Author Archives
Josh Lasser is a freelance entertainment reporter/critic. His work has appeared in print, online, and perhaps one day in book form.
-
Movie Review: “Slay the Dragon”
If the ascendancy of Donald Trump to the Presidency didn’t already make it clear, elections matter; they have very real consequences for individuals within a country. As the new documentary “Slay the Dragon,” out this Friday, makes even more obvious… Read More ›
-
“The Rise of Skywalker” and the ‘Fans’ on the Dark Side
There are great moments in “Star Wars: Episode IX – The Rise of Skywalker.” No, the movie as a whole isn’t great, but there are great moments in it. Is that what causes so much anger amongst fans? Can’t be,… Read More ›
-
Movie Review: “Resistance” (2020)
The world feels different at the moment, so this review will, somewhat necessarily, be different. Movies speak to the time in which they are made and the period which they are made about, but they also speak to the time… Read More ›
-
Warring Road Trips: “The Wizard” and “1917”
What does it mean to struggle with a personal crisis? What does it mean to be going through hell? How can movies harness those ideas? In “1917” we see two soldiers have to go behind enemy lines to stop British… Read More ›
-
Parsing a new World with “Stela”
Generally speaking, I don’t play video games that are strictly platformers. I will take on a Metroidvania-style title, yes, but more often than not I go for vast, open world, RPGs, the kind of game that I can sink 100—or… Read More ›
-
Looking at Movie Cliches with the Man who Wrote the Book
Out on March 31st is a new book called “Spoiler Alert!: The Badass Book of Movie Plots: Why we all Love Hollywood Cliches,” and so this week on the podcast we have one of the authors, Chris Vander Kaay, here… Read More ›
-
“The Ten Commandments” Times Two
We have talked more than once about how interesting it would be to see a director get a second chance to make that first impression. Well, that’s not quite what happened when Cecil B. DeMille got to make “The Ten… Read More ›
-
Movie Review: “Spenser Confidential”
The worst thing about the new Netflix original, “Spenser Confidential,” is that it is a single movie and not a regular series. Sure, Robert B. Parker’s Spenser character already had a television series, “Spenser: For Hire,” but this new team-up… Read More ›
-
“Dark Waters” and the End Times
Listen, if you don’t know this already, the vast majority of companies don’t care about you. There is, no joke, a track record of companies being happy to have you become seriously ill/die if there’s a way for it to… Read More ›
-
Movie Review: “The Invisible Man” (2020)
Although, as you would suspect, the invisible man in this year’s “The Invisible Man” is largely silent (it’s not scary if he goes around merrily singing show tunes), the movie itself is anything but. Leigh Whannell’s “Gaslight” take on the… Read More ›
-
Movie Review: “Guns Akimbo”
editor’s note: the below review was written prior to Jason Lei Howden’s horrible actions over the past week. The substance of the review has not been altered following them. The publishing of the review is taking place because while the… Read More ›
-
“Frozen II” Leaves us Cold
I love the first “Frozen” movie that Disney put out. I thin it’s different in all the right ways while still hewing to some aspects of the Disney Animation traditions. Why then should “Frozen II,” which is oh-so-very similar to… Read More ›
-
Movie Review: “Wendy”
There is a crucial moment in “Wendy,” Benh Zeitlin’s riff on the Peter Pan story, where Wendy (Devin France) and Peter (Yashua Mack) must save the Lost Boys from evil pirates. It is a crucial act and must be done… Read More ›
-
Movie Review: “Standing Up, Falling Down”
Thank goodness for smaller movies that tell smaller stories. These are the movies that deal with human-sized problems in human-sized fashion. We are all so regularly caught up in big events, big cinema, that these smaller films too often escape… Read More ›
-
Movie Review: “Emma.” (2020)
The new movie “Emma.,” based on Jane Austen’s novel, is indeed titled “Emma.” with the period. The title, as with so many other things in the movie, is perfect. The use of the punctuation speaks to the fastidiousness of the… Read More ›
-
Movie Review: “Downhill” (2020)
Inspired by the Swedish film, “Force Majeure,” Nat Faxon and Jim Rash’s “Downhill” is a comedy. Nominally speaking it’s a comedy anyway. In many cases I employ the “in a tragedy everyone dies and not everyone dies in this movie… Read More ›
-
Movie Review: “Sonic the Hedgehog”
Based on the video game franchise, the new “Sonic the Hedgehog” film manages a truly amazing critical feat – as a whole it hits an absolutely neutral state. That is, the movie has good parts (Ben Schwartz as the voice… Read More ›
-
Movie Review: “Portrait of a Lady on Fire”
Some films are beautiful. There is no more clear, more simple, more honest way to describe them than beautiful. Writer-director Céline Sciamma’s “Portrait of a Lady on Fire” is one such film. This tale of love between a painter, Marianne… Read More ›
-
Movies that Mess with our Perception
As is tradition for our first podcast after the Oscars, we give the awards show a brief mention this week to complain/explain why we’re not really talking about it and quickly move on to something else. This week, in fact,… Read More ›
-
Movie Review: “Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of one Harley Quinn)”
For a, relatively speaking, light and airy movie, “Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of one Harley Quinn)” sports an exceptionally unwieldy title. It is a title that feels designed to do a lot of heavy lifting for the… Read More ›
The TV and Film Guy's Reviews 