Movie Review: Let Fury Have the Hour Dan Koelsch, December 14, 2012December 14, 2012 The documentary Let Fury Have the Hour, written and directed by Antonino D’Ambrosio, opens in New York today. The film chronicles the creative response to the directions our politics and culture starting taking in the 1980s, and it features interviews with a bevy of artists. Read my review after the break. Through artists of all different media, including street artists, musicians, poets, and more, the film details how art has become a form of protest and public awareness as a reaction to the changes in Western culture. Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher helps usher in a new wave of individualism and consumerism that destroys the natural ideas of community. It’s a pretty stark portrayal, and necessarily so to help explain the artistic movements it created. From punk rock to rap to street art, art became a way for people to express their frustrations with the system we are stuck in. An outlet from a political system that doesn’t want to hear your voice and a culture that wants you to conform.Photo courtesy of CAVU PicturesI find documentaries hard to review, but there are a few criteria I look for when watching. It has to be engaging, intellectual, informative, and have a clear message. Thanks in part to sharp imagery and a soundtrack provided by the artists interviewed, the film definitely gets your attention. However, it’s a bit light in the other areas. There aren’t a lot of hard facts, and the only interviewees I recognized (out of 50) were Public Enemy’s Chuck D, Rise Against the Machine’s Tom Morello, and comedian Lewis Black, so it’s hard to verify their credibility. The film heavily skews to covering music as opposed to other forms of art, and there is not much focus overall. I’m not sure what the message is supposed to be, other than to keep making art. Not exactly ground-breaking stuff. The heavy-handed introduction to Reagan and Thatcher really caters to liberals, clearly throwing away any desire to appear objective or comprehensive.While there are some nice ideas trying to get through, the film is bogged down by lacking focus and pandering to the far left. Even I had to roll my eyes a few times, and I’m practically a Green Party member. It’s a shame that the film prefers style over substance, because a real discussion about art as a creative response would be fascinating. Maybe then more people would consider themselves a citizen of the world.Rating: 2.5/5 Stars Learn more about the documentary at LetFuryHaveTheHour.com, Facebook, and Twitter. Reviews Let Fury Have the HourMovie Review
Movie Review: The To Do List July 25, 2013You may want to take a break from the superhero blockbusters of Summer. You might want to see a raunchy comedy instead. Well, then you possibly want to see The To Do List, which opens in theaters tomorrow. Read our review after the break. Read More
Top 10 Best Movies Of 2014 (So Far) – Mike’s List July 9, 2014July 14, 2014It’s already July, which means half of the year is already behind us. You’ve already seen what I was disappointed with this year, so let’s finish off our top ten of the year so far on a positive note. Unfortunately there were no real stand outs this year, and half…Pages: 1 2 3 Read More
Reviews Movie Review: Fifty Shades Of Grey February 12, 2015In Fifty Shades of Grey, bland and bookish Anastasia Steele gets whisked into the the fantasy world of the handsome and rich Christian Grey only to find he has a particular set of desires he wants her to endure. She naively goes along with it hoping to win his heart…. Read More