The Blu Spot

The Film: Who would've thought that the little yellow Minions, first introduced as Gru's helpers in the original "Despicable Me" in 2010, would become so popular that not only would they be a prominent part of four films in that series, but also go on to star in two solo outings of their own. The reviews may not have been great for all of them, but that's hardly stopped each of these films from being a box office juggernaut, with a couple of them crossing the billion-dollar m

The Film: The legendary Steven Spielberg is obviously no stranger to science-fiction, having touched on the genre several times in classics like "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," "E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial," and "Jurassic Park," so whenever he decides to make a return to it, it comes with a grand sense of anticipation at the thought of another potential work of greatness. His latest project, "Disclosure Day," does indeed mark not only a return to the genre, but once aga

The Film: It's hard to believe that it's already been 25 years since the original "The Fast and the Furious" was released in theaters. What most critics seemed to dismiss as a silly little car flick was quite heavily embraced by the public, who not only enjoyed its exciting action sequences & undercover cop narrative, but also made it a rather large hit that saw it grossing over $200 million worldwide (about six times its production budget). Little did anyone know that it wou

The Film: Over the past 80 years, we've seen just about every conceivable film or TV show that could be made about World War II. From biopics of the major players involved to various missions to key battles, it seems like there couldn't possibly be anything else that hasn't already been tackled at one time or another. This brings us to Anthony Marras' "Pressure," based on the play by David Haig (who co-wrote the script), a peculiar WWII entry that delves into a rather unlikel

The Film: It seems like every year or two, a horror film comes along that gets everyone really riled up, causing critics to shower it with praise and act like it's one of the greatest things to come along in the genre for quite some time. The problem is, at least within the last several years, these films typically don't live up to the insane hype heaped upon them, making it seem like those doing the raving were simply too easily impressed by what they saw. This year, the fil

The Film: As always, when it comes to the over-saturated genre of romantic-comedies, the single biggest hope one can have when watching one of these films is to find one that doesn't have a strict adherence to the standard formula that the vast majority of them can't seem to get away from. Whenever they recycle it yet again, all we end up with is a banal, predictable, cliched mess in which the audience can name every beat well before it happens, making the need for a hefty do

The Film: When "The Super Mario Bros. Movie" came out just three years ago, many fans were hoping that it would be the long-awaited triumph that would finally see everyone's favorite plumber get a proper adaptation after several decades of waiting (and obviously not counting the bizarre 1993 adaptation in which the only commonality to the games were the names). What we got was something of a mixed bag, one where the visuals were gorgeous and the voice acting was great, but wh

The Film: Director Gore Verbinski had quite the career going from the early 2000s to the early 2010s, giving us such hits as a remake of "The Ring," the first three "Pirates of the Caribbean" films, and "Rango," which earned him the Oscar for Best Animated Feature. However, his streak quickly came to an end when he directed two back-to-back critical & box office duds, "The Lone Ranger" and "The Cure for Wellness." It's taken nearly a decade for him to finally get back into th

The Film: It seems like every couple of years we'll get another adaptation of one of William Shakespeare's plays for the big screen, with any attempt to add all of them up at this point appearing to be a near-impossible task. However, what's far more rare are films about the bard himself, ones that dig into his private life and his remarkable talent for penning the most famous plays ever written. Some of these have been highly fictitious, such as the brilliant "Shakespeare in

The Film: When the first two "Five Nights at Freddy's" games were released back in 2014, it's highly doubtful that anyone could've seen just how popular they would become, a popularity that would go on to spawn 11 main games and several spin-offs, with the most recent addition releasing just last year. This made it no surprise that an attempt would be made to develop the franchise into a feature film, which made its way into theaters just two years ago. The reaction to it was