Posts by Daniel Tompkins
Popfilter Goes to the Movies
The Act of Killing The Act of Killing is sort of about a genocide that took place in the mid-sixties that the world has largely forgotten about because of, you know, all those other genocides we’re always doing – I mean honestly, who can keep up anymore? More than that, it’s about watching the people…
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The Conjuring I saw The Conjuring on short notice because I couldn’t find a theatre that was showing The Way, Way Back nearby and I had to see something. Now I’m wondering if it’ll end up on my Top 10 of 2013. I want to get that out of the way right up front so…
Read MorePopfilter Vs Our Childhood
Popfilter Vs Our Childhood Presents: In which we reminisce about childhood entertainment, then go back and watch it and re-assess. Daniel Tompkins VS A Goofy Movie Rather than pick a movie that I felt defined my childhood I tried to find something that represented the kind of movies I watched without being so famous that I’ve been…
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Pacific Rim Pacific Rim was this year’s consensus choice for underdog blockbuster success story until finally enough other blockbusters failed and we saw the trailer enough that it just became the choice for regular blockbuster success story. The same way sports analysts will talk about how underrated a player is so much that they…
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The Lone Ranger In the documentary Indie Game: The Movie, several independent game creators talk about how the big game studios always try to sand all the sharp edges off their product and make sure nobody could possibly hurt themselves on it in an effort to cast a wider net. Meanwhile the indie…
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Much Ado About Nothing In a recent Goes To The Movies I reviewed The Great Gatsby and I panned it. I did it not only because panning things is easier than saying you liked them, but also because it was a horrific dump of a movie either way. Baz Luhrmann took a classic work and…
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After Earth I really don’t want to fucking talk about M Night Shyamalan anymore. I don’t want to discuss what merit his older movies do or don’t have or talk about how shitty he is now. There are no M Night Shyamalan defenders left. There are only people like this: Hating Shyamalan is so popular…
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Epic Of the stupid number of animated movies I watched as a kid there are very few that actually stand out. When I think of The Lion King I can tell you the character names, the plot, sing the songs word-for-word, retell the jokes, etc. It’s a well-defined, well-made movie, to the point that even…
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The Great Gatsby Based on possibly the most Cliffsnotes-ed book of all time, The Great Gatsby faces the same dilemma that any adaptation of a classic does – everything you need to make it good is right there in the original, but the original is already so important that just making it ‘good’ isn’t…
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The Place Beyond the Pines Director Derek Cianfrance clearly wants to prove that stories do not need to be told in a traditional linear fashion. His previous effort, Blue Valentine, walked us through the demise of a relationship by intercutting scenes from its romantic beginning with much bleaker glimpses of the same couple on the…
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