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Tony Black
Tomatometer-approved critic
Biography:
A.J. Black is the author of Myth-Building in Modern Media: The Role of the Mythic in Imagined Worlds and Star Trek, History and Us. He writes about popular culture in entertainment on his blog, Cultural Conversation, and other outlets. He lives in the South West of England.
Movies reviews only
| Rating | T-Meter | Title | Year | Review |
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The Duellists (1977) |
Even by Ridley Scott’s standards, The Duellists is a remarkable way to kickstart a career. Few directors are able to produce such a lush, visually arresting and well-cast film as their first effort. - Film Stories
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| Posted Oct 27, 2023
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Babylon 5: The Road Home (2023) |
The Road Home is a brisk, breezy Babylon-5 adventure, steeped in fan nods and nostalgia, but also keyed in to modern storytelling’s fascination with both the multiverse and also the intersection between science, faith and love. - Film Stories
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| Posted Oct 14, 2023
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Luther: The Fallen Sun (2023) |
With room for growth as a series, Luther: The Fallen Sun is a rewarding, exciting and brutal first foray for John Luther on a big canvas. - Film Obsessive
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| Posted Mar 13, 2023
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Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022) |
At points rich and bold, fiercely projecting strong female black power into the world especially, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is a film to be admired first, enjoyed second. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Nov 12, 2022
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DASHCAM (2021) |
DASHCAM really won’t be for everyone and that’s putting it mildly, but there is much more going on here than simply nonsensical horror theatrics. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Jun 13, 2022
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Jurassic World Dominion (2022) |
Dominion is a Frankenstein of a tentpole franchise picture and, when delivered with this kind of poorly written, cheese-filled, jaggedly over-inflated direction—with frequently awful CGI to boot—it is everything wrong with franchise filmmaking today. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Jun 11, 2022
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Top Gun: Maverick (2022) |
There will be enormous replay value in Top Gun: Maverick, a film one senses will rank among not just the best sequels or legacyquels, but perhaps one of the finest populist American pictures of the decade. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted May 30, 2022
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Last Action Hero (1993) |
Last Action Hero hasnt quite yet become one of those cult movies we venerate and, yknow maybe we should. It does have, within its bones, just a little bit of magic. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Apr 12, 2022
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Avengers: Infinity War (2018) |
Infinity War is all about balance, in many different respects. Balance and tone, both of which, for a film with such ambition and size, are remarkable in how well they are executed. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Apr 03, 2022
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Ready Player One (2018) |
Steven Spielberg delivers the ultimate expression of why we digest media, and possibly a glimpse into a world we could all be heading towards. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Apr 03, 2022
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Black Panther (2018) |
Black Panther feels as much like a moment as it does a movie. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Apr 02, 2022
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The Bubble (2022) |
The cast clearly had huge fun making The Bubble. Good for them. It certainly doesnt translate. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Apr 02, 2022
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Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) |
Visually and thematically, The Motion Picture is as pure and honourable to the history and themes of Star Trek as anything before or since. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Mar 27, 2022
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The Abyss (1989) |
The Abyss feels like his first attempt to make a film which cant be defined, clearly, as a James Cameron movie, and its probably why its amongst the worst of his efforts, while still being a very good picture. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Mar 24, 2022
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Waterworld (1995) |
Waterworld has the epic scale, the grandeur, the towering oceanic shots, the boisterous (if sometimes misjudged) score and the vast, expensive sets. It just has no soul. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Mar 24, 2022
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Romancing the Stone (1984) |
Romancing the Stone is no searing example of feminist film theory, but it perhaps warrants re-examining in the context of how Zemeckis approaches male and female hero stereotypes. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Mar 24, 2022
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Murder on the Orient Express (2017) |
While this take on Murder on the Orient Express is destined to exist as a Sunday afternoon matinee picture people will throw on and bask in, there is unmistakable depth and humanity inside the confectionary of its exterior and its big-budget staging. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Mar 23, 2022
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Dunkirk (2017) |
Audiences are quite understandably going to consider Dunkirk a war film, quite possibly one of the great war films of our age. Christopher Nolan's tenth picture is possibly an even better survival horror movie. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Mar 23, 2022
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Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) |
Homecoming, in the end, is a coming of age origin story which sticks to the Marvel formula while revelling in how good this franchise now is at it. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Mar 22, 2022
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Deep Water (2022) |
Are we aroused in the same way as we enter the 2020s? Adrian Lyne's return with Deep Water looks to answer this question and while it doesn't entirely work, it does open a doorway long thought closed. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Mar 22, 2022
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Fresh (2022) |
Mimi Cave's directorial debut takes a scalpel to what could have been a rather dour and conventional, exploitative tale and peppers it with strangely romantic & twisted black comic gusto. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Mar 19, 2022
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The Adam Project (2022) |
The Adam Project is yet another example of how the Netflix algorithm just isnt to be trusted. - Failed Critics
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| Posted Mar 13, 2022
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The Batman (2022) |
The Batman is the triumph we hoped for, and the film DC have desperately been in need of for a long time. - Failed Critics
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| Posted Mar 05, 2022
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Death on the Nile (2022) |
Branagh’s film is undeniably a cinematic experience but that, nor the delay, prevent the finished product being a frustrating disappointment. - Failed Critics
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| Posted Feb 18, 2022
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Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) |
For me, No Way Home is joyful. Others will find it infuriating and strangely reductive. And either way, it could be a sign of times to come. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Dec 18, 2021
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Dune (2021) |
Dune: Part One is a stunning piece of work in that context, one that could well be for the ages. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Nov 20, 2021
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No Time to Die (2021) |
No Time to Die caps off films which have elevated the James Bond franchise into something they rarely were before: fine examples of artistic, dramatic craft. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Oct 06, 2021
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The Village (2004) |
We feel the need ever more today, as societies polarise and global political and environmental crises loom, for community and hope, and The Village foresaw that. - The Quietus
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| Posted Aug 13, 2021
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Black Widow (2021) |
Black Widow unintentionally feels of a simpler time for this expansive universe. It should have been made five years ago. - 25YL (25 Years Later)
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| Posted Jul 26, 2021
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Joker (2019) |
A male rage manifesto with ugly societal truths. - We Made This
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| Posted Apr 03, 2021
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Drop Dead Fred (1991) |
The crucial problem of course is that for a comedy, it's not really very funny. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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The Last Samurai (2003) |
The Last Samurai delivers one of the stronger historical adventure epics of recent years. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Gemini Man (2019) |
A 90's sci-fi action thriller that fell through a time vortex. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie (2019) |
Even if it didn't necessarily need to exist, Breaking Bad may end up being enhanced by this in ways nobody ever expected. - The Truth is in Here
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Diana (2013) |
Diana turns out to be an enormously tedious character study which never once has the balls to go beyond its glossed-up TV movie roots. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Terminator Genisys (2015) |
It's just utterly hollow, a big noisy shuffling of temporal timey-wimey mechanics that does nothing we needed to a franchise that will always have legs. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001) |
A thuddingly joyless experience that feels twice as long, with a leaden pace, an awful script & phoned in performances. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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The Shining (1980) |
A true masterpiece. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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The Poughkeepsie Tapes (2007) |
A horrific gem. One of the great found footage pictures and indeed the faux documentary genre. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Doctor Sleep (2019) |
A Kubrickian xerox with soul and dark beauty. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Making Waves: The Art of Cinematic Sound (2019) |
Making Waves manages to cover an array of different areas and delivers a comprehensive, enlightening and relaxed journey through the history of sound and film. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Ford v Ferrari (2019) |
A thrilling, playful middle finger to corporate conservatism. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Goodfellas (1990) |
It's an epic, it's powerful, it's funny, it's tough, it's rough and by God is it cool. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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The Ninth Gate (1999) |
If you go in not expecting thrills or chills but an old-fashioned, carefully constructed puzzle, you may well find this surprisingly beguiling. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Frozen (2013) |
It's genuinely a delightful experience; full of memorable songs and fun moments & lots of dry humour. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999) |
The Phantom Menace will always be possibly the single biggest missed opportunity in modern cinematic history - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Cloverfield (2008) |
Cloverfield is quite a stunning, fresh use of the found footage concept which cleverly updates the Godzilla-concept. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Room 237 (2012) |
It has something to say about obsession & perhaps serves as a warning: look too hard at something, and you may go slightly mad. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (2005) |
Revenge of the Sith is by some distance the finest Star Wars prequel and though it can't quite sit on a par with the original trilogy, it skirts close. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002) |
You go into this prequel wanting to love it, and come out wondering what happened to the Star Wars you grew up with, and whether it really is gone forever. - Cultural Conversation
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| Posted Feb 16, 2021
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