The Shallows

I have to say it took considerable courage for me to watch this movie. I have a real phobia of sharks. This is called galeophobia, or selachophobia. I realize it is totally irrational, even though I can’t swim. I mean, the last time I was in water where sharks might be present was in about 1960, and I don’t ever intend to do that again, so the only way I can get in trouble is if a land ... Read more »

The Shape of Water

So I popped the Best Picture of 2017 DVD into the player and sat back, thinking, Okay, can you show me a woman fucking a fish and not make me laugh? The answer was, Yes. But sadly, the answer to the question of Can you make me believe in a woman fucking a fish was, No. I tried and I tried to really like this film, since it Read more »

A Shark Tale

Incredible colors and textures and flexibility in these bodies and faces. I was most taken with a pair of Rastafarian jellyfish. A lot of funny one-liners, many of them based on our knowledge of The Godfather. (“You’ll be sleepin’ wit’ da fishes. Da dead fishes.”) Staggering visual imagination … but not much else. The story is a dead fish. Some good music. ... Read more »

Sharknado

Even if one is not a fan of Bad Cinema, every once in a while a movie comes along that sounds so epically, cataclysmically, awesomely bad that you just can’t look away. This movie has gained a cult following, having been shown three times at the SYFY Channel (and I am very glad they changed the name so that it no longer sounds like SF) and getting a larger audience each time. A friend of ... Read more »

Shattered Glass

Excellent story based on fact, of one of the most egregious examples of the rash of lying reporters we’ve heard of in recent years. The guy seems positively pathological, because he was not untalented, but he yearned to be the golden boy so much that he went from merely embellishing his stories to making them up completely. It had me on the edge of my seat as Glass’s lies were peeled back ... Read more »

Shaun of the Dead

One of the best spoofs I’ve seen in a while. What if zombies invaded London … and nobody noticed? Shaun doesn’t notice, anyway, not for a long time. After all, what do zombies do? Shamble, stare vacantly, moan from time to time. Not all that different from a regular day. The main characteristic of zombies, other than their unfortunate habit of killing and eating live people, is that ... Read more »

The Shawshank Redemption

I don’t think anyone really knows why this movie pretty much tanked when it was released … and then worked its way up to the #1 spot on the IMDb Top 250 list. I mean, the very top, edging out The Godfather. Some say the title didn’t mean anything to anyone outside of Maine, so they didn’t go. Maybe they should have stuck with Stephen King’s original title: Read more »

She Wore a Yellow Ribbon

I’m far from a John Wayne fan, but in the right part, he’s hard to beat. This is part of the John Ford “Cavalry Trilogy,” the only one in color, and it’s a doozy. The Monument Valley has never looked so good in saturated Technicolor. They also used some camera tricks to make it come even more alive. Wayne is a retiring cavalry officer, and all he wants to do is prevent an Indian war with ... Read more »

Sherlock

Wow. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a really good series crash and burn quite as spectacularly as this one just did. I was awed and horrified as the three episodes went from weak, to pretty bad, to fucking awful. I’ll deal only with the last one, The Final Problem. And jeez, if they keep on like this I sure hope it’s the final problem. ... Read more »

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

Okay, okay, okay. I decided I’d make an effort to lighten up after my review of the first in this series. Not that I still don’t hate, hate, hate that movie. Just that I would try to go into this one deliberately not seeing the hero as Sherlock Holmes, and that guy by his side as not Doctor Watson. Hard, but not impossible, I told myself. Could it work?

I ... Read more »