Cinema Basement

Birds of Prey A review by Azzam Abdur-Rahman Hollywood doesn’t understand women. I think for some odd reason they see women not as people but as concepts. You can just be the (insert stereotype here) but be anymore complex than that the door is there and you are not welcome in this party. That change is supposed to becoming but it really hasn’t. As I have vexed at length Romantic Comedies are still rare and female movie stars are going the way of the dinosaur. So when Birds of Prey was announced I expected trash. I expected a film that made Margot Robbie more of a prop while she acted circles around the men in her cast. I was wrong. Birds of Prey is the best film about the predatory nature of men, the struggle for “strange” women to survive in the modern world, and about understanding each other. Not one male character in this film is a good person. No one female character is a saint either. Everyone is awful but the Birds and their issues are real. Black Canary is a wage slave an...

A review by Brooks Rich We close out Tim Burton month with a film I imagine a lot of people grew up watching. For a long time this was my favorite film by Burton … one of those “comfort” movies for me. After a completely shit day, I put this or Airplane or Ghostbusters on. Just a movie I adore with every fiber of my being that makes me laugh no matter how many times I see it – kinda takes away whatever was ailing me. I am going to break the mold a little in how I cover this film for Burton month. I will discuss aspects of Beetlejuice, but I also want to discuss Burton's career as a whole, and why I see him now as a fallen icon. Exploring his work one right after another, especially his work in the eighties and nineties reminded me of why his fall from grace has been so hard.  If you've never seen Beetlejuice, for the love of God, go rent it immediately! It's Burton's funniest movie and in a way his most imaginative. If you asked me to imagine Tim Burton's visu...

A retrospective by Azzam Abdur-Rahman As I sit in my home in this time of moral ignorance and global pandemic its hard to enjoy much. In the golden age of the television I feel like the lost of the movie theatre has become the lost of something beautifully cultural about the coming of summer in America. It is our last sanctum from the pain of reality where we can get lost in a tall tale. You may be reading this and think “What on god’s green earth does this have to do with Big Fish?” Big Fish is a campfire story played out in its final evolution, on a silver screen. Big Fish is the best film in Tim Burton’s filmography because it understands something about us. It understands we love a big story with small man at the center trying to do his best. Big Fish cut to the core of me as a young man. I found this film in the preteen shadow of my body changing and my mind changing as well. In this time, I still had my grandfather. A sweet man who looked like Rodney Dangerfield when he smi...

A review by Brooks Rich Consider this a bonus Forgotten Film Friday on a Monday as I think Big Eyes came and went without making much of an impact. That's a shame because this is Tim Burton's best film since the '90s. He sort of steps away from his trademark look and style as he tells the story of Margaret Keane, an artist popular for paintings of children with big eyes. In the late ‘50s, she sued her husband Walter after he started to take credit for her work in order to sell the pieces she was producing as he felt a man's work would sell better than a women's. The film chronicles their meeting, his takeover of her work, and the eventual trial after she sued him.  Margaret and Walter are played by Amy Adams and Christoph Waltz respectively – that alone should make you want to see this movie. These are two of the best working in Hollywood right now. Waltz brings a charm to Walter, who is sleazy, but at times is likable –  thanks to Waltz's great performance....

A review by Brooks Rich Anyone remember a little show called The West Wing? Aaron Sorkin's political masterpiece about the inner workings of the White House? Well in 1995 Sorkin was working out his ideas for the West Wing in a romantic comedy called The American President. Michael Douglas is President Andrew Shepherd, a widower president who is seen as too passive by the press and his political rivals. A political strategist named Sydney Allen Wade, played by Annette Bening, is hired by an environmental strategy firm to persuade the president to support legislation reducing carbon monoxide emissions. Shepherd is smitten by Wade and they begin an affair that causes shake ups on both sides of the political spectrum. Like in any Sorkin screenplay the dialogue is top notch. Sorkin is a dialogue master and all those walking and talking scenes from The West Wing got their start in this screenplay. The script is full of that quick back and forth Sorkin is so good at. It is kind of f...

A review by Brooks Rich This is it. The film I consider to be Tim Burton's masterpiece. I get the criticism Burton receives now — he’s all style and his visual eye gets in the way of story. I am not arguing against that. But I will always defend him to a degree because of two films. We're talking about one of those films today.  Burton brings his style and love for B-movies together to make a fitting tribute to the man considered to be the worst director of all time. The film chronicles the period in Wood's life between the making of his movie  Glen or Glenda  to the night of the premiere of his most notorious film,  Plan 9 from Outer Space .  Wood's haphazard filmmaking is highlighted as well as his struggles with being a crossdresser back then. Burton smartly doesn't downplay the crossdressing or regard it with judgmental eyes. He just shows us how it defined Wood as a person.  And he spends the time to really explore the friendship bet...

A Review by Forrest Humphrey  The obvious follow up to my review of Tim Burton's “Batman” is to review the follow up, “Batman Returns!” Unfortunately, while I contend Burton's first outing of the Caped Crusader mostly holds up, the same cannot be said of his second. Before I dive into why this film doesn't hold up nearly as well, if at all, I do want to cover the aspects of the film I do find commendable. Just like in the first, Burton gives Gotham extremely stylized Gothic architecture, and I adore it here just like the previous film. Danny Elfman's score might be even better here than in the first film, combining the dark tones of the previous film with Christmas music into a creepy harmony. Much like Jack Nicholson in the previous film, Michelle Pfiefer, Christopher Walken and Danny Devito put on solid to fantastic performances here.  So the film looks great, sounds great and has more great actors in it, why can't I praise this film like the previous ...

A review by Brooks Rich I love this film. I really do. Burton's visual eye and trademark look work so well in this film. But, this is the last fun Burton in my opinion. I wish he would go back to films like this. It’s like now he's trying too hard. Sweeney Todd is a great example of Burton trying and failing to capture what he had with Sleepy Hollow.  New York police constable Ichabod Crane, played by Johnny Depp, who, shock of all shocks, is starring in a Tim Burton movie, is sent to the tiny town of Sleepy Hollow to investigate a series of beheadings. There he finds a terrified population who attribute the killings to a headless horseman said to haunt the nearby woods.  Burton does what any director with a trademark visual look does here with Sleepy Hollow. He turns into the skid. He finds the perfect project that suits him and his vision. Sometimes Burton picks projects and his trademark style does not line up. It'd be like if Wes Anderson decided to try and make a t...

A ranking by Brooks Rich In order to expand the blog a little, we'll sometimes cover other media besides films. Film will still be our bread and butter but the blog will also cover tv, music, comics, books, and other forms of media. To start it off I will be ranking all 21 main comics in a beloved series of books form my childhood, The Adventures of Tintin. Created by Belgian cartoonist Herge, Tintin, who has literature's greatest cowlick, is a reporter who travels the world with his faithful dog Snowy, the best fictional dog of all time, chasing bad guys and sticking his nose in other's affairs. Tintin is often joined on his quests by Captain Haddock, his most trust human sidekick. I credit Tintin and the Hardy Boys for my current love of mystery novels. Ranking the 21 main Tintin comics is far more doable than ranking the original Hardy Boys runs. As a quick note I will not be counting the unfinished Tintin and Alph Art or Tintin in the Land of the Soviets or Tint...

A Review by Forrest Humphrey  For our look at filmmaker Tim Burton I decided to revisit Batman, the 1989 classic that followed Christopher Reeves Superman films from the previous decade in proving comic adaptations could make huge money. It (and its sequel “Batman Returns) also happens to be my favorite Batman films to this day despite their flaws (especially the sequel). But why is that? Why do I still stick by this film even though “The Dark Knight” stands tall above it in terms of being one of the most universally praised comic films ever by both fans and critics? Lets dig into it.  I'm going to start off simple: The cast. Or at least its two headlining stars, Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson, two of Hollywood's biggest juggernauts. Keaton is still getting high profile roles to this day, and there's no questioning the man is a talented performer. His Bruce Wayne is more affable and personable than later renditions of the character but certain scenes still hint ...

A review by Brooks Rich I think Tim Burton's masterpiece is the film Ed Wood. It is a loving tribute to the man considered to be the worst director in history and Burton tells his story through a sympathetic lens. Then in 1996 Burton decides to try and make a spoof of '50s black and white UFO invasion films, Burton probably thinking of Ed Wood's infamous Plan 9 from Outer Space. Mars Attacks was a somewhat big hit but nowhere near the big science fiction hit of 1996. That was a little film called Independence Day, which is leagues better than Mars Attacks. I loved Mars Attacks when I was a kid but now after rewatching it I realized that it just doesn't work. The film is somewhere between spoof and just a full on comedy. It never really knows what it wants to be. Are you a spoof of other films? Are you just a comedy film? Why is this scene being treated like a serious alien film? For the sake of this article I'll call it a spoof though because I guess it leans ...

For the month of March we will be taking a look at the work of director Tim Burton. He is a visionary director who also has a tendency to get in his own way. Sometimes his look works well for a movie and sometimes it's distracting as hell and takes away from the overall film. We will be looking at films considered to be Burton's best and the films that many site when they refer to him as a hack. Our personal opinions of Burton differ so for this month there may be a film covered twice, once by someone who likes it and again by someone else who doesn't. Burton is a very hit and miss director and so I expect a month with a more critical eye given to the featured director.