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Review: ‘Captain America: Civil War’

The thirteenth movie in the franchise known as the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), “Captain America: Civil War” is most definitely a unique product of movie making in both good ways and bad. While this particular installment of this ongoing saga benefits greatly from many hours worth of character development spread over numerous movies, it also has that feeling of being not so much a complete movie but more of a big budget half step, just another episode in this hugely expensive serialized story. If you haven’t seen the other twelve Marvel movies, then just walking into this movie is very much like picking up a random comic book and just reading a story that is in media res, with characters and callbacks that just come out of nowhere and make no sense in a vacuum. In that way, this movie can not exist on its own in a meaningful capacity without the “Iron Mans” and “Captain Americas” and “Avengers” that came before it.

After a fight in a public space causes casualties, the Avengers are asked to sign an agreement, ratified by a panel representing 117 countries, that says they would be beholden to this international committee, who would decide on a case by case basis as to whether or not this group of mostly American superheroes should be deployed. Basically some official oversight to keep them in check, acknowledging that their actions in previous movies, while meant to save people, also cost many innocent lives. In their attempts to save billions, they have still killed millions. Tony Stark a.k.a. Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) feels much guilt when confronted by a grieving mother, and coupled with everything else going on in his life, sees this agreement as a decent solution to an obvious problem. Steve Rogers a.k.a. Captain America (Chris Evans), still feeling burned by the government from his last movie, refuses to become beholden to some panel, no matter the intentions. This causes a rift in the group as some people agree to sign and others do not.Continue Reading …

Spoiler Bonus Episode – ‘Captain America: Civil War’

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In this BONUS episode, Chris Crespo and Drewster Cogburn saw Captain America: Civil War and they talk about the movie in detail from start to finish. So of course this episode is filled with spoilers so beware of spoilers because otherwise things will be spoiled for you in a big way.

Seriously, though, spoilers.

Netflix pick for 5/3/16 – ‘V For Vendetta’

As heard in episode 173 of Cinema Crespodiso.

The main theme of “V For Vendetta” is that people should not be afraid of their governments, but instead governments should be afraid of their people. Written in the 1980’s as a limited series comic, and then reprinted in graphic novel form, this is the story of a dystopian future (a British one, mind you, in which Big Brother tactics are readily apparent in the real world) in which the government controls everything and dissent is quickly rooted out and squashed with vicious efficiency. That is until a mysterious masked figure known only as V (Hugo Weaving) starts wrecking havoc, trying to set an example to the citizens, showing them that an uprising is possible and that they can indeed fight back against the government that holds them all hostage. In addition to his attempts to inspire the populace at large, he also takes in a young woman named Evey (Natalie Portman) and makes her something of a protégé, dealing with her directly and trying to show her why he is fighting back against the fascist government that has taken over.Continue Reading …

#173 – The Pinball Wizard

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In episode 173, Chris Crespo and Drewster Cogburn are joined by returning guest Steve Etchie (www.twitter.com/Etchie) from the Pfft Radio Network, home of the shows Tidbits and What’s The Fuzz (a.k.a. The Rocky and Billwinkle Show).

Chris and Drew review Green Room and Keanu and Etchie reviews The Jungle Book.

The Netflix Instant Pick of the Week is V For Vendetta and Etchie has his own pick for the listeners.

Dr. Drew gives his two cents on who makes your food at restaurants on Mother’s Day.

Billy D reviews High-Rise.

The Crespodisco features music from Green Room.

Review: ‘Green Room’

“Green Room” is quite simply not for the faint of heart. Intense and foreboding, with the constant specter of gruesome violence hanging palpably over every scene, this is a movie that gets to a point in which every move and decision can lead to something unimaginably disastrous. A simple set up leads to almost unbearable tension which eventually explodes, leaving an impressive body count in its punk rock wake. In this story, no one is safe and everything is on the line, and when it gets down and dirty, watch out.

A struggling band takes a gig somewhere in the Pacific Northwest, and they take it knowing that they would be playing for a bunch of skinheads and racists. But they need the money so they accept the gig, and just try to get in, play their set and get out. Those first two parts went down just fine. Getting out becomes impossible when one of the band members (Anton Yelchin) walks into the green room moments after a murder; he sees the dead body, tries to call the police on his cell, gets stopped by the people running the club, and it is on from there. They put the whole band in the green room while they sort it out, and the band turns the green room into their holdout, knowing that these backwoods racists wouldn’t just let them walk away.

And the tension builds. And builds. And builds. Until…pop. Continue Reading …

Crespodiso Film School – History of Action Movies

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In this bonus episode, Chris Crespo and Drewster Cogburn run down the history of the action movie genre, starting with its roots in The Great Train Robbery from 1903 and tracing its trajectory all the way to the Fast and Furious franchise.

What do you know about swashbucklers? Or the difference between action movies and adventure movies? How many World War II movies have been made? Why was John Wayne so damn popular?

All of these questions are sort of answered, plus more, in this Crespodiso Film School bonus episode.

Review: ‘Everybody Wants Some!!”

“Everybody Wants Some!!” is writer/director Richard Linklater’s return to the world of “Dazed and Confused,” his paean to his high school days in Texas in the 1970s, and here he is back with another love letter, this time to his college days in Texas in the fall of 1980. If you saw “Dazed and Confused” and thought that movie had too much drama going on and too much plot, then “Everybody Wants Some!!” is the movie for you.

Just bros hanging out doing bro stuff. That’s the essence of “Everybody Wants Some!!,” though this movie also seems to be saying “not all bros are bad, bro.” The story is mostly centered on incoming freshman and student athlete Jake (Blake Jenner) and it all takes place on the weekend leading up to the first day of classes. Jake arrives at an off-campus house set up for the school’s baseball players, where he meets his ragtag group of teammates on a team that we are told repeatedly is the best college baseball team in the state. And then Jake just spends the next three days hanging out with these guys, going to parties, cruising for chicks, drinking, smoking, playing cards, you know, just chilling, man.Continue Reading …

Review: ‘Miles Ahead’

“Miles Ahead” is a biopic about music legend Miles Davis, but not a soup to nuts, cradle to grave type of biopic that is so common and has become so boring. Instead “Miles Ahead” is a little more like other recent biopics such as “Steve Jobs” and “Selma,” movies that don’t try to stuff all the facts in to one feature length movie and instead cherry pick certain time periods to really dig into, to use these microcosms of a person’s life as a way to tell the whole story of who they are.

In “Miles Ahead,” co-writer and director Don Cheadle (who also stars) too this approach to the next level. He decided to focus on two specific time periods in the long and storied life and Miles Davis, those being his first marriage to Frances Taylor in the late 1950s and through the 1960s, and his “silent period,” which is pretty much the back half of the 1970s, a time when he lived as a hermit in his NYC apartment, wandering around like a ghost in his own home, haunting himself, and most notably, not making any music. And while the “young Miles” section with Frances contains a number of real life incidents, the “hermit Miles” section of the movie is almost entirely fictional, an outlandish story made up to portray Miles Davis as much more of a bad ass gangster prone to firing off his pistol and making demands of people, which were often met promptly. These scenes are more about showing us his attitude, his way of life, both positive and negative, and what kind of person he was. These aspects of this movie seek to tell the truth of the person, not necessarily the truth of the actual situation.Continue Reading …

Netflix pick for 4/25/16 – ‘The Running Man’

As heard in episode 172 of Cinema Crespodiso.

From 1987, “The Running Man” is a sci-fi action adaptation of a Stephen King book from five years, a book that posited that the world would be in ruins and America will have devolved into an outright fascist dystopia in which the populace is partially placated by violent, state-run reality television, all in the far off and unimaginable year of 2025. That’s actually not that inaccurate, is it? And the movie actually sets the story in 2017 and mostly in 2019, and right now we all know we are just one bad presidential choice away from Pat Sajak hosting the government “sponsored” reimagining of “American Idol” meets “American Gladiators.” We’re talking about a classic Rome is burning scenario, and people are busy placing bets on which contestants will die first. This is the world of “The Running Man” and it started out as Orwellian-inspired ridiculous science fiction and now exists as an actually plausible future.Continue Reading …