Red Dawn Released in 1984 at the height of the U.S.-Soviet Cold War, this film by conservative writer / director John Milius certainly depicted the worst case paranoia nightmare felt by Americans at the time: That Russian forces (combined with Cubans and Nicaraguans) would launch a ground invasion of the United States, aided by strategic […]
Red Heat Action movies with a pseudo political vibe are actually pretty rare, moreso when they mix in a healthy dose of comedy as well, but in 1988 Walter Hill managed to make one of the better and more well regarded ones with this entry that in many ways recycled direct elements from his earlier […]
Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins Many people have tried to replicate the same formula so they can try and recreate the magic of The James Bond Franchise into their own “superspy” type of character. Steven Spielberg (who in the 1970s campaigned to be in the director’s chair for a legitimate Bond movie) has openly admitted […]
Repo Man The punk mentality might be one of the hardest things to capture within the framework of a feature film. Oh, you can have punk rock music on the soundtrack, you can depict punk characters with mohawks and shit running around causing trouble, but the actual, pure nilhilism that comes with the entire movement […]
Repossessed One subgenre of comedy that has completely gone south in recent years is of course the spoof movie, that which mocks a certain movie or type of movie with allegedly hilarious results. Now of course those films are little more than bad, unappealing actors mugging for a silent (and empty) theatre, but back in […]
Requiem For A Dream In many ways, Darren Aronofsky’s much praised 2000 film is the most potent anti-drug work ever made, showing how quickly and how easily heavy drug use and addiction can turn you into a rock bottom loser with no chance of climbing back up. The story depicts the spiritual and physical downfalls […]
Rescue Dawn Vietnam has long been a staple of anti-war filmmakers, as we’ve seen nearly every conceivable cinematic concept put to use, and once again in 2006 we get the (true) story of a downed pilot’s time in a POW camp, in a film so poorly paced it probably should be called “Endless Dawn”. Christian […]
Reservoir Dogs Quentin Tarantino’s major directorial debut in 1992 made an impact like few others in the history of cinema. Buoyed by a tremendous word of mouth buzz in The United States which made it a cult sensation, and an outright box office smash in England, where it’s credited with singlehandedly inspiring the British gangster […]
Resident Evil No doubt about it: Milla Jovovich has got the action heroine persona down cold. Gorgeous with her stunning green eyes, yet able to bring that physicality to the table while showing off her perfect legs. Unfortunately, this 2002 release directed by her future husband Paul W.S. Anderson (which kicked off a franchise of […]
Return Of The Killer Tomatoes The all out slapstick, anything goes for a laugh style of movie comedy was invented and just about perfected by Mel Brooks and The ZAZ Gang with such comedy masterpieces as Blazing Saddles and Airplane!. The at least partial strategy for these types of films was to always have a […]