CHICAGO – Excelsior! Comic book legend Stan Lee’s famous exclamation puts a fine point on the third and final play of Mark Pracht’s FOUR COLOR TRILOGY, “The House of Ideas,” presented by and staged at City Lit Theater in Chicago’s Edgewater neighborhood. For tickets/details, click HOUSE OF IDEAS.
Aldis Hodge
Dwayne Johnson Like a Rock as Star of ‘Black Adam’
Submitted by PatrickMcD on October 21, 2022 - 12:49pmRating: 2.5/5.0 |
CHICAGO – Once again Dwayne Johnson finds himself in a vehicle unworthy of his considerable charms and talents. Johnson stars as “Black Adam,” a demigod from a mythical middle eastern country who was given power from a counsel of wizards to protect his homeland from injustice. He’s woken from a 5000 year sleep to protect the country again from foreign interlopers.
The Greatest! On-Air Review of ‘One Night in Miami’
Submitted by PatrickMcD on December 31, 2020 - 6:08pmRating: 3.5/5.0 |
CHICAGO – Patrick McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com appears on “The Morning Mess” with Dan Baker on WBGR-FM (Monroe, Wisconsin) on December 31st, 2020, reviewing the new film “One Night in Miami,” which is in theaters now, and on Amazon Prime Video on January 15th.
‘The Invisible Man’ is a True Heart Pounding Thriller
Submitted by PatrickMcD on February 28, 2020 - 4:15pmRating: 4.0/5.0 |
CHICAGO – When I think of “The Invisible Man” the first thing I think of is the special effects… and that’s largely what it’s been about … from Claude Raines initial portrayal of “The I Man” in the 1930s, all the way through more modern takes like Kevin Bacon in the thriller “Hollow Man” (2000).
Take the Title Advice in ‘Jack Reacher: Never Go Back’
Submitted by PatrickMcD on October 22, 2016 - 4:24pmRating: 1.5/5.0 |
CHICAGO – The title of Tom Cruise’s second Jack Reacher adventure has almost prophetic ring to it – but we all would have been better off if the writers, and director and star of Jack Reacher: Never Go Back” had heeded the advice. This film seems more like one of those bargain-bin-just-barely-released thrillers than a major studio action movie.
Opportunity For Insight Wasted in ‘The East’
Submitted by BrianTT on June 6, 2013 - 1:36pmRating: 2.5/5.0 |
CHICAGO – Brit Marling is an undeniably smart, forward-thinking writer/actress in that she refuses to succumb to gender stereotypes and tries to chart her own way through the independent film movement. If this is true, and I still believe it is, why did “The East,” in which she stars and which she co-wrote, end up so frustratingly melodramatic? Why was the opportunity for true commentary or even character development within this fascinating world discarded in favor of an awkwardly-staged and poorly-written love story laden with genre tropes? I so wanted to like “The East,” but it never pointed me in the direction where I could do so.