Movie Review: Grudge Match (2013)

by Tony Dayoub

One of the unfortunate effects of cramming the viewing of so many awards-worthy films into the final months of the year is that a movie like Grudge Match ends up looking quite thin in comparison. No, this comedy-drama isn't a dramatic or technical heavyweight, if you'll pardon the pun, like others currently in release. But if it'd open just a month from now, in the winter doldrums just preceding the Oscars, it might be judged differently. Robert De Niro slums a bit, rehashing a lot of his Raging Bull tics in service of a turn that's more a parody than a performance. But Sylvester Stallone builds on his Rocky past in his continual bid to prove he can hold his own with more renowned actors.

The Other Side of Cinema: Argo (2012) and Seven Psychopaths

by Tony Dayoub

Argo does an outstanding job of establishing both its world and its central conceit in the movie's prologue. Intercutting between documentary footage and the type of comic book frames used in movie storyboards, director Ben Affleck establishes a key fact that will surprise younger viewers, the closeness of the U.S. and its one-time ally Iran in the years just before the dictatorial Shah was forced to flee the country during 1979's Islamic Revolution. Subsequent sequences depicting protesters overrunning the gates of the American embassy are evocative not only of the actual events they cover, but of the recent embassy protests in Benghazi, Libya where Ambassador Chris Stevens was assassinated. Much of what will no doubt fuel Argo's Oscar campaign—or its chances for Best Picture in the minds of Academy voters—is this prescience or timing.