Tag Archives: J.C. Chandor

NYFF 2013 Review: All Is Lost

All_Is_Lost_PosterWatching a man try to survive a mid-sea disaster is compelling, but watching a man try to survive a mid-sea disaster in an effort to live for something would have been exponentially more compelling.

“All Is Lost” features Robert Redford as an unnamed man indulging in some alone time on his yacht in the middle of the Indian Ocean. While asleep, his boat collides with a stray shipping container, causing the vessel to take on water. As time passes and his situation worsens, the man is faced with a barrage of decisions that will determine whether he’ll stay afloat and alive.

Lost at sea, lost in space, lost in the mountains, lost wherever movies come with an inherent connectivity. As long as the piece is mildly successful, it’s a thrill to watch a character try to figure out how to defy the odds and survive, and then to wonder how you’d fare in such a situation. While “All Is Lost” does bear that quality, it also suffers a major disconnect due to insufficient information.

Click here to read more.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Reviews

Review: Margin Call

Sure, it’s awful that we’re still suffering through financial gloom and doom, but, on the bright side, it does make movies like Margin Call all the more compelling. So perhaps that’s a lame attempt at staying optimistic, but if you do have the funds to drop on a weekend movie, it’ll do your hard earned cash some justice.

It’s a rough day at the office, but, lucky for Peter and Seth (Zachary Quinto and Penn Badgley), they merely have to watch as co-worker after co-worker is ushered out, cardboard boxes with the trinkets from their desks in hand. However, one of their superiors, company veteran Eric Dale (Stanley Tucci), isn’t as fortunate and thanks to his ranking and long-term employment, he’s considered a security risk and is not only escorted off the premises, but must leave every single bit of his work behind. But, just before the elevator doors shut for Eric for good, he manages to slip Peter a thumb drive holding the contents of an important project he was working on.

When the office clears for the day, Peter burns the midnight oil to investigate the information, filling in the holes of Eric’s work. What results is evidence that a piece of the investment firm’s formula for success is faulty and that that error will inevitably drive the company into the ground, taking every employee and potentially the whole economy with it.

Click here to read more.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Reviews