Thursday, March 28, 2024

Featured: Anticipating The BFG

Steven Spielberg is one of the best directors of all-time and one of my personal favorites as well. Regardless of content or critical reviews, I will always be excited for a new Spielberg film. And how can you not be excited for Spielberg in the fantasy/adventure genre? E.T., Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and Indiana Jones are some of his best work and seeing him jump back into this genre is rather exciting. It’s especially alluring when you realize that The BFG is Spielberg re-teaming with E.T. writer, Melissa Mathison (Rest in Peace good ma’am). I’m not saying that The BFG will be or should be as good as E.T., because let’s be honest, that would be extremely challenging. However, seeing Spielberg and Mathison reunite is still exciting and it should be fun to see where their imagination goes.

That said, I feel like this film has gotten almost zero buzz. If this were to come out 20 years ago, it would easily be one of the most anticipated of the entire summer. Yet here we are in 2016 and no one is really talking about The BFG. Perhaps it’s more the subject matter than it is Spielberg, but still, I don’t think that would have hindered this film or its buzz if this were 1996. Granted, if that were the case, it would be coming off the heels of Jurassic Park in 1993. So, yeah people would have been elated for the next Spielberg film regardless. Perhaps it’s the fact that The BFG is instead coming off the heels of War Horse, Lincoln and Bridge of Spies, three films that are more “serious”-Spielberg than “fun”-Spielberg. I’m not sure what the answer is but we as cinephiles need to be anticipating this film more, that’s all I’m saying.

The BFG also stars Mark Rylance, who is coming off an Oscar win for Best Supporting Actor at this year’s Academy Awards for his performance in Bridge of Spies. In our conversations around that film, we kept talking about how we were we excited to see more from Rylance. Well, here we are with the “more” and it’s again with Spielberg. The BFG has a solid supporting cast as well, including Rebecca Hall, Bill Hader and Jemaine Clement. And while I don’t know anything about child actor Ruby Barnhill, Spielberg’s history of working with child actors is damn near impeccable.

Regardless of how mixed some of the early reviews have been, Spielberg is a filmmaker I always get up for. Yes, he’s had some bad stinkers (looking at you Lost World) but to compare his bad to his greatness is an absurd exercise. And it’s the reason I’m excited for The BFG. What about you though, are you excited?

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Here’s what else is coming out at the box office this weekend:

The Purge: Election Year

The Legend of Tarzan
Our Kind of Traitor (limited)
Life, Animated (limited)
Equals (limited)

JD Duran
JD Duranhttps://insessionfilm.com
InSession Film founder and owner. I love film. Love art. Love how it intersects with our real lives. My favorite movies include Citizen Kane, The 400 Blows, Modern Times, The Godfather and The Tree of Life. Follow me on Twitter @RealJDDuran. Follow us @InSessionFilm.

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Comments

  1. I saw The BFG last night and was bored for most of it. The Mark Rylance performance capture is amazing and the chemistry between he and Ruby was solid. Bill Hader is wasted.

    I plan on seeing The Legend of Tarzan, Our Kind of Traiter and Swiss Army Man this weekend. I don’t have any expectations for those first two, but I am really looking forward to finally seeing Swiss Army Man.

    • Yeah I’m excited for Swiss Army Man as well. We are discussing it on next week’s Extra Film podcast!

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