Deadpool 2 Goes Mega Meta
Movie review: Deadpool 2
Ryan Reynolds still has the magical combination of charm and smarm that makes Deadpool unique in the superhero universe, but this highly self-aware sophomore effort feels like being at a party where everyone is taking selfies.
A Moral Argument Reduced to Meh
Movie Review: The Hitman’s Bodyguard
Ryan Reynolds and Samuel L. Jackson exchange character clichés in a lazy thriller that misses the mark, aiming for moral high ground under a stack of corpses
Bringing up Babies: Top Ten movies of 2016
Movies: Top Ten 2016
Some say Donald Trump won the Presidency playing to childish insecurity and name-calling, but the annual box-office derby also proved a public appetite for adolescent entertainments. Film Critic Katherine Monk breaks down the top-ten money earners, and offers her own take on the year's best.
By Katherine Monk
(Published Jan. 2, 2017)
The political arena wasn’t the only place where childhood behaviours prevailed in 2016. Movie theatres also played to our apparent desire for less-sophisticated, over-simplified entertainments.
It was the year the Mouse House roared: The Walt Disney Company was responsible for five of the year’s top ten earners worldwide, for a record haul of $4.829 billion - just a little under half the cumulative worldwide gross of $11.3 billion.
Disney raced to the pinnacle of a relatively static box-office heap with titles that included the top-earning Captain America: Civil War ($1.153B), Finding Dory ($1.027B), Zootopia ...
Ryan Reynolds: swimming in Deadpool success
People: Ryan Reynolds Interview
Ryan Reynolds wears his love of Vancouver on his fleshy sleeve with a tattoo of the Nine O'Clock Gun, but thanks to the skyrocketing success of Deadpool, the sexiest dad alive is making a big noise of his own.
By Katherine Monk
VANCOUVER, BC – He’s officially the hottest star in Hollywood now that Deadpool has racked up a quarter-billion $US in its first week of release and launched an on-line fan frenzy demanding he host SNL, get his own statue in the prairie province of Saskatchewan, and get on with spawning a series of Deadpool sequels.
Vancouver’s Ryan Reynolds has come a long way since his so-called “breakout year” back in ’02-’03, when he made the leap from recurring roles on TV shows such as Fifteen, The Odyssey and The Outer Limits to being the star of features films. He played a party hound Van Wilder, and a master thief in Foolproof, Canada’s first full-size experiment with the action genre. The whole movie was geared ...
Deadpool reanimates comic book form
Movie review: Deadpool
Ryan Reynolds's physical skills and comic timing prove unbeatable as he takes on the role of a nihilist antihero in Deadpool, a self-conscious wink to Spandex form that would have been unwatchable without him
Mississippi Grind percolates
Movie review: Mississippi Grind
The team behind Half Nelson and Sugar return with a film about chronic gambling that isn't as depressing as it probably should be, thanks to a pair of pocket kings in Ryan Reynolds and Ben Mendelsohn
Trainwreck lacks emotional carnage
Home Entertainment: November 10
Amy Schumer's blockbuster rom-com doesn't reinvent the comedy wheel but it does apply some rubber, while Ben Kingsley walks a mile in Ryan Reynolds body in Tarsem Singh's so so Self/Less
By Katherine Monk
Trainwreck 3/5
Starring: Amy Schumer, Bill Hader, Brie Larson, Colin Quinn, Vanessa Bayer
Directed by: Judd Apatow
Is it an Amy Schumer movie directed by Judd Apatow, or a Judd Apatow movie that stars Amy Schumer? It’s hard to tell, because Trainwreck is sexual, psychologically insightful, funny and, in the end, earnest with a very human message about being real, and putting love first.
Yeah. Yeah. Nice. Nice. But I was expecting something a little less conventional from Schumer, the woman who’s been able to “transform comedy” – apparently overnight – by referring to her genitals as often as men. But is that truly transforming comedy, or a case of pushing the boundaries of conformity far enough to include ...
