By now, many of us have seen Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s latest powerhouse film, The Revenant, and we can safely say we’ve never felt dirtier. It’s a dire and unrelenting, yet profoundly beautiful movie about fur trapper Hugh Glass’ desperate fight for survival and revenge in the American frontier.
Few contemporary filmmakers have managed to garner the respect and adoration of Christopher Nolan. It’s been a decade since the release of his beloved film about rival magicians – The Prestige – and yet fans continue to dissect it and draw their own conclusions about what exactly happened in that masterpiece.
One of the more surprisingly enjoyable films to hit theaters in recent months had to be Ryan Coogler’s rebootquel of the Rocky franchise: Creed. Centering on Adonis Creed (Michael B. Jordan) – the son of deceased boxing Champion Apollo Creed – the film follows the up and comer as he enlists the help of Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) in order to follow in his father’s footsteps.
Vulgarity, obscenity, and all-around offensive rhetoric have characterized Quentin Tarantino’s career over the years; it’s what fans of his work have come to expect (and love). The Hateful Eight is no different. Taking place in the tumultuous post-Civil War period of American history, the film tackles major themes associated with race and bigotry.
Now that Star Wars: The Force Awakens has hit theaters it can officially be classified as a bona fide worldwide phenomenon. The movie not only continues the story of Luke, Leia, Han, and the rest of the iconic characters from the original trilogy, but it also introduced a whole new roster of young heroes to carry the saga forward into the future.
When the most recent trailer for Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice dropped, everyone pretty much lost their minds – in two distinct ways. While some people were thrilled to see more of a movie that will undoubtedly make history, others felt cheated because they assumed the trailer spoiled the movie.
Costumed vigilantes may have dominated the box office for the better part of the last decade, but 2016 will truly be the year of the superhero. The arms race between DC and Marvel is just starting to ramp up, and as a result we're getting an absolutely insane influx of iconic character introductions in the coming year.
SPOILERS AHEAD: This article contains spoilers for Star Wars: The Force Awakens. If you want to read our spoiler-free review, click here. The rest of you, read on… but know that you have been warned. I tried, you guys. I tried so damned hard. Looking back over the last week, I am trying to figure out what exactly I did wrong, but at the end of the day, Star Wars: The Force Awakens was still spoiled for me.
In recent years George Lucas has become one of the most instantly identifiable pariahs of Hollywood. Fans of the original Star Wars trilogy quickly turned him into some sort of Sith lord when he went back and used modern technology to tamper with his iconic films – and then completely gave up on him when he mishandled the prequel trilogy.
Adam Driver has a serious task on his hands when it comes to portraying the character of Kylo Ren in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Not only does he have to create a character that lives up to the series’ history of badass bad guys, but he also had to express that sort of menace whilst wearing a stifling, cumbersome costume.
Actual television networks are not even purveying some of the best television programs that you can find these days. We have spoken at great lengths about the success Netflix has experienced in creating their own original content, but Amazon has similarly produced arguably some of the best shows available.
Technology and innovation are fundamentally linked to the film industry. Every year, new techniques and tools debut that filmmakers from years gone by could have only dreamed of. However, sometimes trends are not a matter of moving forward, but going back in time and returning to long forgotten technniques.
It has quite literally been mere hours since Star Wars: The Force Awakens premiered for the general public, but that hasn’t stopped anyone from heaping ungodly amounts of praise on the latest adventure in the galaxy far, far away. The film has met – if not completely exceed – expectations, and is performing so well that it’s even causing a major Hollywood institution to consider altering their rules in order to make it eligible to become nominated this year’s Critics' Choice Awards Best Picture category.
Seemingly against all odds, we will soon be getting another Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie. We’re not going to pull any punches here, we here at Cinema Blend did not give the original film in the newly rebooted franchise what one would call a "glowing review." It felt like a cheap cash grab that lacked fidelity that made the titular turtles so beloved in the first place.
Hollywood loves few things more than a good boxing movie. When Sylvester Stallone brought Rocky to the silver screen back in 1976, he proved that the sport was ripe for all the drama necessary for an Oscar winning movie – a notion only reaffirmed by Robert DeNiro’s take on Jake LaMotta in 1980. Despite the multitude of iconic boxers who have been broached by the film industry, few actors have ever taken on the role of one of the most iconic boxers of all time.
Fans of Mel Brooks have long clamored for a follow-up to his 1987 classic comedy Spaceballs. The film dissected and then expertly lampooned numerous iconic science fiction franchises – with particular emphasis on the Star Wars galaxy far, far away. With the recent release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, numerous rumors have continued to swirl that Brooks may intend to return to the franchise.
