Aimed squarely at an audience that’s barely too old for the likes of Bridesmaids and Girls Trip, but too young for the stylings of Book Club or this week’s Poms, director and star Amy Poehler’s surprisingly hilarious ensemble comedy Wine Country is a party flick for the firmly middle aged.
Jason Schwartzman
The darkly comedic biopic The Polka King is a well made example of a “straight to Netflix” film. This “stranger than fiction” look at a former oom-pah-pah baron and Grammy nominee who perpetrated massive amounts of fraud in the 1990s is lean, fast paced, almost completely devoid of filler, and likely works better at home than it would in the confines of a theatre. Netflix is the perfect place for a film like The Polka King, and that’s not in any way a knock against the talent and effort that went into making it.
We talk to graphic novelist, animator, writer, and filmmaker Dash Shaw about his latest effort, the animated melding of a teen movie and a disaster epic, My Entire High School Sinking Into the Sea, opening in select cities this weekend.
There’s an inescapable landing between unimpeded childhood and the grown-up world with all of its resident angst and constraint, and it’s often aptly coined as the summer when everything changes. That middle place is Moonrise Kingdom.
This week on DVD and Blu-ray: a review of Sandra Bullock‘s Oscar-winning performance in The Blind Side; Tobey Maguire and Jake Gyllenhaal star in the drama, Brothers; George Clooney plays a psychically gifted solider in the offbeat farce, Men Who Stare At Goats; plus a look at the much-praised animated film, Fantastic Mr. Fox.