When you add up my weekly reviews in the Sacramento News & Review, my work here at E Street Film Society, and my contributions to other print and online publications, I penned over 250 published movie reviews in 2015. At an average of 300 words a pop, that’s […]
Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens (J.J. Abrams) GRADE: B By Daniel Barnes “Tangible and Dimensional” “Luke Skywalker has vanished.” With those four words, strategically chosen by director J.J. Abrams and his co-screenwriters Lawrence Kasdan and Michael Arndt to begin the opening crawl of Episode VII, […]
By Daniel Barnes All hail, Awards Season! Tyrant of all she surveys! Oppressor of cinephiles! Scourge of the pudgy and bespectacled! Obvious Ben Whishaw fan! Long may her tastefully bland mediocrities inexplicably occupy our otherwise intelligent thoughts! SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 29 Victor Frankenstein (Dir.: Paul McGuigan; GRADE: C+) Not […]
BEST ACTOR Christopher Abbott, James White Samuel L. Jackson, The Hateful Eight Tom Courtenay, 45 Years Tom Hardy, Mad Max: Fury Road Jesse Eisenberg, The End of the Tour BEST ACTRESS Charlotte Rampling, 45 Years Greta Gerwig, Mistress America Juliette Binoche, Clouds of Sils Maria Cate Blanchett, Carol […]
By Daniel Barnes More coffee-fueled palaver about meaningless awards and reductive categorizations? No problemo! WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 25 Love & Mercy ***REWATCH*** (Dir.: Bill Pohlad; GRADE: B+) The only real change from my initial assessment of this Brian Wilson biopic is that I severely underrated Paul Giamatti’s performance, probably […]
w By Daniel Barnes I’m dedicating the month leading up to the SF Film Critics Circle awards on 12/13 to my End-of-Year Cramfest. It’s my personal War on Xmas – I’ll be screening the awards contenders, catching up on overlooked movies, and rewatching some of my favorites from […]
