Movie Reviews

  By Tom Pacak “Based On A True Story. We’re Not Kidding.” This tagline (no pun intended) reads across the movie poster for “Tag.” I couldn’t believe it either. A couple years back a Wall Street Journal article was published about a group of middle age men who would take one month out of the year to play a simple game of tag. Everybody playing was fair game. You can get tagged at the airport, movie theater, or even your backyard. It’s a great way for this unique group of guys to stay in touch.  Now, this weird story has actually been adapted to the screen. The film does wear itself thin on just being a one-joke comedy about a guy's fear of getting tagged. Sorry, this isn't the summer comedy we were hoping for.  “Tag” opens up with Hoagie Malloy (Ed Helms) applying for a job as a janitor at an insurance company. Despite having a Ph.D. in Animal Studies, Hoagie’s real intentions at getting this job is so he can tag the CEO of the company, Bob Callahan (Jon ...

By Tom Pacak Growing up as a kid, I was a huge dinosaur buff. I would read books about them and learn about their survivals. My favorite dinosaur was the Trooden, the smallest dinosaur with a unique sense of intelligence.  I favorite movie growing up was Steven Spielberg's "Jurassic Park." In fact, it was the first movie I remember watching that got me hooked on exploring the art of cinema. "Jurassic Park" is a landmark film in the Sci-Fi genre and the effects are better than most films out today. The toilet scene with the lawyer (Martin Ferrero) gets me every time!   Above is a picture of the Trooden.  So having a huge bias for dinosaurs and the Jurassic Park series, I knew I was going to enjoy “Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom.” I’m completely well aware that the sequels to Jurassic Park have lots of plot holes that are hard to ignore. Going into Fallen Kingdom, I knew exactly what I was getting into. Just a bunch of people getting c...

By Tom Pacak Fourteen years ago, I went to see Pixar’s “The Incredibles” with my family. Being eight years old at the time, I thought the movie was literally incredible. Even as an adult, I still find the movie to be amazing. I remember it being the movie to see, everybody my age was wearing Incredibles t-shirts and wearing Incredibles Halloween costumes. It’s truly one of the Pixar’s best movies put on screen. Finally, after fourteen years, Brad Bird and Pixar return to give long-awaited fans a 2018-updated sequel. I'm here to report that “The Incredibles 2” gives fans enough balls to the wall action, heart, and humor that made the original a classic. It was worth the wait! Bird picks up where the original left off, the Incredibles are last seen fighting The Underminer, a mole-like villain who wants to rob banks by drilling them underground. After failing to defeat the minor villain, the public and government require that superheroes stay illegal. Like in all Marv...

By Tom Pacak Ethan Hawke is one of the most interesting actors out there. He’ll either do great (anything he’s been in with Richard Linklater) or God-awful (Getaway, The Purge). In Paul Schrader’s “First Reformed,” Hawke brilliantly plays Rev. Ernst Toller, an alcoholic protestant minister who goes through a spiritual and psychological crisis. Think Taxi Driver’s Travis Bickle (Robert De Niro) but with a conscience. Director Paul Schrader grew up going to the Calvinist Christian Reformed Church. Early in his life, he lived through strict religious teaching, which prevented him from seeing movies. As a young movie critic, Schrader expressed his deep admiration for religious movies, not “faith-based movies,” which he would describe as propaganda. In “First Reformed,” Schrader set out to expose the flaws of religion and how money controls the churches.     Schrader opens up the film in pitch black then slowly zooming into the white First Reformed Church in Snow...

By Tom Pacak Before seeing “Hereditary,” I had no idea what the exact definition was. So before seeing the film, I decided to look it up. Hereditary is defined as, “ (of a title, office, or right) conferred by or based on inheritance” and as “(of a characteristic or disease) determined by genetic factors and therefore able to be passed on from parents to their offspring or descendants.” I think the second definition fits the title. “Hereditary” the new horror film directed by newcomer Ari Aster, is a film about how people inherit evil and how it's passed down to the living. Sometimes this supernatural force is a calling to bridge back failed relationships or get unanswered questions from the past. What we don’t know is sometimes the ghosts of the past have far more sinister plans than you can imagine. The film opens with a newspaper obituary; this sets up the film's powerful sense of foreboding. After this obituary, cinematographer Pawel Pogorzelski zooms in on sev...