Netflix

Review by David Baldwin

My exposure to Mötley Crüe has been limited at best. I played their songs in Rock Band and Guitar Hero. I was briefly obsessed with “Kickstart My Heart” after hearing it during the trailer for the all but completely forgotten Clive Owen romp Shoot ‘Em Up (do you remember that movie? I own in on DVD and remember literally nothing besides Owen’s character liked to chew carrots like Bugs Bunny and used one to stab a guy). A girl I was intrigued with had a grotesque image of a two-faced demon from Nikki Sixx’s book The Heroin Diaries tattooed on her hip. That’s pretty much where my knowledge begins and ends.

Oh, and I watched Tommy Lee and Pamela Anderson’s sex tape when I was a teenager, as you do.

So when it came time to watch The Dirt, I was at a bit of a loss. Do I wade in as blind as possible or do I look up some of the stories? Do I just trust that the filmmakers will be honest in their portrayals? And if they aren’t, will the movie and music be entertaining enough for me to completely look past it?

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Review by David Baldwin

I turn 32 this weekend, so my future mortality has been top of mind as of late. I am not sure if 22-year-old me would be excited or disappointed at who I have become. I have had highs, lows and plenty of what-have-yous over the past 10 years and am literally coming off the most exciting year of my life. Some of these moments were planned, some not so much. Some were those classic “Jesus Take the Wheel” moments you can never have too many of. So while my writing situation is less than ideal at this given moment (a grungy food court in downtown Toronto where a couple is breaking up feet away from me), I was very much in the right frame of mind to watch Paddleton, the latest Netflix film from the Duplass Brothers.

Paddleton revolves Michael (Co-Writer Mark Duplass) and Andy (Ray Romano), best friends who live in the same apartment complex. They are both single and hang out together often – mostly at Michael’s place, which is on the ground floor directly below Andy’s. Michael has terminal cancer and has been given only months to live. Neither are ready to lose the other, but Michael wants to be sure he makes the decision on how he leaves this world.

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Review by David Baldwin

When I pitched watching Velvet Buzzsaw to my wife, I mentioned that Dan Gilroy had written and directed two other films: Nightcrawler, which I love, cherish and still to this day remain devastated did not land Jake Gyllenhaal a Best Actor Oscar nomination; and Roman J. Israel, Esq., a total mess of a movie that landed Denzel Washington a Best Actor Oscar nomination, despite featuring the single worst performance Denzel has ever given. The film was better used as a punchline in a Weekend Update sketch involving Bill Hader’s Stefon which still makes me laugh just thinking about it.

So needless to say, it was a 50/50 shot going into Velvet Buzzsaw. I refused to watch the trailer (and you should too) and tried my very best to stay away from any and all of the Sundance reviews. But even after seeing Gilroy’s mash up of satire and horror set in the world of art dealers, creators and critics, I am still sort of confused about what a Velvet Buzzsaw is. But I would be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy the hell out of whatever Gilroy thought he was making here.

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Review by David Baldwin

I watch a lot of movies, so it seems to shock friends and co-workers any time I have not seen the popular movie of the moment as quickly as they have. I usually have the standard excuse of “It’s on the list” or “I’m waiting for Netflix”, but as must-see content continues to pile up on an almost hourly basis, I find myself consistently behind the curve. Quitting my full time job is not an option (especially when you’ve only recently become a full-time homeowner), so I’m constantly playing catch-up.

I say all of this, because the last few weeks have been dominated by discussions about Christmas, New Year’s, whether or not Die Hard is a Christmas movie (spoiler alert: It is), and Bird Box. The film premiered with little fanfare at AFI Fest in November (mostly because they cancelled their Red Carpet coverage out of respect for on-going wildfires terrorizing California at the time), but has since become one of the most watched original Netflix films, has inspired conspiracy theories about the veracity of the memes about the film being posted on Twitter, and now has inspired its own social media challenge related to activities being performed while blindfolded.

So yes, it makes sense that someone would be surprised I had not watched the film just yet. I made a point of fixing as soon as I possibly could.

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Another year, another TIFF. It was my ninth year in a row of going to the festival, and my second time covering as Press — but first time where I actually used the pass as it was meant to be used. The less said about the last time, the better.

I watched 5 films before the festival, 44 films during (my own personal record!), attended 2 Press Conferences, 1 Jason Reitman Live Read (for The Breakfast Club no less), and even had some time leftover to skip a whole day to attend the wedding of a dear friend. Through all the smoking and deep, depressing films, I had a total blast and cannot wait for next year. Perhaps I’ll budget my sleeping better so I don’t doze through a good portion of a movie like The Old Man & The Gun? Probably not, but I can at least pretend that I’ll try.

I wrote quite a few words for Mr. Will Wong on a number of the films I had the opportunity to see, so here are the individual links to those reviews and the links to the Press Conferences I covered:

CAPSULE REVIEWS
Can You Ever Forgive Me?
Fahrenheit 11/9
First Man
The Front Runner
Halloween
High Life
Hold the Dark
The Kindergarten Teacher
Kingsway
Let Me Fall [Lof mer ad falla]
Life Itself
Mid90s
Monsters and Men
Nekrotronic
The Predator
A Private War
The Public
ROMA
Les Salopes or the Naturally Wanton Pleasure of Skin [Les salopes ou le sucre naturel de la peau]
A Star is Born [2018]
Wildlife

FULL REVIEW

White Boy Rick

PRESS CONFERENCES

First Man
The Front Runner

After multiple release date changes and some troubling rumours, Netflix finally cleared up any and all confusion about The Cloverfield Paradox tonight. Once called God Particle, once called Cloverfield Station, we finally have the third entry in the loosely connected Cloverfield series. And despite some excitement earlier this evening with Netflix’s bold decision to drop a teaser during the Super Bowl — for a film that would start streaming immediately following the big game — the long awaited film is not all that great.

Rather than type up a full review (it is almost 2 AM after all), I figured I would just deliver a few thoughts on the film, and do my very best to avoid some of the more spoilerish elements. Continue Reading