Author: Rob Dean

Escapism is a natural tendency for people and a driving force for much of modern day life. No matter where people fall on the Maslow hierarchy of needs, everyone has an escapist streak within them. At the most basic level, people dream of a life different from their own, fantasizing about something apart from themselves in which they are able to evade the drudgery and darkness of their daily existence. For the lucky few that are able to experience art, they can be transported into another world, another story and/or another experience for as long as it takes to watch…

Sequels are always an uncertain proposition. So many different elements have to come together perfectly for a film to be successful. Once that lightning has been captured in a bottle once, how do filmmakers harness it again? Furthermore, how do storytellers expand the worlds and characters they created and tell an original and engaging tale while retaining the parts of the first movie that resonated with audiences in the first place? “Pacific Rim: Uprising” adds new aspects to the premise of giant robots fighting behemoths from another world while staying true to what viewers loved about the original. Unfortunately, although…

All artists have their idiosyncrasies. Even the lesser talented ones that imitate but never innovate have particular ways of filtering their influences into their work. But those with a singular vision are always easy to distinguish. Since “Rushmore,” Wes Anderson’s mark has been instantly identifiable. Whether it’s the central/symmetrical framing of his blocking, his singular color palettes or his use of Futura font, there is an unmistakable stamp that Anderson has put on all of his films. So it is impressive to see Anderson and his collaborators engage in a fantastical epic, done in stop-motion, that is singularly from his…

The dark comedy film is a hard needle to thread. While it comes in different varieties – whether it’s the anti-comedy of “The Greasy Strangler” and “Entertainment,” or the thriller plus comedic elements of “The Ice Harvest” and “Very Bad Things” – it’s a tonal minefield that requires a delicate hand to balance out the funny moments with those bleaker elements. Veer too much into comedy and it just becomes a screwball farce that doesn’t properly handle the serious bits. Steer too far into darker territory, however, and it becomes a joyless attempt at entertainment that thinks it’s clever but…

The Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union is a fascinating and unique period of history in which two superpowers jockeyed for dominance through surrogate countries and economic means rather than engage in direct combat. For many, it ended with the dissolution of the USSR triggered by the fall of the Berlin Wall, resulting in separation of Soviet states into distinct countries with various forms of leadership. Recent political news, of course, suggests that this long simmering rivalry between Russian and American forces is far from over, with many suspicions abound about Russia’s actions in the most…

As long as there have been movies, there have been heroines who have faced impossible odds and strenuous events to come out on top. Whether it’s Letty in “The Wind,” Maria in “Metropolis” or Scarlett O’Hara in “Gone With the Wind,” female characters have been pitted against insurmountable odds, albeit usually in a dramatic fashion. The strength of these women is shown through their ability to withstand hardships, to survive against all odds and, usually, to end up with the man they love. It wasn’t until the late ’60s and early ’70s that this inner strength was made external and…

Cancer is life. That’s a weird concept to wrap one’s head around, especially for those who have seen the ravages of the disease. But at its core, cancer is growth, spawning new cells and branching off, replicating at an accelerated rate. These happen to be the wrong cells in the wrong place that do people harm, but this often fatal affliction is based on the idea of propagation, of unchecked growth that can be harmful to the host body. The flip side of this is the idea that every breath someone takes is one breath closer to death. Unbeknownst to…

Family films are often derided for being shallow and clichéd. The need to have a moral or teach a lesson is more obvious in movies aimed at children than in other films. But there can still be a lot of entertainment and even pure insight in these stories. Recent examples like “Coco,” “Frozen,” “The Boy and the Beast,” “Kubo and the Two Strings” and “Paddington” show that there’s a class of family film that excels at being entertaining, visually inventive and emotionally rich. Unfortunately, “Early Man” is not part of this crop of movies but instead is a mish-mash of…

Despite the fact that there are now more ways to create and distribute films, there has been a continual shrinking of the types of movies that major studios release. For the most part, they are either putting out tentpole films (giant blockbusters with hundreds of millions of dollars in budget and marketing) or prestige pictures (smaller projects made to garner awards, praise and therefore raise the profile of the studio). One of the casualties of this striation of films is the B-movie, that entertaining and totally adequate movie that was never made to break box office records or reap tons…

While 2017 was something of a garbage fire on the national and international levels, there was a lot to praise in cinemas this year. Pretty much every genre had at least one great movie that showed off the best of that category. Musicals excelled with “The Lure;” superheroes shined in “Wonder Woman” and “Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2;” romantic comedies were never better than “The Big Sick;” and horror was at its peak with “It” and “Tragedy Girls.” It was a year of very good movies for independent films and big studio titles alike, with a new piece of…