Lionsgate With its florid title, Fortnite tie-ins, and blockbuster-sized predictions that it will unseat Avengers: Endgame at the box office, John Wick: Chapter 3—Parabellum opens this weekend—cementing the bizarre fact that the ultraviolent, relatively low-fi action flick that was 2014’s John Wick has grown into a massive, full-on, crowd-pleasing franchise. By all rights, the fantastic […]
Erik Henriksen
With honor and distinction, Erik Henriksen served as the executive editor of the Portland Mercury from 2004 to 2020. He can now be found at henriksenactual.com.
Posted inMovies & TV
Game of Thrones Discussion Group: Episode 5 – “The Bells”
courtesy of HBO Last night’s episode might have been the most divisive Game of Thrones episode yet (although remember how mad everybody was after the Red Wedding?). As we enter the home stretch, time is starting to feel really compressed, with plot threads and characters behaving unnaturally in order to get this thing wrapped up […]
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What To Watch This Weekend! (Now with Help from Detective Pikachu!)
Pokémon Detective Pikachu Warner Bros. Welcome to What to Watch This Weekend™, a weekly post in which I tell you what to watch this weekend! I will continue doing this post until you have watched everything you should watch. “More than anything,” writes Morgan Troper, “Pokémon Detective Pikachu feels like Turner & Hooch on a […]
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The 35 Best Movies and Shows to Watch in Portland: May 10-23
★ Amazing Grace Even with Aretha Franklin’s album Amazing Grace firmly established as a classic, the movie is a staggering thing to behold, and is probably the greatest filmed document of American gospel music that has ever been captured. (Now playing, various theaters) NED LANNAMANN ★ Aniara “Hell is other people,” goes the Sartre quote, […]
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Game of Thrones Discussion Group: Episode 4 – “The Last of the Starks”
Helen Sloan/HBO Last night’s episode of Game of Thrones was called “The Last of the Starks,” but it just as easily could’ve been called “Stopgap,” since we got a huge battle last week and we seem to be gearing up for another big battle next week. Things this week were relatively low-key, but there were […]
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What to Watch This Weekend: QDoc, Tuca & Bertie, Long Shot, and More!
Scream, Queen! My Nightmare on Elm Street QDoc / Scream Queens Welcome to What to Watch This Weekend™, a weekly post in which I tell you what to watch this weekend! I will continue doing this post until you have watched everything you should watch. QDoc 2019—The well-curated queer documentary film fest is back! “I […]
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I Am a Member of the Satanic Temple. JOIN ME
Hail Satan? Magnolia Pictures “Sorry about the mess,” Lucien Greaves, the cofounder of the Satanic Temple, says to the crew of Hail Satan? as he welcomes them into the organization’s headquarters in Salem, Massachusetts. The two-story, formerly cream-colored building has been painted black, and a tasteful Sigil of Baphomet decorates the porch. Like the Satanic […]
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Movies Don’t Work the Same after Avengers: Endgame
Avengers: Endgame Marvel Studios “The two-hour film has had a great run over 100 years, but it’s become very difficult to work in,” said Avengers: Endgame co-director Joe Russo in December. Filmmakers’ focus on two-hour movies, Russo joked, was the equivalent of writers saying, “Hey, we all love sonnets. Let’s just write sonnets for 100 […]
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Game of Thrones Discussion Group: Episode 3 – “The Long Night”
Helen Sloan/HBO Oh, wow. Did you see that on HBO last night? Man, that was incredible. What a cool, cool episode, one of the best they’ve done so far. Can’t wait to see where Barry goes from here. Oh, wait! We’re not here to talk about Barry. (Still—how good was that???) We’re here to talk […]
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The Mighty Avengers, and the Endgame of Cinema
“The two-hour film has had a great run over 100 years, but it’s become very difficult to work in,” said Avengers: Endgame co-director Joe Russo in December. Filmmakers’ focus on two-hour movies, Russo joked, was the equivalent of writers saying, “Hey, we all love sonnets. Let’s just write sonnets for 100 years.” “We have to […]
Posted inMercury Things to Do Staff
The 31 Best Movies and TV Shows to Watch in Portland: April 26-May 9
★ Amazing Grace Even at a remove of 47 years, and even with Aretha Franklin’s Amazing Grace album firmly established as a familiar classic in the canon of recorded music, the movie is a staggering thing to behold, and is probably the greatest filmed document of American gospel music that has ever been captured. While […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Hail Satan? Review: Hail Satan? HAIL SATAN!
“Sorry about the mess,” Lucien Greaves, the cofounder of the Satanic Temple, says to the crew of Hail Satan? as he welcomes them into the organization’s headquarters in Salem, Massachusetts. The two-story, formerly cream-colored building has been painted black, and a tasteful Sigil of Baphomet decorates the porch. Like the Satanic Temple, director Penny Lane’s […]