SUPERSTAR falters, as Legend lacks. Poor John Legend! He’s a great soulful rhythm and blues vocalist, a great composer, a great performer; he’s won Oscars, Grammys, Golden Globes and Tonys; he’s a friend to the last great American president, Barack Obama, and he was instrumental in bringing a whole generation to that inspiring 2008 election. He’s a producer, actor and … Read More
THE YOUNG MESSIAH
The Cramming Chronicle. He’s not the Messiah. He’s a very naughty boy! — MONTY PYTHON’S THE LIFE OF BRIAN. And yea, 6,000 years ago, God did create the Earth. It took him two days, for he was a lazy god. And lo, Adam and Eve did eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge in the Garden of Eden, … Read More
SON OF GOD
Another reboot for the best-looking zombie in history. Someone, somewhere in the world, is seeing their first Jesus movie. Some 8-year-old, indoctrinated in Christian idiocy, is seeing for the first time those fantasy stories brought to life in this 2014 reboot of Christianity’s original superhero. Therefore, though there will be a multitude of followers/believers inspired by this film to Love … Read More
SPOTLIGHT
Pederast Priests and The Coverup That Rocked a Religion. What other business could you be in where your company gets caught running a child sex ring since forever, and you still keep your customers? — Bill Maher, REEL TIME, March 2013. If only the movie SPOTLIGHT was called BUSTING RAPIST PRIESTS, maybe it would be better served by its title. … Read More
THE PROPHECY: FORSAKEN
Hells to the No. Again with the boasting: “I could whisper a suggestion and have you step in front of a subway train, I could force a neighbor to hurl you down a flight of stairs. I can put a baby in your belly that would rip its way out of your womb in three days–” Okay, I wanna see … Read More
THE PROPHECY: UPRISING
My gorge is up rising. There’s this “anti-bible,” see? And the Big Man Himself is narrating it even at this moment, burning the ancient Aramaic into the pages. He’s putting the finishing touches on The Book of Revelations because it went to the printer too early the first time, apparently. And – like all three previous PROPHECY movies – it’s … Read More
THE PROPHECY 3
Turning Cities to Salt, and Movies to Shit. Christopher Walken, former angel of death, returns in THE PROPHECY 3: THE ASCENT and does nothing, except walk around with a spectacular mullet, wearing his pants a little too high. Oh, and he’s the Angel Gabriel, mystically powerful villain of two previous films. He’s the guy who could “turn cities to salt” … Read More
THE PROPHECY II
The Angelic Boast. Angel Gabriel (Christopher Walken) is thrown out of hell by Lucifer, and proceeds to cause hell on Earth by starring in THE PROPHECY II. Dying at the end of the previous film (THE PROPHECY) meant nothing to Gabriel, as dying at the end of this movie will mean nothing as well. Why then, expend all this effort … Read More
THE PROPHECY
Angels In The Outhouse. Angel Gabriel comes to Earth to extract a soul and destroy heaven. Like the catholic religion, THE PROPHECY is confused as hell. A spine-shivering opening sequence: camera pans down on a lone figure standing over a charred skeleton – of what appears to be a human with wings, bird-like appendages scorched into the ochre stone ground. … Read More
MACHINE GUN PREACHER
Rebel With A Cause. Chronicling the true story of an American religious convert in Sudan, MACHINE GUN PREACHER stars Gerard Butler as Sam Childers, a Pennsylvania ex-con who found his calling rescuing kidnapped children from militant terrorist mobs in Africa. It’s an incredible tale, commendable, inspiring, honorable, humane and laudable… … and by “laudable” I mean “Lord-able”… And that’s where … Read More
RAPTURE-PALOOZA
Apoca-Lips and a great rack. It’s The Apocalypse, and everything is pretty much the same… except the Anti-Christ is Walking The Earth and trying to get off with your girlfriend. RAPTURE-PALOOZA is atheistic, irreverent and very funny, with just the right amount of C-cup. Just the way I like it. For those irreligious and sensible enough not to know what … Read More
CHARIOTS OF THE GODS
Of The Clods… Long before Giorgio’s ANCIENT ALIENS, just before Leonard Nimoy’s IN SEARCH OF…, there was Erich von Daniken’s jam-packed movie from the compelling 1968 book of the same name, CHARIOTS OF THE GODS. The book Chariots of the Gods? makes the compelling argument that ancient cultures in Earth’s past were visited by astronauts, who were mistaken as gods … Read More
THE GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD
The Most Tedious Story Ever Told. Oh God! THE GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD is so far up its own arse that Satan called the filmmakers and thanked them for turning so many people off Christianity. While choirs of angels provide the soundtrack, God speaks through Jesus Christ, his only begotten son whom he sent to Earth to take away the … Read More
NOAH
Dark Ark. Obsession! It’s not just a perfume. It’s all over the King James Bible. And for the first time, captured in a major motion picture that doesn’t paint a biblical figure like a cardboard cutout whimsically pimping himself out to God’s unholy will. On the strength of a “vision,” a guy builds a boat 300 cubits long (whatever that … Read More
METROPOLIS
Fritz Lang and Karl Marx had a nightmare-child… METROPOLIS, Fritz Lang’s stunning 1927 masterpiece on class warfare, is an ancient German expressionist film set in the future – but its message is as current as bank bailouts destroying the world economy. As soon as mankind aggregated into social groups, class warfare arose, and continues – from hunter-gatherers to Utopian futures … Read More
LIFE OF PI
The Gripe with Pi. Get rid of all the religiosity and Ang Lee‘s LIFE OF PI would be an intriguing adventure and unique thought experiment. But with the muck of God pervading every second line of dialogue, it makes me want to crucify somebody. Indian teen Pi Patel (Suraj Sharma) is onboard a ship, journeying with his family from India … Read More
THE LAST EXORCISM PART II
Not really “Last” and not really “Exorcism.” This movie’s predecessor, THE LAST EXORCISM (2010), had a great hook: an exorcist who knew he was only placating the superstitious with his staged exorcisms, but if it helped the redneck families who believed this guff to regain their lives, it was beneficial – until he ran up against a real demon. THE … Read More
THIS IS THE END
The Apocalypse is Upon Us… and it’s at James Franco’s house. Seth Rogen and Jay Baruchel drop in at James Franco’s housewarming party in Hollywood – just in time for The Apocalypse. THIS IS THE END is a laugh-a-minute, self-referential, absurdist, end-of-the-world comedy starring Rogen, Baruchel, Franco, Jonah Hill, Craig Robinson and Danny McBride – as themselves. Innumerable other dynamic, … Read More
NONE MORE PRO | The Muddying of “Pro-Life” in the Abortion Debate Debacle.
ince when is the opposite of Pro-Choice “Pro-Life”? Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t the opposite of Pro-Choice “ANTI”-Choice? Such is the underhanded misnomered word game the extremist villagers who call themselves the American Republican Party have played since the landmark decision Roe v. Wade made abortion legal in the United States in 1973. And everyone else has played … Read More
KNOWING
Not Knowing what’s coming next. Astrophysicist John Koestler (Nicolas Cage) discovers a page of handwritten numbers from a 50-year-old time-capsule opened at his son’s school, figuring out that they are dates when disasters occurred. Some of the dates have yet to arrive. Shades of numerology, CONTACT, Revelations, ANCIENT ALIENS, Chariots Of The Gods?, writers Ryne Douglas Pearson, Juliet Snowden and … Read More