Google+ Cinema Viewfinder: Ray Stevenson
Showing posts with label Ray Stevenson. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ray Stevenson. Show all posts

Friday, March 21, 2014

Movie Review: Divergent (2014)

by Tony Dayoub


You want Divergent to be a better movie than it is, if only for its up-and-coming young star, Shailene Woodley. With its Twilight franchise gone and nearly forgotten, Summit Pictures has been grooming a couple of Young Adult novel adaptations as potential money-making successors. The first, Ender's Game, was a complex, male-oriented sci-fi war picture burdened by the troublesome politics of both it and its author. The second, Divergent, has the luxury of showcasing a new female star even more appealing than Jennifer Lawrence, the lead of its most successful rival, The Hunger Games. It's also helmed by possibly the most talented director a YA movie series has attracted yet, Neal Burger (The Illusionist). Even with all of these winning components in place, Divergent still feels half-baked.

Saturday, April 30, 2011

Movie Review: Thor (2011)

by Tony Dayoub


Shoving exposition into a summer blockbuster is quite a feat when it consists of years of mythology, both of the comic book kind and that of Norse folklore. In Thor, director Kenneth Branagh not only manages to accomplish both quite expertly, he also leaves room for the larger backstory of the interwoven Marvel films. Branagh (Henry V, Hamlet, and Much Ado About Nothing) is, not too surprisingly, a great fit at the helm of the latest Marvel Comic-inspired movie. At its core, Thor is a tale built of legendary battles, palace intrigue, and sibling rivalry on a grand Shakespearean scale.