Film

All of Us Strangers: Not All Ghosts Make Pottery

When you think of ghosts in movies, what images come to mind? Scary ghouls spewing blood from their eyes? Weird little boys telling their therapists they see dead people? Creepy twins holding hands in a hallway while they beg you to come play with them?

No, like any God-fearing American, you think of Patrick Swayze sidling up behind Demi to make some erotic pottery. Why wouldn’t you? Nothing captures the complexity, mystery, and dark beauty of the afterlife better than an impromptu, sex-filled art session with your soon-to-be-murdered boyfriend.

Well, I’m here to tell you, there is a better way to tell a ghost story, and it doesn’t have to be scary, creepy, or craft-filled. It can actually be done quite beautifully.

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Just Make a Mini-Series Already: The Year of Film in Review

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As we age, time feels as though it is running on a constant fast-forward setting. Life flashing by in the blink of an eye while we wait in line at Starbucks. It’s hardly a novel take, but something that each of us comes to realize eventually. An inconvenient fact of life, if you will.

That is, unless you’re a heralded filmmaker in 2023. In that case, you put your all into writing scripts thicker than Jon Cena’s neck, firing any editors who dare propose cutting even one second from a scene that is already five minutes too long, and then “rewarding” moviegoers with overly long, often self-indulgent films that would be far better served as five-part mini-series on Netflix, AMC, or even MTV2. Yes, I’m talking to you, Martin Scorcese (“Killers of the Flower Moon”), Ari Aster (“Beau is Afraid”), and Ridley Scott (“Napoleon”), to name a few.

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Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3: A Stomach-turning Farewell?

For many moviegoers, Marvel is as good as it gets. The very hushed rumor of a new Marvel release pulls at the corners of the their mouths, forcing an uncontrollably insane Joker-like smile onto their faces. Despite the feeling being largely lost on me — and avowed comic-book film hater — there is one franchise within the Marvel universe that will still plant my ass in a movie theater seat: Guardians of the Galaxy.

The first Guardians film was ground-breakingly fun. The second, while filled with dazzling eye candy, was abysmal. So, what would franchise fans get for the third, and final (the film is reported to be the last in the franchise) film?

Settling into my seat, I witnessed an overly excited young boy and his father hurry up the stairs carrying pizza, popcorn, and sodas as they searched for their seats in the row behind me. Watching the young lad skip, I lowered my guard and remembered that Marvel movies weren’t made me. No, they were made for excitable whipper snappers like this.

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SISU: Gold Mine, Meet Land Mine

A knife jammed completely through your skull from ear to ear. An land mine expertly lobbed onto your face. Your arm helplessly strapped to a bomb, followed by the rest of you exiting a bomb bay door towards the welcoming ground below.

These are just a few of the inventive ways in which an unsuspecting Nazi may meet his demise, should he run afoul of the ominously silent Finnish gold prospector Aatami Korpi. Yes, the best advice a goose-stepping, Hitler-adoring Aryan could receive in this fictional Tarantino-wannabe of a film would be to run in the other fucking direction…and quickly.

This is the situation in “Sisu” (watch trailer), a sparsely written, yet robust-feeling excuse for humorously graphic violence and occasionally banal escapism. Jorma Tommila plays the film’s protagonist, a physically and emotionally scarred Finnish World War II veteran who has lost everything, only to find some semblance of meaning when he discovers a rich deposit of gold in the middle of nowhere. On his way to the nearest town to cash in his windfall, he crosses paths with several swaths of retreating Nazi forces, the beady-eyes meanies going scorched earth on every village and soul they encounter as global defeat rapidly approaches.

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How’s the Despair?: The Year of Film in Review

“How’s the despair?” It’s a simple question asked by a village priest to Brendan Gleeson’s morose character in “Banshees of Inisherin.” Might as well be the slogan for 2022.

In the nearly three years since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, much has changed. People have cast aside life-long friends due to their opinions on cloth masks, Donald Trump, or student loan forgiveness. The Ukraine has repeatedly repelled its crazy uncle to the east at the cost of countless lives. The cost of gas, eggs, and Hot Pockets remain as volatile as…well…the insides of a Hot Pocket. And Kanye West decided that life is more interesting when you profess your love for Hitler whilst wearing a gimp mask.

Yes, it’s been a long haul these past few years. But despite all of the gloom, doom, and pure lunacy of our recent history, at least Hollywood decided it was time to start bringing life back to your friendly neighborhood theater (even if in much smaller doses than most of us film dorks would prefer). That’s right, there was a glimmer of big-screen (and small-screen) hope in 2022. Blockbusters returned, stock prices for fake butter popcorn flavoring rose, and a few brave directors even decided that the craft of filmmaking doesn’t always have to take a back seat to comic-book franchise nonsense.

Perhaps best of all, after a long hibernation, Stink Whispers has returned with our list of the best and worst films of the year, as well as the reintroduction of the awards nobody ever asked for, the Whispy Awards.

With that, I leave you with a quote from the always brilliant Taylor Swift that has nothing to do with movies: “The lesson I’ve learned the most often in life is that you’re always going to know more in the future than you know now.”

That shit is deep.

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The Life of a Rabbit: A Decade in Film

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Ten years. One tenth of a century. The average life expectancy of a rabbit. Well, it’s all over. The decade is over. That rabbit is dead.

Yes, the 2010s are in the rear view mirror, and as such, every jackass who’s ever listened to music, watched TV, or paid way too much for movie theater popcorn must ponder one important question: Do I act like a healthy, balanced, otherwise dignified human being who spends his free time with friends and loved ones? Or do I hunker down in my house like a pit-stained hermit and create a “Best of” list that four, possibly five, people will partially read on the toilet?

Don’t answer that. It matters not. I’ve already done the work.
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Feel Good About Feeling Bad: The Year of Film in Review

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During my sophomore year of college, I attended a house party where I consumed a few too many beers and lost my senses. As a result, I ended up making out with a nice young lady whose eyes were so crossed that she could read a street sign directly behind her without the use of a mirror. What does this have to do with the past year in film you ask? Well, not much, I guess. It’s just that the image of those wonderfully crisscrossed eyes staring back at me between drunken kisses always seems to bring a smile to my face. And after another so-so year in film, maybe we all need a few more smiles in our lives.

All that to say, you can be forgiven if 2018 did little to inspire you to visit the theaters for $11 Twizzlers, seat neighbors who only shower on a monthly basis, and two hours of sub-par Hollywood self-indulgence. However, despite the downer tone here, there were some moments of note on the big screen this year. That’s where Stink Whispers comes to your rescue. We’ve got you covered with our fifth-annual list of the best and worst films of the year, as well as more of our self-critically acclaimed Whispy Awards.

And, no, folks. It’s not opinion. It’s pure, unadulterated fact.

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Nobody Puts 2017 In A Corner: The Year of Film in Review

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As a new year beckons us—like a bored toddler slapping a sleeping parent in the face at 6 a.m. to get them to rise from bed and retrieve a bag of fruit snacks—it is our duty as human beings to take a look back at the year trailing sadly behind us and ask ourselves “How did I spend the precious hours, days, weeks and months of my life this past year?”

For many, the answer to this powerful question may contain joyous moments spent with family and friends, the exploration of new cultures through travel abroad, or the advancement of a burgeoning career through hard work, innovative thinking, and achievement born from years of singular focus. For others, the answer may revolve around drug-induced memories of morally suspect sex acts performed in the back alleys with out-of-state strangers met on Craigslist. Wherever you fall in that mix, we hope you were able to find a little time to take in a movie or two, complete with popcorn and a large ICEE. Yummee!

If big screen escapism was not in the cards for you and yours in 2017, though, no need to worry. Stink Whispers has you covered with our fourth-annual list of the best and worst films of the year (and the return of the Whispy Awards).

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Stink Review: The Great Wall

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What is it with white A-listers hijacking films about revered Japanese or Chinese warriors engaged in epic battles to save their way of life?

First, Tom Cruise (playing a drunk Army Captain who ruthlessly slaughters indigenous people in his spare time) decided it was his duty to hop a charter to Japan to learn the way of the samurai in four easy lessons, then lead the very samurai who trained him to defeat ninjas and gun-toting soldiers in The Last Samurai.

Next, Keanu Reeves saddled himself with the selfless responsibility of leading 47 disgraced ronin warriors against ghosts, witches and really shitty 3-D animation in 47 Ronin.

Now, with The Great Wall, Matt Damon has thrown his hat in the ring as a lily white dude with a fake beard and destined to lead tens of thousands of Chinese warriors in a battle against giant, man-eating salamanders (called Tao Tei) at the foot of, you guessed it, the Great Wall of China.

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Gods and Turds: The Best and Worst of the Big Screen in 2016

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When the world gives you lemons, you make lemonade. When the world gives you brown bananas, you make banana bread. When the world gives you fermented lactose, you make yogurt. These are phrases you’ve most likely heard ad nauseam.

But what about when the world gives you a horrendous year of film? What then? Well, you make a list of the best and worst of them and share with a world that could care less that you even exist, let alone spend inordinate amounts of time sitting in a dark move theater like a creepy pale-skinned loser.

So, here it is. The annual Stink Whispers list of best* and worst films of the year (mixed in with the first-ever Whispy Awards).

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