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Jenni Miller

Jenni Miller

Jenni Miller has been writing for fun and profit since the age of six and can be found bathing in the glow of the silver screen, playing video games, inhaling books, and examining pop culture with a savvy, feminist eye. She writes for Film.com, BUST Magazine, Hollywood.com, and a variety of other publications.

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'Tyrannosaur' Review: Like a Boot to the Head

By Jenni Miller (Subscribe to Jenni Miller's posts), Posted Mar 31st 2011 8:00PM
Filed under: Reviews, Cinematical


'Tyrannosaur' is currently playing as part of the New Directors/New Films series at the Museum of Modern Art.

Paddy Considine's 'Tyrannosaur' challenges the viewer from the first frames to keep watching. Will we walk out in the first few minutes when Joseph has a foamy-mouthed meltdown after being kicked out of a bar? Or when Joseph turns to his dog waiting faithfully outside and kicks him until his ribs break? What about when Joseph lugs the dying dog home as the day dawns behind him? Still here? Okay, good; there are more suburban horrors to explore here in Considine's world, if you're game. For most viewers, however, that's a big if.

Joseph (writer/director Peter Mullan) lurches and curses and drinks his way through a life as desolate as the grey landscape around him. He doesn't befriend so much as take hostage Hannah (Olivia Colman), a religious woman who works in a Christian charity shop. First he hides out in her shop from people looking to finish a fight Joseph started; then he confides in her; then he verbally abuses her and her faith. But he keeps coming back and even though she tries to get rid of him, she eventually allows him into her life. This is not because of the graciousness of her faith, necessarily, as we soon learn it's tested on a daily basis by her even more abusive, foamy-mouthed husband James (Eddie Marsan), but perhaps because she sees in him her own building rage.
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Create a Poster for Edward Burns' New Film, 'Newlyweds'

By Jenni Miller (Subscribe to Jenni Miller's posts), Posted Mar 28th 2011 6:20PM
Filed under: Movie News, Cinematical


If you want a peek into truly indie filmmaking, take a look at Edward Burns' tweets. The actor, director and writer has been writing in 140-character spurts about the process of making his latest film, 'Newlyweds,' for $9,000. Burns has quietly reinvented himself as a savvy early adopter and champion of the online and on-demand film revolution, from the premiere of his film 'Purple Violets' on iTunes to showing his last film 'Nice Guy Johnny' using the Tribeca Film Festival Virtual platform.

Now he's using the power of Twitter and his blog to crowdsource a poster for 'Newlyweds,' offering anyone the chance to design and submit a poster that will then be voted on by visitors to his site. All you burgeoning film-poster designers have to do is tweet your creation with the hashtag #NewlywedsPoster, and submissions will be posted on Burns' site. The winning poster will be used for its promotion at the Tribeca Film Festival, and the winner will receive a copy of the poster, tickets to see it at the festival and a copy of the DVD when it comes out.
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'Margin Call' Review: Last Call Before The Financial Meltdown

By Jenni Miller (Subscribe to Jenni Miller's posts), Posted Mar 23rd 2011 7:00PM
Filed under: Reviews, Cinematical

Writer/director J.C. Chandor's directorial debut 'Margin Call' takes place at a financial firm in midtown Manhattan, far above the normal people whose money (and lives) the analysts and brokers affect with their every decision. Whether or not this firm is the first domino to fall in what would become the financial meltdown of 2008 is unclear, but the scent of change -- or is it blood? -- is in the air, as the movie opens with a series of ruthless layoffs.

As senior risk analyst Eric Dale (Stanley Tucci) is escorted out of the building, his years at the firm reduced to a box of mementos, he thrusts a thumb drive at junior analyst Peter Sullivan (Zachary Quinto) and urges him to look at the data on there. There's something there, a problem that he's been working on, and it's bad news. He'd tried to warn others, but no one would listen, so it's probably no coincidence that it's now curtains for Eric and his career. What Peter finds later that night, after his coworkers and bosses leave to celebrate not being canned, is devastating data that indicates the coming collapse -- a discovery that sends his higher-ups into an all-night frenzy of meetings. What they decide could save their hides but send the stock market into a free fall, and each exec has their own angle on the matter.
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Paul W. S. Anderson Talks 'Resident Evil,' Video Games, 3D and 'The Three Musketeers'

By Jenni Miller (Subscribe to Jenni Miller's posts), Posted Mar 22nd 2011 9:00PM
Filed under: Celebrity Interviews, Horror, Sci-Fi, Cinematical
"Jean-Luc Godard once said, 'All you need to make a great movie is a girl and a gun.' And that's definitely my approach to filmmaking."
-- Paul W.S. Anderson

Welcome to part two of Cinematical's interview with Paul W. S. Anderson (here's part one)! After 'Shopping' got the attention of Hollywood industry types, Anderson kicked off his mainstream career with 'Mortal Kombat.' From there, his path led him towards bigger and even more sci-fi/action-infused flicks like 'Event Horizon' and, of course, the 'Resident Evil' movies based on the Capcom video games. Here he discusses the evolution of the franchise, 3D versus 2D and his upcoming 3D action period piece, 'The Three Musketeers.'

The 'Resident Evil' movies are interesting because the first one started out as a more straight horror movie like the video games, but the other ones have a different feeling to them. What made you decide to take it in a more science fiction direction?

There have always been a lot of science fiction elements in the original source material, in the Resident Evil games themselves. Even though the first game is set in a decaying gothic mansion, you discover beneath the gothic mansion is this high-tech research laboratory where something terrible has gone wrong, so it was a kind of mix of the science fiction and the gothic elements that really interested me in 'Resident Evil.' Then the games again, they have a lot of kind of high-tech weaponry in them, they have a lot of bio-engineering in them; that's all part of the, these science-fiction ideas are all part of the DNA of the video game so we were kind of staying true to the game in one regard. The reason why the movies changed and continue to change is that I personally believe that if a franchise is to survive and to grow, you can't just deliver the same movie over and over again.
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Paul W.S. Anderson on 'Shopping,' Car Crashes and How He Ended Up in Hollywood

By Jenni Miller (Subscribe to Jenni Miller's posts), Posted Mar 21st 2011 6:05PM
Filed under: Celebrity Interviews, DVDs, Cinematical
Before Paul W.S. Anderson made his name in Hollywood with action-packed flicks like 'Resident Evil,' 'AVP: Alien vs. Predator' and 'Death Race,' he wrote and directed a slick crime flick about disaffected British youth called 'Shopping.' Starring an impossibly baby-faced Jude Law and spiky-haired Sadie Frost, this edgy independent about stealing and crashing cars got a licking from the British Board of Film Classification, the critics and even its own distributor, Rank. Now it's found its way onto DVD and Blu-ray thanks to Severin Films, who made it possible for Cinematical to chat with the busy director about his first movie and more in this two-part interview.

Cinematical: 'Shopping' has a very different feel than your other movies, from its sort of dystopian aesthetic to its storyline. What were your primary sources of inspiration for the story and the overall look of the film?
Paul W.S. Anderson: I grew up in the northeast of England, in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, and the whole subject of ram-raiding -- you know, stealing [a car] and joy-riding -- was very much a part of kind of that culture. It was big, big news when I was growing up, and it was happening even as we were making the movie as well. So that's the primary inspiration from the story, was a lot of the events in the film were kind of lifted from real-life events.
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Matthew McConaughey on the Smooth-Talking 'Lincoln Lawyer'

By Jenni Miller (Subscribe to Jenni Miller's posts), Posted Mar 18th 2011 3:00PM
Filed under: Celebrity Interviews, New Releases, Cinematical


Despite spending years in the spotlight -- or, more often, the long lens of a camera whose owner is eager to catch him doing some beach side sit-ups -- Matthew McConaughey seems like someone whose Southern mama raised him right. Even when, for instance, this reporter's recorder entered its death throes near the end of our phone interview, McConaughey remained easygoing and cool, humming to himself while I fumbled for extra batteries.

McConaughey's character in 'The Lincoln Lawyer,' Mick Haller, is also pretty cool, but in a far shadier sort of way. As a defense attorney whose office is basically the back seat of his car, Haller works the seedier side of Los Angeles, and his livelihood -- and sometimes his safety -- depends on his ability to smooth-talk and grease the right palms. This is no less true when he finds himself representing a very rich and seemingly clean-cut young man accused of viciously attacking a prostitute. Haller has to use everything at his disposal to find out if his client, played by Ryan Phillippe, is as innocent as he says he is.

Although McConaughey started college with hopes of becoming a criminal defense attorney at the University of Texas, his interests turned towards writing and more creative work by his junior year. "I woke up scared, going, 'Oh my gosh, what about my twenties? What about my twenties? I don't want to just go get educated for my twenties. I want to go get some practical experience with whatever I'm going to do,'" the actor says.

His worries were for naught, as he's now been in well over 35 movies since starting his acting career in the early '90s. Now he admits, "I really like playing an attorney. I like playing an attorney more than I like attorneys."
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'The Lincoln Lawyer' Review: A Film That Offers a Thrilling But Bumpy Ride

By Jenni Miller (Subscribe to Jenni Miller's posts), Posted Mar 18th 2011 9:45AM
Filed under: Reviews, New Releases, Cinematical

'The Lincoln Lawyer' makes it clear from the start that we're miles -- or at least zip codes -- away from most buttoned-up courtroom dramas. Defense attorney Mick Haller (Matthew McConaughey) uses the backseat of his old Lincoln as a makeshift office as his driver Earl (Laurence Mason) takes him back and forth across town to appointments. Some of Mick's meetings are conducted curbside, such as when a gang of bikers forces his car aside for a quick chat about a friend in the clink. Smooth as butter, Mick doubles his price and weighs the envelope of cash in his hand, thanks the leader of the pack and puts the envelope in his suit jacket.

"Aren't you going to count it?" asks the biker.

"I just did," says Mick with that famous McConaughey grin, and the deal is done. The town car moves smoothly back into traffic, and the bikers disperse.

The streets of Los Angeles are Mick's office and his element, yet despite Mick's tendency to play fast and loose with the law, he has his own code of ethics. While he's definitely cool with paying off bailiffs or similar shady practices, he feels just as strong about representing people that are generally thought of expendable by society. Mick is tormented by the possibility that his former client Jesus Martinez (Michael Peña) is on death row for a crime he might not have committed, but he isn't too concerned about the murderer that he got off on technicalities and police error. He did his job; it's the police and the DA that screwed that one up. Mick's also a doting father and a caring ex-husband who has a rather complicated relationship with his ex-wife Maggie, a prosecutor played by Marisa Tomei.
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