Cutting Room for April 20

by Ryan Syrek

• If you want to get my attention, the words “deadly vagina serpent” will do it. Those three words were used in a description of a film featured in Splatterhouse Movie Night, an ongoing series at the P.S. Collective (inside the Pizza Shoppe in Benson) that will be starting on April 25 at 8 p.m. My second favorite part of the email I received on this subject was the note that minors are not...

Kids Slay the Darndest Things

by Ryan Syrek

Hanna

While many folks can hum the tune that is the ballad of the distant father, until your pops assaults you while you’re disemboweling the reindeer you murdered because he told you to, it’s best not to sing your personal song of woe to Hanna (Saorise Ronan). Because she may stab you in the eye hole.

Dressed in the trappings of spy games and science fiction — spy-ence fiction, if you will —...

There is an appropriate amount you’re allowed to like horror movies

by Ryan Syrek

Like I said, we're shaking things up on this blog. That means more essay-type stuff while I'm working towards the unquestionable impending awesomeness that shall be the Reader's movie podcast. Now, before I get all wordy up in here, hella props to Dan J who dropped me a line with a few suggestions for that aforementioned dose of audio awesome we're working on. You don't know the squee-inducing...

Cutting Room for April 13

by Ryan Syrek

• It’s fitting that a movie with “thief” in the title is about to be part of a crime, as Alfred Hitchcock’s classic To Catch a Thief is getting remade. Although we don’t know as of now who will replace Grace Kelly and Cary Grant — thank goodness those two are so easily replaceable — we do know that the script will be written by Josh Stolberg. So no worries there; you definitely want...

Did you miss me?

by Ryan Syrek

I feel like this particular blog post is like running into an ex-girlfriend or boyfriend (or, if you're lucky...both) months after a mutual breakup. I have this overwhelming urge to thrust my hands deep in my pockets to avoid nervous gestures (I get really handsy when I'm worked up) and a desire to look down at the ground and mumble questions you'd ask of a total stranger and not of someone you...

Out in the Street

by Justin Senkbile

“I had no plans to make a film like this,” says director Matt Porterfield. He's speaking from Los Angeles, where he's promoting his latest picture, Putty Hill, which has its Omaha premiere on Friday at Film Streams. It's his second feature, after Hamilton in 2006 (which will screen on Sunday), and it has gotten quite a lot of good attention lately, not least from Richard Brody of The New...

Cutting Room for April 6

by Ryan Syrek

• While theologians and atheists continue to spar over the existence of an eternal creator, The Reader can officially confirm that the devil is 100 percent real. The proof? Ashton Kutcher is teaming up with Justin Bieber in a romantic comedy. No, they won’t play each other’s love interests, as that would be too original and creative. Seriously, Brokeback-ing rom-coms with something like, I...