Category: 2000s

Based on a true story, this follows the experiences of the Wiley College Debate Team during the 1930s. Denzel Washington portrays the professor who trains and inspires a team that includes Nate Parker, Jurnee Smollett, and Denzel Whitaker. I feel like there aren’t a lot of period pieces regarding educated Black Americans, so the setting here was refreshing though being in the South, there were expected racism experiences. Also interesting to see star and director Denzel Washington as a disheveled socialist and his interactions with college president Forest Whitaker. Somewhat annoyingly, it seems the male debaters were given much more backstory than Smollett. She was relegated to the center of a love triangle and despite having mention in the epilogue, her character didn’t share the name of a real person. I understand there are often changes in ‘true stories’ but they just as often annoy me for their portrayal of alternative facts.

In a post-apocalyptic American wasteland, Viggo Mortensen and his son Kodi Smit-McPhee head to the hopefully warmer south, struggling to find enough food to survive while also avoiding cannibals. It’s a long, dark, and depressing trip, even the ocean lacks color and moments of succor are quickly dowsed. I personally would have gone with mom Charlize Theron who gave up before the film even started.

On a police force full of corruption, Clifton Collins Jr. is a former gang member turned cop who, on the day he is supposed to give testimony on a shooting involving his partner Cuba Gooding Jr., has the worst day of his career. It’s not a great film, told so quickly that it’s impossible to really take in the action or the details of the plot as it unwinds, but the leads give fairly solid performances and make it somewhat worthwhile for anyone interested in their work.  

In this overly long war film, lieutenant colonel Mel Gibson is chosen to lead and train a battalion to fight during the early days of the war in Vietnam. Back home, his wife Madeline Stowe provides support to the other wives left behind. It’s a pretty typical war film with lots of fighting and lots of people dying. There’s just enough backstory about each character that the viewer is supposed to care when they’re blown away. I found the female characters to be somewhat more interesting, but their stories also soon just became notifying the women about their dead loved ones. Though only a little actual characterization is given, there are small attempts to show the Vietnamese command and their soldiers’ experiences on the other side of the war.