Bill Bria

We can all agree that giant monster fights are some of the best cinematic moments to grace the big screen. Whether it’s mechs fighting creatures from the ocean’s depth a la PACIFIC RIM, or watching the King Of The Monsters himself wiping out creatures from land, sea, and space, there is something so joyous about kaiju films. They are entertaining, gorgeous, and silly — a bowl of delicious comfort food that will make you smile no matter what. In a time like this one, monster movies are needed ...

—Frank Sinatra (via Paul Anka), “My Way”
Men are a problem that have yet to be solved. The word “problem” should be taken a variety of ways, as the past few years have proven, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that men are broken creatures; the primary cause of all manner of atrocious, violent acts. Men are also a problem in the sense that they’re ill-defined, especially in an increasingly expansive and progressive social landscape. The old definitions and expectations of men are increasingly out...

The most common misconception about science-fiction is that it concerns the future, when in reality, it’s all about the present. This is why the genre is one of the most diverse in terms of tone and visual aesthetic, as it reflects the hopes and the anxieties of the time period each work was made within. For much of cinema’s early history, science-fiction films were on the whole cautiously optimistic, depending on what other genre they had been blended with. Fantasy and adventure sci-fi, such...

There aren’t many incidences in human history of someone accurately pinpointing a momentous future date or event — there was only one Nostradamus, after all. Yet New Year’s Eve 1999 was one of those dates that gathered a wild storm of credibility around its built-in religious and philosophical notoriety as the end of a millennium, thanks to a fear by many professionals that a computer glitch could cripple the world’s technology, sending us all forcibly into a dark age. While that fear turned ...

Just from reading a short description or synopsis of the film, it’s obvious that MASS is going to be a hard sell to audiences. A movie that deals directly with the epidemic of mass shootings in America over the last decade, the film takes place entirely in one location, primarily with just four actors. Its writer and director, Fran Kranz, is a first-time filmmaker primarily known for his varied acting career, and most of his well-known works are genre-based, while MASS is heavily grounded in ...

Is documentary filmmaking journalism? It’s a tricky question, one that delves far enough into the form and function of the genre production that it begins to split hairs. The easiest compromise of an answer is that documentaries have the potential to be journalism, despite the typical artistic flourishes associated with many other genre movies. The easiest and best way to remove all “entertainment” aspects that would seem to dilute a documentary’s journalistic ability is to present material a...

Fantasy can be a powerful tool in everyone’s life. Rather than being mere escapism, it can function as a way to process and understand the world around us, as well as inspire strength to fight life’s numerous, seemingly never-ending battles. Most fictional fantasy worlds about struggle and strength, however, are predominately male, with fantasy fiction for women too often falling into “damsel in distress” stories and the like. Writer-director Karen Cinorre’s first feature film, Mayday, seeks ...

The term “modern-day fairy tale” is one that usually promotes a good deal of eye-rolling. That’s generally for good reason, especially as the function of most classic fairy tales is lost on modern storytellers, as they typically use the description to cover up for a story that’s too ambiguous or broad. Director Pascual Sisto’s debut feature, John and the Hole, seems to embrace its identity as a modern-day fairy tale wholeheartedly, however. It doesn’t announce its intentions right away — more...

Over the last four years, it’s become obvious to just about everyone how pervasive and prevalent the problem of racism is today, as well as how bad it has been for so long, especially in America. What might not be as well known is how absurdist some past solutions — or pseudo-solutions — became. How else to explain the phenomenon of “racial passing,” where Black folks of mixed-race — particularly women — were able to pass into and through white communities. This was partially done through thi...

At first glance, On the Count of Three seems like the typical formula for a Sundance movie: take two disparate, seemingly conflicting elements, put them together, and hope you get a peanut butter & jelly sandwich. Making a comedy that also takes suicidal thoughts and depression seriously seems like an impossible task that would easily fall into the trap of being too crass, thoughtless or insensitive. Fortunately, director and star Jerrod Carmichael balances its elements, telling a story that’...

Barely a year out from the Coronavirus pandemic, the initial responses by horror filmmakers to the crisis has generally focused on aspects such as isolation, political and social strife, and, most unoriginally, zombies. We’ve been so focused and appalled at the various responses (or lack thereof) to the virus that we haven’t quite reckoned with the virus itself, particularly its status as a deadly offshoot of nature. Writer-director Ben Wheatley’s In The Earth, written and shot in the middle ...

Back when the Coronavirus pandemic began in early 2020, a number of films and projects using the crisis as a setting were announced, resulting in a premature backlash. While those projects either didn’t come to pass or landed with a thud, the continuing status of the pandemic — a phenomenon that many of us never experienced before in our lifetimes — means that we can’t reasonably expect our arts and entertainment to ignore it. The reason for the initial backlash at the idea of “pandemic movie...

The idea of transgressive art as potentially harmful to the human psyche goes back almost as far as civilization itself. Particularly with the advent of film, the concept of art as potential corruptor has been used as an easy scapegoat for society’s ills, and various censorship boards were created around the world to keep a lid on things. When restrictions on content were significantly lifted in Hollywood thanks to the creation of the MPAA, the floodgates began to open. By the 1980s, exploita...

The myth of the auteur theory suggests that artists are born fully formed overnight, their style and proclivities intact. While certain first-time filmmakers have made some extraordinarily assured works, numerous others have had to find their voices as they went along. This is especially apparent in the career of director Robert Altman, a man whose name now carries with it a number of thematic and stylistic expectations: a love for the underdogs of society, a skewed and highly critical look a...

The demonic possession film has been in a rut for nearly 50 years now. Despite many attempts at originality, each new entry in the subgenre still seems to owe a great debt to landmark works Rosemary’s Baby (1968) and The Exorcist (1973). Need proof? Just take a look at how many films exist that are entitled “The Exorcism of [Insert Name or Place Here]” — even the poster art for these movies tends to be just as uninspired, typically featuring the image of a young woman either levitating in the...