acts have the power to make you cry. But within the first minutes of the extraordinary Selma, director Ava DuVernay stages a literal explosion of historical violence so frightening, repellent, and emotionally overwhelming that, in the awestruck moments of silence that followed, it was absolutely no surprise to hear viewers sniffling.

31 Mar 2014

Bee Prepared: "Bad Words," "Enemy," and "Sabotage"

By Mike Schulz

Rohan Chand and Jason Bateman in Bad WordsBAD WORDS

It's not impossible to make a comedy centered on an angry, sullen, emotionally inaccessible bastard, as Oscar Isaac recently proved in Inside Llewyn Davis. In that film, however, Isaac had a Coen-brothers script and a bunch of sensational folk songs to help carry him through. In Bad Words, director/star Jason Bateman merely has a half-workable comic conceit and access to unlimited profanities. The anger, sullenness, and inaccessibility, I'm sorry to say, win out.

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