Star Trek: Into Darkness

startrek2posterThere is an unspoken rule among movie critics that you do not spoil a movie’s ending. This speaks to the respect that grows between an audience and a trusted reviewer who realizes that when a person invests hard-earned cash in an evening of entertainment, they deserve the right to approach the film with a child’s innocence and sense of wonder. Of course, that rule only applies to critics who are actually paid. The rest of us are just hacks working out of our basements so we can say anything we damn well please. And frankly, if you spend any time on the internet at all, there is no way you have made it this far without knowing about this ending.

But just in case you are one of those darling naive movie patrons, let me switch to all caps and declare a SPOILER ALERT. This review is so spoiled that if you drank it out of a carton in front of an unplugged refrigerator, it would cause you to puke up every taco you have eaten in the past twenty-four hours (just keeping with the theme of the site!). Continue reading “Star Trek: Into Darkness”

The Great Gatsby

great-gatsby“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”

As the final words of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby floated across the screen in the latest film interpretation, I was transported back to a classroom in 1971 where a group of bored teenagers were forced to read this classic aloud. As a pimply, mush-mouthed boy attempted to wrap his Appalachian accent around the final sentence of the book, he unfortunately misread the closing phrase as, “So we beat off…” The classroom erupted with hoots and hollers, and since then the poetry of this ending has always brought a little smirk to my face. Continue reading “The Great Gatsby”