Sean Patrick
Bio
Hello, my name is Sean Patrick He/Him, and I am a film critic and podcast host for the I Hate Critics Movie Review Podcast I am a voting member of the Critics Choice Association, the group behind the annual Critics Choice Awards.
Stories (1976)
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Movie Review: 'Downeast'
Downeast is a rarity in this modern movie world. It’s a tiny, independent, gritty crime thriller that doesn’t feel as if it is recycling every crime movie cliche. Sure, the characters and the situation are familiar but the setting is new and the characters are authentic and charismatic. Written and directed by Joe Raffa, Downeast is a smart crime drama pitched at a perfect moderate pace that allows the characters to breathe and lets the story to settle into a lovely rise and fall.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Criminal
Movie Review: 'Dachra' Tunisia's First Horror Movie
Dachra is said to be Tunisia’s first horror movie. If that’s indeed true then they’ve learned a lot from the horror traditions of America. The film is about three journalism students who are chasing an exclusive story in order to get a good grade in their class. They are tasked with doing an original, exclusive, investigative news story and one of the three happens to have an idea that involves a legendary mental patient and the strange village near where the patient was found having survived having her throat cut and other such horrors.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Horror
Classic Movie Review: 'Bad Lieutenant'
Abel Ferrara is one of the most daring, fascinating, and unique voices in film. Though he’s made his fair share of duds in his nearly 50 years behind the camera, he’s also made some truly iconic movies. Ms. 45 was a recent revelation for me, a film about Me Too decades before Me Too became a movement demanding change in the way women are treated by men in our American society. Ms. 45 is, for me, a true classic but for most it is not a movie they’ve even heard of, let alone experienced.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Geeks
Movie Review: 'Black Widow'
The legendary pop song American Pie has a small role to play in Black Widow. The song features early in the movie acting as comfort for a little girl who grows up to be Black Widow’s little sister Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh). It reprises later in the movie as a reminder of a more innocent time in Yelena’s life. It’s a bit on the nose but I appreciated it nonetheless, an all time great pop song about America’s loss of innocence reflecting the loss of innocence for one of Marvel’s great heroes.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Geeks
Classic Movie Review: 'Speed'
Speed is a near perfect action movie. Starring Keanu Reeves as Jack Traven, a member of the LAPD bomb squad, Speed crafts a nearly non-stop thrill ride while delivering characters we find easy to care about and root for. Co-starring with Reeves was Sandra Bullock in the role that would make her a superstar. Annie is a plucky every-woman and Bullock radiates star power and charisma in the role. Bullock is so good in Speed that she makes the previously wooden Reeves look like the movie star Hollywood claimed he was in 1994.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Geeks
Movie Review: 'The God Commitee' The Heart is Just a Muscle
“You fail to remember that the heart is just a muscle.” I have to give Kelsey Grammer credit for being able to deliver that line above without breaking into a giggle fit. The context is that Grammer is portraying a world renowned heart surgeon who is demeaning another heart surgeon for getting too emotionally involved with her patients. Grammer is called upon to deliver lines like this one more than once in the new movie, The God Committee, a deeply flawed and earnest melodrama about a heart transplant.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Geeks
Documentary Review: 'Summer of Soul' and the Empathy of Shared Memories
Summer of Soul is one of the most emotional documentaries I have ever experienced. Watching this more than 50 years after it had seemingly disappeared, the music at the heart of Summer of Soul is more powerful than ever. Time has given Summer of Soul a power that it did not have when it happened. Don’t misunderstand, as you watch this remarkable footage, the moment captured had power in the moment it happened. I mean that time and incident have given the footage even greater impact.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Beat
My Own Personal Apocalypse
I have stared longingly at this locket so often that the hinges squeak and the picture has begun to fade. It’s been 20 years since I lost Carol and rarely an hour passes when I don’t look to see her face. Carol was among the first to go when this dystopia descended around the world. She wanted to help people and now she’s gone. That’s what you get for your goodwill in this world, you get to die and have the world barely notice.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Fiction
Movie Review: 'Good on Paper' A Funny Showcase for Comedian Iliza Schlesinger
Comedian Iliza Schlesinger is a comedian’s comedian. She’s beloved among her comedy peers and that eventually led to fans finding her via her very funny Netflix specials. Now, Iliza Schlesinger is setting out on the acting track hoping that her stand up act will translate into movie stardom. The first step is a brand new Netflix comedy called Good on Paper. The romantic comedy, of sorts, co-stars Ryan Hanson (Veronica Mars), as a ‘nice guy’ who cajoles Schlesinger’s Andrea into a relationship that is filled with deceit of varying degrees.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Geeks
Movie Review: 'F9 The Fast Saga'
I have an emotional connection to the Fast and Furious franchise. As a young critic, I became quite pretentious, quite early on. I wanted to be highbrow and talk about film art and look down my nose at blockbuster movies. I wanted to be a snob though not admit that I was a snob. This turned out to be a soul sucking endeavor as I was something of a fraud. I forced myself to deny the simple pleasure of a spectacle just so I could claim the clout of watching obscure art movies that I wasn’t really enjoying.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Geeks
Classic Movie Review: 'Fast Five' is Sooo Dumb but Sooo Fun
Boy, Fast Five is a dumb movie. Truly, Fast Five is remarkably, unabashedly ludicrous. The dunderheaded stupidity of Fast Five is both a virtue and a curse as it frees the filmmakers from the boundaries of logic, of rationality, of taste; it's dumb to a point where you sympathize with the idiocy as you would sympathize with that one kid in a grade school for whom 2 + 2 is a monumental challenge. On the other hand, Fast Five is so dumb at times it's physically painful to watch. But it's also so much fun that it is downright irresistible.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Geeks
Movie Review: 'Rollers' is a Warm and Inviting Dramatic Comedy
Rollers is the rare movie about an alcoholic character that portrays the often mundane nature of alcoholism. People tend to focus on the rock bottom aspects of alcoholism but rarely is there a story told about someone in the midst of their problems, before everything falls apart, before alcoholism becomes something that ruins a life. Much of the life of an alcoholic can be a rollercoaster ride for family and friends but often alcoholism isn’t something you recognize right away, it’s a series of seemingly unconnected nights of drinking that only begin to add up over a long period of time.
By Sean Patrick5 years ago in Geeks
