Dustin’s Three to See: February

Don’t get out to the movies as often as, say, a single 29-year-old man-child with an escapism complex? Well don’t fret, I’ve taken all of Hollywood’s shoddy offerings and narrowed them down to the three that won’t make your $20 movie ticket feel like a total waste. I call it Dustin’s Three to See because I was raised to believe that rhyming things are better than non-rhyming things.

February is historically known for three things: Valentine’s Day, Black History Month, and $5-Footlongs at Subway. If I’m being honest, all three get me about equally excited. February is typically a pretty slow month for movies — and despite its romantic trappings, nary a single rom-com or rom-dram was released (rom-dram is an abbreviation I just invented for romantic drama). But I get it, even if there aren’t any good romance movies out, you’re still gonna need to find an hour and a half to kill between your romantic dinner and when you and your super hot girlfriend can go makeout in the car. With that in mind, here’s the three movies worth seeing from February:

Movie 1) — Warm Bodies
It’s a classic story of boy meets girl. The only snag is that the boy is dead, and sort of wants to eat the girl’s brains. It’s like Twilight, except for in this movie the lead’s acting is actually supposed to be stilted and lifeless (sorry K-Stew (not really)). I’m a little biased toward this movie because it’s essentially the same premise as a movie idea I had in college, and so the fact that it got made gives me some weird sort of validation (it doesn’t take much) despite the fact that I had nothing to do with it. The story is cute enough, the gore is calmer than trying to convince your girlfriend to watch The Walking Dead with you every week, that’s a win/win in my book.

AKA Drop Dead Fred

Advertisement

Dustin’s Three to See: January

Don’t get out to the movies as often as, say, a single 29-year-old manchild with an escapism complex? Well don’t fret, I’ve taken all of Hollywood’s shoddy offerings and narrowed them down to the three that won’t make your $20 movie ticket feel like a total waste. I call it Dustin’s Three to See because I am as creative as a kindergartner. As always I keep things as spoiler free as possible.

As any even casual observer of movie culture can tell you, January is a bad month for movies. Generally considered the graveyard of the release calendar, January is where bad movies go to die. After the holidays people usually have less in the budget for activities like moviegoing or tipping their bartender, and as a result, movies that are deemed not as good as movies like Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Witness Protection end up here. Whether it’s rewrites, poor focus group results, or just an overall bad film…if you think of a movie as a toddler, January is the timeout-chair its sent to when it’s misbehaved.

That said, there were still a couple diamonds to be found in the rough of this January, and if you got an AMC giftcard for Christmas like I did, here are the January releases that are worth your while.

Movie 1) — Gangster Squad
Remember a second ago when I said how January is full of mediocre movies? Gangster Squad is not a good movie. However, it’s not a terrible movie, either. And against the rest of the January slate, that makes it…watchable. The awful tragedy in Aurora, Colorado last summer meant that Gangster Squad’s much-publicized scene where the gangsters shoot through a movie theater screen and into the audience instantly became extremely inappropriate, meaning that the newly-infamous scene and the ending of the movie both needed to be rewritten and reshot before the film could be released. Whether it was those drastic post-wrap changes or something else that made Gangster Squad only okay, we’ll never know. But if you like Ryan Gosling (and just a cursory glance at any social media suggests that you do…a lot), flapper-style Emma Stone, and some cool period-accurate visuals, Gangster Squad is worth a go…if only to whet your whistle for when The Great Gatsby comes out.

Hey girl, sorry you couldn’t be in Drive.

Focus On One

Part two of a three part series exploring some significant people in my life at the moment (albeit for vastly different reasons). If you’re interested in the loosely-affiliated part one of this faux-trilogy (on Joseph Kony, professional douchebag), it’s here.

Topic the Second: Jack Gilbert, man about town (1950-2012).

30 in 30, Day 20: Analysis of Screenwriting

Being a world-famous writer of stage, screen, and craigslist, people often come to me for help with their writing projects, or just to ask for my critique of whatever sorts of movies have come out recently. A lot of times, they want me to give them the secret of my success. Well obviously not everyone can hope to achieve the same level of noteworthiness as I have, but as a starting off point, I have put together a brief analysis of some popular screenwriting styles that you can compare and contrast. What you do with that knowledge afterwards is up to you, I just ask that you thank me in the credits when you sell your first million-dollar script.