As a child, Johnny Depp wanted to become his television idol, Barnabas Collins, on the daytime soap “Dark Shadows.” Fascinated by the complexity of this cursed vampire who tried to be selective of those he killed, Depp was joined by Tim Burton who was also obsessed with this late 1960’s television series. Now as an accomplished actor and director, the two have joined forces to recreate their beloved childhood characters on the large screen. The problem is that the story and the characters are rather appalling and the attempt to make it a comedy is incomplete. Additionally, the love and violence portrayed are one-dimensional, which ends up making the film less of a tribute to the original tale and more a caricature.
Based on a dream and subsequent story by Dan Curtis, the writing was expanded by John August and Seth Grahame-Smith for the film version. True to the timeline of a two hundred year tale in which the Collins family came from England and founded a town and castle in Maine, the story begins with Barnabas as a teen taking advantage FULL POST

“The Avengers” is wonderful story-telling. Not only does it bring together the familiar Marvel comic characters, but it does so with witty dialogue and complex plot twists as well. The struggle between good and evil is obvious, yet the characters are not simple. With both the screenplay and direction by Josh Whedon, “The Avengers” benefits from his veteran skills and experience. One of the most versatile persons creating films today, Whedon’s skills range from writing the screenplay for “Toy Story” to directing “Thor” to producing the TV series “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” to being an actor, lyricist and even providing the soundtrack for a variety of films. This breadth of experience comes together in “The Avengers” to create an exceptionally entertaining film.
Based on the story by Zak Penn, who also wrote “The Incredible Hulk”, “Fantastic Four” and “Elektra”, among other science fiction films, the story of the various Marvel characters takes on a new chapter as they all come together to FULL POST

The Avengers

Like the Hulk, The Avengers, directed by the imaginative Joss Whedon, has smashed all previous weekend box-office records, hauling in over $200M in just three days. So what is it about these kinds of films that draws people to see them over and over? Part of it is the sheer spectacle of it all, some of it is star power – and piggy-backing onto heroes such as Iron Man, Thor, and Captain America, who are or will soon be franchises in their own right, doesn’t hurt.

[Author's Note: Get the MovieBibleStudy FilmTalk Card for The Avengers at www.moviebiblestudy.com]

But I think it goes deeper. Plenty of films with exciting battle sequences tank at the box office. The question always comes down to what’s at stake. People want to see stories about real good and evil, and they are fascinated by superheroes whose existence points up the fact that we cannot always save ourselves. Sometimes, we need someone to fight for us. FULL POST

Think Like a Man

Remember when romantic commitment was followed by a ring, a date, a wedding, a house, kids, and a choice to act in a loving way toward the beloved every day until death parted the lovers? If you don’t, you have probably spent the last ten years or so watching Hollywood’s version of “the love story.” This week, three romantic tales are in the top five at the box office: Think Like a Man, The Five-Year Engagement, and The Lucky One. While the films do a relatively good job identifying the problems facing modern romance, their answers to those problems represent half-solutions unlikely to do much to heal the wounds that have been inflicted in the long-standing battle between the sexes.

Marriage: The Great Hurdle

It is not secret that Hollywood film is hot on romance leading to weddings, but cold toward marriage. A simple test will suffice: Taking the last ten years of film, try to identify ten movies in which married people are depicted as having an exciting sex life. Now flip the assignment and using the last year, name ten films that show single people having an exciting sex life. Even if you found a way to get to ten in the first challenge, it was certainly much more difficult than naming ten for the second. If we were to believe Hollywood, marriage is the sexual death knell. FULL POST

Steve Harvey wrote his best-selling book “Act Like a Woman, Think Like A Man” in 2009 to share his experiences and wisdom on relationships. In bringing his advice to the big screen, Harvey partnered with screenwriters Keith Merryman and David A. Newman who wrote the dialogue for the explicit and sometimes vulgar “Friends with Benefits.” As producer of the film, Harvey secured the directing skills of Tim Story due to his work on such films as “Taxi” and “Barbershop.” Combining the forces of these artists produces a work that is a fascinating combination of moral counsel, relationship manipulation, gender and racial stereotypes, and raunchy comedy in an expose on modern dating relationships.
The storylines acted out by the ensemble cast are based on the various chapters of the book and explain how different men look for and need different things from the women in their lives. The “player” Zeke (Romany Malco) has avoided meaningful relationships FULL POST

As a black raven sits on the branch above a troubled Edgar Allen Poe (John Cusack), we enter the world of a grieving literary genius. Helping us understand what haunts both him and us, we recognize that his morbid tales are part fiction and part reality. It is this fine line between the two that is the focus of James McTeigue’s film of “The Raven.”
Stating in the opening frame that Poe was found dying on a park bench, the last days of his life a mystery, we enter into the possible madness that brought him to that moment. Like the engulfing sorrows of the man in Poe’s poem who, “once upon a midnight dreary, while [he] wondered weak and weary,” was visited by a Raven rapping on his chamber door who witnessed his descent into insanity, McTeigue’s film is just such a witness.
Recognizing that all of us have an uneasy truce with art that delves so deeply into the darkness FULL POST

Romantic relationships often feel like they were meant to be, as though fate or even God has brought us together. This common experience is often identified in retrospect as a couple looks back on their beginning and identifies the serendipitous romantic elements. This is in part what makes “The Lucky One” believable. Although a work of fiction, we identify with the romantic tale as we see two people brought together through circumstances so unlikely that we can only ascribe them to some greater force at work in their lives.
The film is based on the book by Nicholas Sparks, known for such romantic tales as The Notebook, A Walk to Remember and Message in a Bottle, and directed by Scott Hicks, who asked Will Fetter to adapt Spark’s novel for the screen. With beautiful scenes and subtle character development, we are introduced to the two people upon whom luck has smiled.
The young man is FULL POST

The Hunger Games

The Hunger Games looks to be the start of a franchise set to rival Harry Potter in popularity. The post-apocalyptic film, based on the first book in the best-selling series by Suzanne Collins, continues a four-week reign at the box office. It would be dangerous to dismiss this film as an entertainment fad.

With more depth than any summer action flick, The Hunger Games speaks to the very real fears and hopes of the coming generation, and illuminates much about contemporary culture. The film exposes both a horrible idolatry and a desperate longing, revealed in the kinds of motivations and sacrifices which support each side in the battle for cultural and spiritual supremacy.

Author's Note: for a free FilmTalk Discussion Card for The Hunger Games, and a look at our illustration content click here: http://www.movieministry.com/landing_HungerGames.php

It is easy to read The Hunger Games as a political story of youthful idealism in the face of a tyrannical state (and it is that). But it is also a mirror, reflecting both our appetites and our longings. The Hunger Games is us.

FULL POST

In a world where political lines are often drawn over abortion rights, it is important that our artists provide us with experiences that lift us above the partisanship to our shared humanity. That is what the Erwin brothers provide in their latest film “October Baby”. Opening the lives of a southern family when their daughter collapses on stage in her college play, we soon realize that her illness is based on a deep physical and psychological pathology caused by her premature birth due to a “failed abortion.” What is even more disturbing is that she did not know the circumstances of her birth or that the only parents she has ever known are not her biological ones.
Based on a story collaboratively written by Andrew and Jon Erwin, Cecil Stokes and Theresa Preston, the tale focuses on the college freshman Hannah (Rachel Hendrix). She is a beautiful and sensitive young woman with FULL POST

Are we a carbon copy of our parents? Are we destined to fall prey to the same demons or have similar dispositions or to seek the same dreams? Are we only the product of our family’s social, spiritual, and emotional conditioning? “Being Flynn” is based on a true story that traces a son’s experience with his father’s descent into addiction and his own fight to overcome the temptation and conditioning to do the same.
In his 20’s, Nick Flynn (Paul Dano) is aimlessly wondering through life with little direction or ambition other than to be a writer. FULL POST