Dedicated to movie nerdom, nostalgia, and escape. In the late 90s, I worked at Blockbuster Video where they let me take home two free movies a day. I caught up on the classics and reviewed theatrical releases for Denver 'burbs newspapers and magazines. Today, while raising two young, beautiful daughters with my amazing wife, I look forward to anything rated R and not Bluey. Comments and dialogue encouraged!
No director can get inside your head like Darren Aronofsky. He pushes his actors and actresses to physical and psychological extremes and challenges his viewers to accept both the real and the imaginary as truths. In Black Swan, Natalie Portman threw all self-preservation to the wind, trained for 8 hours a day, 6 days a... Continue Reading →
Would you tell Picasso to sell his guitars?! Love him or hate him, Jack Black exudes a ferocious passion for rock music that is so infectious, it’ll make your grandma pick up a guitar and shred. Put him up in front of a classroom of fifth graders, and it’s just too easy—like kids in a... Continue Reading →
I have seen Groundhog Day (1993) over a dozen of times and each viewing has never felt like Groundhog Day. Despite its premise about a day that repeats itself thousands of times from Sonny and Cher’s “I Got You Babe” at 6:00am to the next flip clock rotation 24 hours later, Groundhog Day remains innovative... Continue Reading →
For me, all of David Lynch’s oddities offer an evocative perspective on the American dream turned nightmare, the ‘burbs behind locked doors, and the mystery of rabbits. None of it makes sense narratively or chronologically, and Lynch is notorious for not providing explanations. Yet, if you dig his noirish style and peeping tom pace, the... Continue Reading →
In a capsule review, this is an immaculate novel-to-screen adaptation, breathing life through portraits made out of shots, spontaneity made out of performances, and a score made out of melancholy. Its only flaw is found in an overabundance of voiceovers—a redundancy, given the visual spell of talented Director Barry Jenkins of Moonlight (2016). However, I... Continue Reading →
Something must be said about the over-the-top goofy dad. That’s my dad. And, he kind of looked like Chevy Chase back in the 80s. Chevy Chase as Clark Griswold possesses an unrestrained enthusiasm for his family and their road trip to Wally World—a fictional adventure park that supposedly brings solutions to parental challenges and reward... Continue Reading →
Not since the cinéma vérité of Chop Shop (2007) has a small, independent film been so raw and compassionate in celebrating its abandoned community. Set in the outskirt motel/apartment slums of Disney World, these are the people we might pass by on our way from the airport to the Magic Kingdom. They have a voice... Continue Reading →
My favorite coming-of-age movie is a tossup between E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (E.T.) and Cinema Paradiso, and I’m going to pick Cinema Paradiso because Spielberg represents other upcoming selections on my Reely Bernie Faves movies list. Plus, you have to include the Italian filmmakers, right? As an avid reader of Roger Ebert (RIP), I caught up... Continue Reading →
For me, So I Married an Axe Murderer is everything wonderfully 1990s. It is the self-conscious Mike Myers schtick from Saturday Night Live, it is a younger (and much safer) San Francisco celebrated, and it is the best darn soundtrack for lifting your spirits. Most noteworthy: this is the rom-com that came out before the... Continue Reading →
I suggest to you that it is because God loves us that He makes us the gift of suffering. Pain is God’s megaphone to rouse a deaf world. You see, we are like blocks of stone out of which the sculptor carves the forms of men. The blows of His chisel which hurt us so... Continue Reading →
“Do you have anything besides Mexican food?” I start my Top 50 Reely Bernie Faves list with ¡Three Amigos! to make the point that some of our favorite movies are the least insightful, and within their “no-brainer” status, we find a place of comfort and nostalgia. For me, ¡Three Amigos! was babysitter backup for dozens... Continue Reading →
I’ll never forget flipping through Entertainment Weekly’s 100 Greatest Movies of All Time magazine at the Gonzaga University Bing Crosby Student Center. It was October 1999, and the trend of releasing as many “Top,” “Best,” and “Greatest” lists was exploding before the world itself was predicted to explode. Y2K anticipation was all about the fear... Continue Reading →
If you're in need for some non-traditional Christmas movies during the holidays, below are a few of my favorites. Christmas is kinda included in these "kinda Christmas" movies: Home for the Holidays (1995) PG-13 It's Thanksgiving, and for Claudia (Holly Hunter), that means spending the weekend with her nosy mom, erratic brother (a very pre-Iron... Continue Reading →
This was my favorite stretch of movies since the dire reality of March of 2020. Laughing at the face of COVID with new, audacious filmmaking playbooks and neo-classical perspectives, 2022 cracked the medium wide open. This was also a tougher year for me to choose just ten. I realize many will have Everything Everywhere All... Continue Reading →
Watching a Baz Luhrmann movie is like sitting in front of a gold confetti-blasting canon. It’s style over substance, obnoxious over subtle — a nightmare for minimalist cinephiles like me. For anyone with a smidgen of an attention span, conveying a groundbreaking musician’s artistry on film just takes hitting a record button. Ever see last... Continue Reading →
I remember seeing the trailer for this movie last year and thinking, “This looks like an ode to late-twenties selfishness. Puke.” But, then I thought: Isn’t that exactly the time when someone should be selfish, especially when it comes to relationships? Isn’t that exactly the time we are supposed to date in person (or online),... Continue Reading →
Filmmaker Paul Schrader is renowned for taking us to the dingiest of places and introducing us to the gloomiest of people, and these are good reasons to watch the movies in the first place. Hopefully, we don’t want to be the imploding taxi driver, raging middleweight boxer, or guilt-ridden Calvinist priest, but it is surely... Continue Reading →
For me, it was the smell. An amalgamation of Milk Duds, buttery popcorn, and hard-shell plastic would rush through my nose the moment I opened the glass door. It was the smell of nostalgia long before I was old enough to be nostalgic. It reminded me that movies were comfort, and comfort was home. In... Continue Reading →
Reely Bernie 