Cinema Crespodiso

A weekly talk show hosted by film critic Christopher Crespo

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Review: ‘Secret in Their Eyes’

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“Secret in Their Eyes” is the kind of movie that never fully clicks, despite having all the elements needed to be a good, if not great movie. A twisty-turny plot with a great cast all doing solid work, it all works as well as an extended episode of “Law & Order” but also ultimately feels just as disposable, and considering the subject matter, this trait isn’t a good thing.

Constantly jumping back and forth between 2002 and 2015, “Secret in Their Eyes” is the story of the rape and murder of a young woman and how this deviant act of criminality deeply affected a number of people directly related to this case. Counter Terrorism expert and FBI Agent Ray (Chiwetel Ejiofor) ignores the orders of his boss by spending his time investigating this murder instead of doing the counter terrorism work he was there for, and he does so because the victim is the daughter of his FBI Agent partner Jess (Julia Roberts). With a little help and encouragement from the foxy district attorney for whom he has the hots (Nicole Kidman), he does his best to solve the murder in 2002, and again in 2015 when he finds new evidence.Continue Reading …

Review: ‘Spotlight’

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In the grand tradition of movies about journalism as well as whistleblowers, “Spotlight” is a remarkable movie not because of the salaciousness of the story details but because of how well those details and this story are handled. An even keeled and classy drama that feels right at home with similar dramas from the 1970s, we have here a movie that can be seen simply as a procedural but really does point to some more profound aspects of our day to day lives and how they are interwoven with larger institutions throughout our culture.

For years and years the idea of the child molesting Catholic priest has been around, to the point where people were fine with joking about it among themselves. And despite being “a thing,” it has persisted. This could only continue within a system that allows it to happen, discreetly of course. And as history has shown, the best way to deal with monsters is to drag them into the light. And that is exactly what happened in from 2001 through 2003, as the investigative reporting team of the Boston Globe made this their mission in regards to the Catholic Archdiocese and their consistent cover up of the sexual abuse of children in their own city.Continue Reading …

Review: ‘The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2’

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“The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2” is finally here, bringing yet another film franchise to a close, this time the story of Panem, the land in which wealth disparity is the name of the game and open rebellion is all the poor people have left. After the episodic feel of the second movie and the incredibly boring wheel spinning of the third movie, we finally have here a movie with scenes featuring characters doing stuff, with final goals in sight and ultimate sacrifices ready to be made. It took several years, a number of films, and hundreds of millions of dollars, but we finally have a conclusion, an ending, a sense of finality…but was it all worth it?

In this final film we pick up with Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) and the rest of the rebellion, planning their final missions that will have them secure weapons for their final assault on the Capitol, in which they will attempt to overthrow the dominant paradigm by ousting cruel President Snow (Donald Sutherland) and making Panem a free country with open elections…you know, good old democracy. But just as Katniss has been a reluctant participant in the rebellion, offering her services as the face of the rebellion mostly due to her hatred of President Snow, in this last movie she openly questions the actions of the rebels, who are willing to kill many civilians in order to advance their own cause. She sees the horrors of war firsthand and she recoils. She would rather everyone just worked together to take out Snow and be done with it, but war isn’t easy, and the rebellion gets messy, and she doesn’t like it.Continue Reading …

Netflix pick for 11/23/15 – ‘Come Drink With Me’

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Long before Katniss Everdeen and Beatrix Kiddo and Ellen Ripley, there was a bad ass female protagonist in the form of Golden Swallow, featured in the 1966 martial arts Shaw Brothers classic “Come Drink With Me.” With great cinematography and epic fight scenes, this is one of the best kung fu movies to come out of the 1960’s, and definitely set a high standard for decades to come.

“Come Drink With Me” starts with a kidnapping. The governor’s son gets kidnapped, specifically, and instead of giving in to the ransom demands, the governor sends his daughter Golden Swallow to get his son back, because why send your royal guards when you have an awesome warrior for a daughter, a daughter who has a reputation that precedes her; when she sits down to eat in a tavern filled with shady folk, they start to realize who she is, and they are split between trying to be tough and trying not to look scared of her, and once the fighting breaks out and she proves to be damn near unbeatable, we can see why all these bad guys would rather hide than try to take her on.Continue Reading …

#150 – The Morning Whiskies

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In episode 150, Chris Crespo is joined by guest co-host Chico (www.twitter.com/ThisIsChico) and returning guest Ed Shuffles a.k.a. Ed Luvables.

Chris reviews “Hunger Games – Mockingjay Part II” as well as “The Night Before.”

Billy D reviews Jessica Jones on Netflix.

The Netflix Instant Pick of the Week is Come Drink With Me.

The Crespodisco features a cover of a King Crimson song, a small part of which was used in the movie “Children of Men.”

Continue Reading …

Crespodiso Film School – M. Night Shyamalan

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In this Crespodiso Film School Bonus Episode, Chris Crespo and Drewster Cogburn talk about (most of) the films of M. Night Shyamalan, who went from critical darling to…well, something else.

Follow along with us on this journey of discovery and education as we learn more about the man known as M. Night, how he got started, where he’s coming from with all of this, and what it has all lead to thus far.
Continue Reading …

Crespo Guest Appearances: A Corporate Time with Tom and Dan – 11/16/2015

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Being a regular radio talk show guest and podcaster, I get occasional opportunities to spread my brand of madness to the world on other programs. In addition to Cinema Crespodiso, I also call in every Thursday to The Curtis Earth Show on 91.5 fm WPRK (WPRK.org) to talk about movies for 10-20 minutes, but that can only be heard live as it happens. But sometimes that’s not enough, and I pop up somewhere else, spewing my opinions out like a dragon spitting fire, albeit with far less damage to my surroundings. Here is where these guest appearances are documented.Continue Reading …

Review: ‘Room’

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“Room” is a tense little character drama expertly made in every way, a raw, emotional movie that tells a tough story and freely digs deep into a nightmarish scenario that we all know is far too common and which we try not to think about very much. This is the type of movie that reminds us about what kind of terrible things happen out there in our world, and how there are people going through tremendous hardships and how amazing these people can be in their very basic quest for survival. Sounds like fun, no?

And despite being heavy, “Room” is not a depressing movie, it does not beat you over the head and force you to feel bad for some people, but instead in a way it manages to reinforce our more positive feelings about humans and our will to live and what we would do for each other. Yes this is a story about a person who has been suffering terrible abuses for years, but it is also a story about motherhood and the connection between a parent and child and how this can be one of the strongest bonds in the known universe.

Ma (Brie Larson) lives inside a small windowless room, with only a skylight far above providing any natural light, and the rest of the walls and ceilings covered in sound-proofing foam. In this room she has everything – a toilet, a bathtub, a tiny kitchenette, a television, a bare minimum of supplies basically – and this is because she can never leave the room. She is locked in, an electronic keypad keeping the door shut, with supplies being brought to her by some creepy guy named Old Nick (Sean Bridgers), who tells her how lucky she is to have someone like him to bring her stuff, all while he’s taking off his pants and climbs into bed with her.Continue Reading …

Crespo Guest Appearances: InSession Film Episode 143

20150405_134541_20151110140111386

Being a regular radio talk show guest and podcaster, I get occasional opportunities to spread my brand of madness to the world on other programs. In addition to Cinema Crespodiso, I also call in every Thursday to The Curtis Earth Show on 91.5 fm WPRK (WPRK.org) to talk about movies for 10-20 minutes, but that can only be heard live as it happens. But sometimes that’s not enough, and I pop up somewhere else, spewing my opinions out like a dragon spitting fire, albeit with far less damage to my surroundings. Here is where these guest appearances are documented.Continue Reading …

Netflix pick for 11/16/15 – ‘Hellraiser’

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As heard in episode 149 of Cinema Crespodiso.

“Hellraiser” from 1987 stands out from the rest of the 1980’s popular horror films and icons due to its sheer brutality and intense weirdness. In a horror movie landscape that includes two masked seemingly supernatural slashers and a burn victim who kills kids in their dreams comes this group of alternate dimensional beings who are the universe’s ultimate sadomasochists. More gory, strange and involved than the other films of the era, “Hellraiser” doesn’t get the same kind of recognition and kudos as its contemporaries, and that is a shame because it is probably the scariest and most horrific of them all.

Most people think of the colloquially-named Pinhead character when thinking of this series of movies, but the initial “Hellraiser” only featured this character in a few scenes, and he was among of group of like-minded beings, all of whom were only into taking people and putting them in a terrible purgatory-like existence in which they inflict both extreme pleasure and extreme pain on these people, torturing them forever (or I guess until they get bored). But when one of these people somehow escapes back into the real world, he has to convince his ex-lover to kill people so that they can use the blood of the victims so he can reform himself and re-enter the world. Sound weird? Because it IS weird.Continue Reading …

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