“Schindler’s List” (1993): Corporations Are People

Schindler’s List should be remembered for more than just being a Holocaust movie. It takes more than simply depicting a violent historical subject to make a film as magnificent as Schindler’s List is. Steven Spielberg may have been personally drawn to the subject, but the story he actually told with his 1993 black & white […]

“Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 3” (2023): Rocket’s Playlist

★★ Usually a movie that gets two stars from me gets it because despite my disappointment with it, I’m unable to care enough to downgrade its score further. But there is another kind of 2-star picture – the kind that wildly swings between very strong high points and other moments that are so pathetic that […]

Episode VII: What V Would’ve Done

Happy Lisp Day (get it? That’s a May 4th joke.).  Star Wars has not been good in nearly two decades, and its last moment of glory came in 2005 with the one-two punch of Episode III: Revenge of the Sith and Lucasfilm’s Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords. History repeats itself in […]

“John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum” (2019): Adjudication and Consequences (Review)

AUTHOR’S NOTE: This article was originally published on the Cinematic Katzenjammer in March, 2019. ★★★★ “Consequences,” a character says to another. “Consequences,” the second character replies. John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum feels like one gigantic set of consequences for the series, in spite of the fact that very little of it is truly explained. […]

“John Wick: Chapter 4” (2023): Such is Life (Review)

★★★ There are multiple moments where John Wick: Chapter 4 looks to be setting itself up to underwhelm, disappoint, or settle for less.  Then it defies itself. The series has grown to the point that it makes order out of consequences, and Chapter 4 traverses four separate continents and the greatest number of intercontinental miles […]

Remembering Lincoln

Yesterday was Abraham Lincoln’s birthday. In these dark times we find ourselves in, a day like that prompts a useful reminder that Lincoln should not just be celebrated for his idealistic qualities, his speeches, or his being the leader of the North. He should be celebrated, respected, and even admired for his darker deeds. No […]

Blue Skyler

AUTHOR’S NOTE: This article was originally published on the Cinematic Katzenjammer in April, 2017. It is easy to hate Skyler White.  And for most of Breaking Bad it was easy to love Walter White.  But if the show has a flaw, even when audiences decide they no longer liked or would root for Walter, very […]

Why “Seinfeld” Was the Peak of Television

On television, you can do anything; except nothing. Despite there being entirely too much of it, I like television today more than I liked it when I was a kid.  It is fashionable to label the modern era “the golden age of television.”  In reality, that “golden age” ended with a pathetic whimper following the […]

The Twenty-Two Best Films of the 21st Century

The “Movies of the Century – Year by Year” can be found here. And now the second list to end the year 2022; Merry Christmas to all! This is the list of the century’s best and most significant films, separate from my own list of subjective preferences, but perhaps not entirely so.  This list will […]