Mike's Movie Tips

3.5/4 Starring (voices): Robbie Daymond, Lexi Cowden, Kristen Sullivan, Graham Halstead, Kira Buckland Not Rated (probably PG-13 for Strong Thematic Material involving Bullying and Emotional Abuse, and for Brief Language) The emotional impact of "A Silent Voice" is at times so strong that it elicits a physical response.  We don't just understand what the characters are going through.  We feel it ourselves.  Few movies achieve that level of success.  Most are too coy or too overboard.  Others simply lack the courage.  That's not the case for Naoko Yamada, whose frank depiction of bullying and the scars it leaves is uncompromising.  There isn't a lot of physical violence in this movie (a couple of the characters get slapped, for example).  But on an emotional level, it hits you in the gut.  This is not a movie that Disney would ever touch. Shoya (Daymond) is preparing to die.  He has spent the last few months settling his affairs a...

 3/4 Starring (voices): Brandon Engman, Ashley Boettcher, Lee Pace, Alison Brie, Riz Ahmed Rated PG-13 for Suggestive Material, Some Violence and Language "Weathering with You" ultimately works because it takes its subject matter and its characters seriously.  It expects that the audience will accept that a girl can change the weather by praying.  If you're willing to accept that, the film is a success. Hodaka (Engman) has run away from home.  He has gone to Tokyo, which is experiencing strange weather phenomena.  It is always raining, or about to rain, and there are puddles of water that float in the sky only to drench unlucky pedestrians passing under them.  At first, it is slow going and without a place to stay and no legal way to obtain a job, Hodaka is resigned to sleeping in the streets.  Salvation comes when he reunites with Keisuke Suga (Pace), a carefree layabout he met on the ferry, offers him a job at his bizarre underground magazine, and Hi...

There were a lot of great movies this year.  I didn't have to change any ratings to get ten qualifiers (3.5 or 4) like I have in the past.  Probably because I was scrambling this past month to see every contender I could, although there were a few that I missed, like "The Farewell" (I own it, but I haven't seen it yet).  Still, there were some great movies that spanned a wide variety of genres.  It gives me hope that there are people who don't go for the easy buck and just make yet another copy of an MCU movie or slap an old name on a generic script for a few extra bucks.  There are lots of talented individuals who are making rich and involving cinema.  Movies that remind me why I fell in love with the movies in the first place. Some of these movies I was expecting would turn up on this list.  Others surprised me at how much I enjoyed them.  It just goes to show that you never know what to expect as a film critic. 10.  Dark Waters . ...

 3.5/4 Starring: Josh Wiggins, Darren Mann, Taylor Hickson, Maria Bello, Kyle MacLachlan, Olivia Scriven, Niamh Wilson, Peter Outerbridge, Hailey Kittle, Kiana Madeira Rated R for Sexual Content, Language and Some Drug/Alcohol Use - All Involving Teens Finally, here is an LGBT movie without all of the trappings of "queer cinema."  There are no drag queens. No pride parades.  No flamboyance or kitsch.  Instead, it's about real people having real problems.  Coming to terms with your sexuality is never easy, and "Giant Little Things" never pretends that it is.  In fact, it illustrates the confusion, uncertainty and pain that come with it. Franky (Wiggins) is an average teenager.  He's smart, handsome, has a girlfriend named Cil (Kittle) who wants to take things to the next level with him (although he doesn't seem to be too interested in her), and has a spot on the swim team with his lifelong best friend, Ballas (Mann).  Ballas is a stud through and t...

3.5/4 Starring: Jillian Bell, Micah Stock, Michaela Watkins, Utkarsh Ambudkar, Lil Rel Howery Rated R for Language Throughout, Sexuality and Some Drug Material I didn't like this movie at the start.  The characters were unpleasant, especially the lead, and it was depressing.  Then a funny thing happened.  I started to pay attention.  I grew interested in the characters.  I started to care.  By the end of the movie I was surprised at how involved I got in Brittany's attempt to turn her life around. Plump party girl Brittany (Bell) is stuck in nowhereland in New York City.  She had an internship in advertising that fizzled out, and now spends her days working a dead end job and partying with her roommate Gretchen.  While visiting a doctor to con an Adderrall prescription from him, he tells her that she is morbidly obese and risking her health.  Initially she scoffs at him and refuses to do anything about it.  But the news nags at h...

 3/4 Starring: Daniel Karimyar, Fardin Mijdzadeh Rated PG-13 for Thematic Content, Disturbing Images and Strong Language I've often found that seemingly ordinary people have the best stories.  They're not bound by rules of the so-called "heroic journey," not hammered into quadrant marketing or weighed down by canon, fan service, or whatever.  Seen through the lives of the ordinary person, we get a first-hand look at their experiences.  That is what was so fascinating about the "World War Z" book; it never saw the bigger picture and instead took the point of view of the grunt, the soccer mom and people like that.  Of course, the movie version fell victim to all the usual problems that always befall blockbusters not helmed by Christopher Nolan, Steven Spielberg, James Cameron and the few filmmakers who can work with big budgets and not be beholden to the studio heads. In any event, "Flee" is a story just like that.  Amin isn't an extraordinary in...

2/4 Starring: Jamie Lee Curtis, Donald Pleasence, Lance Guest, Dick Warlock, Gloria Gifford Rated R (probably for Strong Violence/Gore, Some Language, Sexuality/Nudity and Brief Drug Use) The success of " Halloween " took everyone by surprise.  Initially written off as a generic horror flick, a short article in "The Village Voice" saved it from a future covered in dust and lint.  Soon, critics began to see that there was more to this movie than meets the eye.  Audiences did too, and the film ended up becoming the most successful independent film of all time for a long while. So it was inevitable that a sequel would be made.  Directed by Rick Rosenthal, who was hand-picked by John Carpenter himself, "Halloween II" entered into theaters four years after the original.  Unfortunately, slasher movies had evolved (or should that be "de-volved"?) into cheap, schlocky gorefests at that time.  Rosenthal wanted to keep it bloodless like the origina...

3.5/4 Starring: Gene Kelly, Donald O'Connor, Debbie Reynolds, Jean Hagen, Millard Mitchell Rated G "Singin' in the Rain" is magical, and while it's a little overlong, it's also a lot of fun.  The songs are cheery, the romance sizzles, and it's often very funny.  But because it stars Gene Kelly, the dancing is standout. Silent film stars Don Lockwood (Kelly) and Lina Lemont (Hagen) are America's sweethearts; they're the equivalent of Bennifer.  Everyone loves them and wants to believe that they're together off screen.  Of course that's not the truth.  Don feels nothing for her, but Lina thinks they're in love because that's what the tabloids say.  But with the arrival of the talkies, their stardom is threatened because Lina's voice is like fingernails on a blackboard.  Their luck changes when a girl who helped Don escape from rabid fans (before she called him on his large ego), Kathy Selden (Reynolds), has a beautiful voi...

3.5/4 Starring: Linda Fiorentino, Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, Alan Rickman, Chris Rock, Salma Hayek, Jason Lee, Jason Mewes, Kevin Smith, George Carlin Rated R for Strong Language including Sex-Related Dialogue, Violence, Crude Humor, and Some Drug Content "Dogma" is a comedy about ideas.  That's an extremely rare thing to find.  It would be too easy for Kevin Smith to spend a surprisingly quick 2+ hours taking cheap potshots at religion,  but fortunately he doesn't take the easy way out.  Rather, he finds humor in the philosophy of religion and his characters' viewpoints. Bartleby (Affleck) and Loki (Damon) are two fallen angels who have found a loophole to get them back into heaven.  Of course, this presents a problem for everyone because it would render God fallible, thus destroying our entire reality.  That's when Bethany (Fiorentino) gets a visit from Metatron, The Voice of God (Rickman), who tells her to head to New Jersey to stop them.  She...

3/4 Not Rated (contains Language and Graphic Discussions of Sexual Abuse involving Children). Amy Berg's incendiary documentary, "Deliver Us From Evil," will leave anyone who views it sick to their stomach and boiling with rage.  Those are compliments. Everyone has taken care to remind people that the sleaziness of the priests in this documentary is not typical behavior among the men of the cloth.  Most are good people who wouldn't hurt a fly, much less rape a child.  People like Roger Mahoney, who let their ambition and ego overrule the need to protect children, are the exceptions. Berg focuses on Oliver O'Grady, who openly admits to molesting so many children that he has lost count.  At first glance, he seems almost grandfatherly with his boyish face and kind voice.  But he is a far more terrifying individual than most horror movies can come up with.  He is a pedophile whose acknowledgement of the pain he caused is debatable.  Also featuring ...