Isaac's Film Reviews

By Isaac Handelman For those of you who haven’t seen ’10 Cloverfield Lane’ yet and want to get the optimal viewing experience, I’d suggest not reading anything about the film before you go and see it. Which would mean not reading this piece. You’ve been warned. Dan Trachtenberg’s directorial debut 10 Cloverfield Lane will undoubtedly draw up discontent from fans of 2008’s found-footage monster smash Cloverfield ; fans of that film have been desiring a follow-up for years, and 10 Cloverfield Lane ’s title seems indicative of something akin to a sequel, or at least a successor, to the 2008 hit.  And 10 Cloverfield Lane is not that film — at least not on the surface. For most of its duration, Lane is a tense, claustrophobic psychological thriller, a far-cry from the horror and bombast of the first Cloverfield . Lane centers on Michelle (Mary Elizabeth-Winstead), a young woman who finds herself in the captivity of a strange, possibly malevolent man named Howard (John G...

By Isaac Handelman You may have seen World of Tomorrow , Don Hertzfeldt’s fifteen-minute animated short that was nominated for an Oscar this year. If you haven’t, go ahead and do so -- it’s a wonderful little sci-fi jaunt with a feel-good message -- but I’d like to talk about another of Hertzfeldt’s efforts, an hour-long film entitled It’s Such a Beautiful Day , which resides on Netflix and shares some, though not all, of the generic elements of Hertzfeldt’s shorter effort, such as its black comedy. Composed of three of the animator’s short films strung together with a bit of extra material included, It’s Such a Beautiful Day is kind of an indescribable viewing experience. It’s about a man named Bill, whose life is narrated in non-linear fashion by the soothing voice of Hertzfeldt himself. Bill, despite his visual simplicity, manages to be more expressive and relatable than many more physically substantial cinematic protagonists. The film is visually eclectic, drawing from...

By Isaac Handelman A few months ago, near the beginning of my time in college, in a fit of what might have been homesickness coupled with my unshakable sentimentality, I set to work compiling a Spotify playlist encapsulating my senior year in high school. I happened upon this idea because I’d been thinking a lot about the ability of certain songs, when played, to transport me back to the times in my life that I associate them with. My plan was to compile every song that had meant something to me over the course of my senior year (a collection that turned out to consist of about 120 distinct tracks) and order them chronologically by the specific time or event in my life for which they held meaning and/or significance. I soon found the task daunting -- after all, certain songs were associated with foggier feelings or memories than others, and were difficult to place in order -- and I gave up. But my reason for setting out on this endeavor still holds truth: music has a certai...

By Isaac Handelman Note: this article of mine was originally published on the Spokesman Review's Tech Deck blog. The original post can be found here:  http://www.spokesman.com/blogs/tech-deck/2015/mar/26/ranking-entries-your-favorite-video-game-series/ In the realm of video game discussion, nothing gets the blood boiling and the flame wars burning quite like a good, old fashioned ranking feature. By the very nature of opinions, comparing the qualities of drastically different games can be problematic -- which is why, in today's Tech Deck feature, we'll be narrowing the playing field considerably by ranking the independent entries from a batch of the most popular franchises in modern gaming. Despite the smaller scope of these rankings when compared to your typical, broad "top ten" feature, hearing me decry your favorite series entries and call them inferior to their franchise brethren may stir up some hostile feelings. Don't forget, these are just opi...

By Isaac Handelman Note: this article of mine was originally published on the Spokesman Review's Tech Deck blog. The original post can be found here: http://www.spokesman.com/blogs/tech-deck/2015/jan/16/learning-appreciate-guild-wars-2-mmo-newcomer/ I am not an MMO player. That is, unless you count my time in sixth grade spent hopping onto a friend's World of Warcraft account for a few trial sessions. Perhaps fortunately, my burgeoning addiction to that title was harshly counteracted by the daunting $15-a-month paywall. Having now been primarily a PC gamer for upwards of two years, I decided that I was long past due to give some attention to one of PC gaming's darling genres. As it just so happened, Amazon's $20 holiday price point for the subscription-fee-less Guild Wars 2 fit the bill for an acclaimed, economically accessible MMO and I, along with two friends, jumped on the offer. Following a lengthy, comfortable period of character creation durin...