March 2017 – Ealasaid's Web Empire

Directed by: Daniel Espinosa Starring: Rebecca Ferguson, Jake Gyllenhaal, Olga Dihovichnaya, Ariyon Bakare, Ryan Reynolds Rated: R for language throughout, some sci-fi violence and terror There are only a few requirements for a horror movie to be really good without being ironically good or campy: decent production values and acting, genuinely horrifying things happening on screen, and refraining from the ridiculous. “Life” succeeds amply in the first two categories, but face-plants in the third. How much ridiculousness it takes to ruin a film is a matter of personal taste, but some generalities are true of a whole lot of people, and “Life” checks several of those boxes. The setup is a familiar sci-fi and horror trope: half a dozen people are trapped in a structure along with a malevolent entity that’s picking them off one by one. “Life” adds in the requirement that the protagonists have to make sure the alien doesn’t get down to

Starring: Tom Hiddleston, Brie Larson, Samuel L. Jackson, John Goodman, John C. Reilly Directed by: Jordan Vogt-Roberts Rated: PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi violence and action, and for brief strong language They say there’s nothing new under the sun, and for most of “Kong: Skull Island,” that is definitely the case. The characters fall into archetypes established back on the silver screen, the monsters are mostly straightforward giant versions of familiar critters, and it’s pretty easy to guess how the film is going to go. There are deviations from the traditional here and there, but this is not a film to see if you’re looking for innovation. If you just want to go to the movies, eat popcorn, and watch a giant gorilla fight a giant dinosaur-looking-thing, it will not disappoint. An opening credits sequence takes us from 1944, when a young American pilot and a young Japanese pilot have the misfortune to crash