Die Hard: Year One is an eight issue miniseries published by BOOM! Studios in 2009-2010. Made up of two volumes of four issues each, the series begins with John McClane as a rookie beat cop learning the ropes and following orders from his superiors.
20. Dead Man Walking Directed by: Tim Robbins Susan Sarandon earned herself an Oscar for her work in “Dead Man Walking,” a film directed by her then husband, Tim Robbins. She plays Sister Prejean, a nun who befriends a death row inmate named Matthew (Oscar nominated Sean Penn) as they confide in one another and …
Vice Written by Andre Fabrizio and Jeremy Passmore Directed by Brian A. Mills USA, 2015 At this point of his career, Bruce Willis’ choices in parts are a crap shoot. While 50% of the films he makes are legitimately great (Looper and Moonrise Kingdom), the other half go straight to video and die. This latest …
Traditional Christmas films get overplayed this time of year so every once in a while it’s nice to play something that doesn’t feature clay-mation or Jimmy Stewart diving off a bridge. For those cinephiles seeking a little more subversive entertainment for the long holiday break, check out these five films. Die Hard The Scene: After …
Sin City: A Dame to Kill For Written by Frank Miller Directed by Robert Rodriguez & Frank Miller USA, 2014 When Sin City exploded into theaters in 2005, we had never seen anything like it. It was a resounding declaration that digital filmmaking had finally arrived. The new Robert Rodriquez-Frank Miller collaboration, Sin City: …
What proved the saving grace to the careers of these action stars – and also a way to turn the self-caricature, normally a loss, into a win – ended up getting bigger than just any one of them. It gave them a moment of relevance to get some action films of theirs made, but it won’t last long.
Hollywood history always makes for fascinating reading. Hindsight and whatnot. During a month in which Sound on Sight takes an opportunity to tip a collective hat in the direction of recently ‘retired’ workhorse auteur Steven Soderbergh, there is a further chance to reel back the years and examine a period of time when one of …
Quick question; does a flamboyantly camp and knowingly ridiculous science-fiction adventure costumed by Jean-Paul Gaultier and written by a teenager obsessed with 50’s and 60’s Belgian/French futuristic pulp comics sound like a good idea? The idea that any cynically minded executive would immediately stab his thumb in the air at the pitch of The Fifth Element is as fanciful as the bizarrely hypnotic and anachronistically beautiful world (or worlds) in which it is set.
G.I. Joe: Retaliation Written by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick Directed by Jon M. Chu USA, 2013 The latest blockbuster sequel to a mildly profitable first film that doesn’t actually have an enthusiastic fan base, G.I. Joe: Retaliation is admittedly not on the same level of terrible as its Stephen Sommers-directed predecessor. It is still …
A Good Day to Die Hard Directed by John Moore Written by Skip Woods USA, 2013 Die Hard, 25 years after its initial release, is one of the best action films of all time not because of its jaw-dropping setpieces or titanic explosions, but because its hero is perfectly, proudly unspectacular. John McClane pulled off …
1988’s Die Hard has become a modern action classic, with scores of oft-quoted lines of dialogue and a fair share of memorable characters, including well-suited villain Hans Gruber and veteran cop John McClane. The latter has since appeared in three more sequels, with the fifth movie in the series, titled A Good Day to Die …
Over the years, numerous cartoons from the 80s have been granted a second life on the big screen. Among them was the cartoon G.I. Joe, which saw a rebirth in the form of 2009’s Stephen Sommers blockbuster G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra. The film’s success spawned a sequel, titled G.I. Joe: Retaliation, with Jon M. Chu taking over in the …
[quote by=”IMDB synopsis”] “John McClane travels to Russia to help out his seemingly wayward son, Jack, only to discover that Jack is a CIA operative working to prevent a nuclear-weapons heist, causing the father and son to team up against underworld forces.” [/quote]
Every month we choose a theme for our movie/TV club. In the past we’ve highlighted directors such as Quentin Tarantino, Alfred Hitchcock and David Cronenberg. Other times we’ve concentrated on events such as the Academy Awards. January’s theme is currently westerns, but we always plan ahead here at Sound On Sight. So now we are …
On December 14, 2012, a young man named Adam Lanza broke into a primary school and fatally shot 26 people in the small village of Sandy Hook, Connecticut. Twenty of them were children, aged 6 or 7. On that day, no matter where I went or what I did, I couldn’t stop thinking about the …
Lay the Favorite Directed by Stephen Frears Written by D.V. DeVincentis USA, 2012 Perhaps the most surprising element of Lay the Favorite, a pastel-colored look at the world of legal and illegal bookmaking and gambling, is its eerie sincerity. Within the first five minutes, the bubbly, ditzy lead character (Rebecca Hall) has left her job …
Director Rian Johnson has been slowly gaining acclaim in the film community for his unique feature films, which he also writes, the latest of which is the Bruce Willis and Joseph Gordon-Levitt starring time travel thriller Looper. Before a film can go into production, however, directors are expected to create a Pitch Reel that effectively …
Looper Written and directed by Rian Johnson USA/China, 2012 Of its numerous strengths, one of Looper’s greatest is that, despite featuring narration by its lead character, it heavily relies on visual storytelling to successfully convey both information and emotion. The narration delivers as little exposition as necessary to begin understanding both of its dystopian worlds, …
Looper Directed by Rian Johnson Written by Rian Johnson USA, 2012 If there’s any justice in this world, we’ll look back on Looper in 10 or 20 years, and pinpoint it as the moment when Rian Johnson entered into the realm of stardom. Though he proved his directing savvy with Brick and The Brothers Bloom, …
Looper Directed by Rian Johnson Written by Rian Johnson U.S.A., 2012 It is tempting to write that it does not get any better than a new film from Rian Johnson starring seemingly everybody’s favourite actor of the past couple years, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, as well as Bruce Willis and Emily Blunt. However, last week saw the …
The Expendables 2 Written by Richard Wenk and Sylvester Stallone Directed by Simon West USA, 2012 Of the myriad problems with the horrifically tedious first instalment of The Expendables, one of the most prominent was the incompetent execution of its action sequences. Prone to an absurd cut frequency, confusing spatial relations, terrible CGI blood effects …
*Exclaimer: Please don’t read this if you haven’t seen Inception, The Empire Strikes Back, Planet of the Apes, The Wizard of Oz, Saw, Gone With the Wind, Casablanca, The Usual Suspects or The Sixth Sense – As a probable testament to my poor academic acumen, I cannot, in good memory, recall the particulars of the situation …
Sin City Directed by Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller Written by Frank Miller U.S.A, 2005 Every Friday during the month of June, the Friday Film Noir column will be taking a slightly offbeat look at noir in film. More specifically, films that embrace noir elements in their own fashion yet are not from the traditionally …