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(04/07/19 10:04pm)
“I love you, baby, and if it’s quite alright, I need you baby,” Heath Ledger mouths to an audience of gym class students, marching band members, and—behind the screen of a 2012 Dell laptop—my best friend and me. It is one in the morning, and we are trying not to whisper too loudly in our sleepy hometown. This was my first introduction to 10 Things I Hate About You: the spring break of seventh grade, when I couldn’t fathom why anyone would want to hold hands, let alone touch tongues.
(04/01/19 11:46pm)
Bildungsroman: a novel that focuses on a protagonist’s growth from youth to adulthood. Translated to film, the core of the bildungsroman is a coming–of–age story chronicling the life–long trials we face in identifying who we are.
(04/15/19 11:10pm)
On the surface, Triple Frontier appears to be the sloppy result of Netflix taking a Buzzfeed quiz along the lines of “We’ll Tell You Which Exotic Location To Film Your Movie In Based On Your Choice in Men,” choosing Oscar Isaac, Ben Affleck, Garrett Hedlund, Charlie Hunnam, and Pedro Pascal, and ending up with Colombia. The beginning of the movie, released by the streaming service on March 13, is quite rocky; the characters' background stories are hastily slapped together and the script itself is a bit dry. However, approximately twenty–five minutes in, the plot begins to quickly unravel and the audience is able to see the movie for what it truly is: the adrenaline–inducing love child of Narcos, Ocean’s 11, and Survivor.
(04/03/19 5:24pm)
This April, like every month, an interesting variety of productions will be added to our Netflix options, while other options will be leaving us. To keep you up to date on what’s coming and going, the following is a brief compilation of trends and titles to watch out for.
(04/02/19 11:46pm)
With the days growing longer and spring in the air, there is no better time to start enjoying Philadelphia outside our academic hamlet here in University City than now. If you’re heading out to Old City for a little distance, any Penn film buff would tell you to drop in for a couple of hours at the Ritz Five, grab some tea and cookies, and enjoy a great movie. However, if nothing among the selection of independent films that are typically playing catches your eye, the Ritz has classic film showings every Tuesday at 7 p.m. When you’re in the mood for a little weekday getaway as the semester winds down, you can catch these showings throughout the month of April.
(04/01/19 6:16am)
On Monday, March 18, the Social Planning and Events Committee (SPEC) announced that R&B singer Miguel will headline the 2019 Spring Fling Concert on Saturday, April 13. The Afro–Mexican artist is well known for his Grammy Award–winning song "Adorn" and self–identifies as part of a new wave of R&B, falling in line with artists like Frank Ocean, the Weeknd and Elle Varner.
(04/10/19 11:12pm)
Watching First Man cemented my image of Ryan Gosling as perhaps the most versatile actor in his industry today. It made me realize that there is nothing he cannot do. Gosling morphs into roles as easily as he can look the part.
(03/29/19 1:23am)
For college students, high school is mostly out of sight and out of mind. Present day situations call for present day attention, and that usually means putting aside irrelevant memories and experiences from years past. But they’re still there—and On My Block captures both the good and the bad that comes from looking back on what we all experienced.
(04/03/19 10:49pm)
As we continue to see the mass production and commercial success of true crime television, it's becoming safe to say that true crime has dethroned the romantic comedy genre as audiences' favorite form of guilty pleasure television. Although it's not entirely clear why so many of us enjoy delving deep into the horrifying worlds of real–life killers, convicts, and victims, entertainment companies like FOX, HBO, and Netflix have certainly taken notice. They continue to satisfy our thirsts for blood, gore, and drama in the form of quick, binge–worthy miniseries like Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes, The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story and Making a Murderer. The latest addition to the true crime TV dynasty, Hulu's The Act tells the absurd life story of Gypsy Rose Blanchard and the murder of her mother, Clauddine 'Dee Dee' Blanchard. The unique circumstances surrounding the crimes of the Blanchard household make The Act an equally horrifying and heartbreaking experience that is sure to make your stomach turn.
(03/25/19 5:40am)
How exactly do you turn a convoluted, high–frequency trading fiber–optic cable development scheme into a compelling, fast–paced thriller? If The Hummingbird Project is any indication, chances are you can’t. Not to say that the jargon–laden drama with buddy–movie tendencies is an all–out failure, for it hits a handful of high notes and occasionally edges on effective dark humor. However, while some risks do pay off in the end, and I mean the very end, The Hummingbird Project has a difficult time getting off the ground as the true thriller it seems to want to be.
(03/23/19 6:06pm)
Even before its release on March 15, Five Feet Apart was embroiled in controversy. From a misguided influencer campaign to worries about the romanticization of in–patient life, the film has had a rough go of it. These criticisms were amplified by the sheer star power this film held for its teen audience: Haley Lu Richardson of The Edge of Seventeen starred opposite of Cole Sprouse of Riverdale, both under the direction of Justin Baldoni of Jane the Virgin. The movie seems tailor–made for lovestruck young girls and boys, the kind who swoon over teeny–bopper Instagram stars and wield social media as their greatest weapon.
(03/24/19 10:25pm)
Cable television has always been seen as somehow less prestigious than movies: a step down, even. This is due, at least in part, to the astronomical pay–grade difference between the two mediums. Apart from a handful of powerhouse series like the Big Bang Theory or Modern Family, television provides actors with far less "big bang" for their buck than movies typically do. Resultantly, we don't see movie stars do television (save for the rare miniseries) unless it’s a desperate attempt to revamp their careers.
(03/18/19 10:32pm)
Netflix has officially released the highly anticipated third season of the Emmy award–winning reboot, Queer Eye.This season we're following the Fab Five—Tan France (the fashion guru), Antoni Porowski (the food and wine connoisseur), Jonathan Van Ness (the grooming specialist), Bobby Berk (the design whiz), and Karamo Brown (the culture expert)—as they travel through the Midwestern city of Kansas City, Missouri to offer advice and make people over from the inside–out. This is the reality TV series' best installment yet—and this is why.
(03/21/19 8:46pm)
When it comes to making audiences uncomfortable, sometimes movies go beyond the canon of horror film antagonists and confront people with the very worst of their own humanity. In the case of Gasper Noé’s Climax, uses a mind–bending cinematic style that replicates the chaotic, nightmarish experiences of his tormented characters. Climax delivers on a premise that could have easily produced a hollow, superficial film capturing what might happen if a group of people accidentally drinks LSD–laced sangria at a company party. However, the film’s fluid, observational cinematography captures the narrative layers of a world of illuminated passageways, echoing with screams and thumping music, while the film’s ensemble cast act out a terrifying drug–induced fantasy. Climax should have been a terrible film, and though it may be a disturbing one, it is mostly just a gloriously uncomfortable imagining of our most unsavory impulses.
(03/25/19 4:20am)
It’s International Women’s Month this March, an incredibly important time to advocate and support the fight for gender equality. To celebrate this monumental and difficult time period in current events and history, here are a few films that you can watch to celebrate the strength and resilience of women everywhere.
(03/24/19 9:48pm)
“Free food, free movies, free ideas,”—that's how Ethics professor Jonathan Moreno aptly describes the upcoming Penn Bioethics Film Festival.
(03/19/19 4:58am)
Nine years after aliens first land on Earth, all governments have been taken over by spiky alien “legislators” (as they call themselves), and all human life is under constant surveillance in the form of neck–implanted, trackable bugs. Captive State, released March 15, follows several main characters in one long, highly confusing espionage plot. Rebelling against the alien takeover are Rafe Drummond (Jonathan Majors) and a gaggle of nameless faces, and supporting the aliens is William Mulligan (John Goodman). Caught in between is Rafe’s brother, Gabriel (Ashton Sanders).
(03/17/19 8:47pm)
Marvel’s first female superhero origin story is finally here: Brie Larson stars as extraterrestrial Kree warrior fighting a war between her people and the evil, shape shifting Skrull people. All the while, she struggles with keeping her emotions in check at the direction of her Kree comander, Yon–Rogg (Jude Law), and working through recurring snippets of her past life that she can’t quite piece together. After a mission goes bad, she finds herself on Earth in 1995, where she meets future SHIELD director, Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) and enlists his help to end the war with the Skrulls. She eventually uncovers her true identity as U.S. air force pilot Carol Danvers and realizes her true power to become Captain Marvel.
(03/14/19 3:05am)
Netflix is more than just a streaming service. Conceived initially as a DVD rental business, the company has grown far past its initial model and is now best known for producing and streaming its own original series and movies. The business model raises questions around the nature of film production, movie theaters, and how we view the medium as a whole. Steven Spielberg thinks that Netflix’s artistry is nonsense.
(03/17/19 8:56pm)
2019 is the year to acknowledge the existence of video–game–to–live–action movies: Pokémon: Detective Pikachu is slated for release on May 10, and Sonic the Hedgehog for Nov. 8. Regardless of their future successes or failures, these two movies have the hefty task of bringing nostalgic, beloved worlds and characters to life.
