The Skolney Blog

1986: I'm not sure there is another film quite as quintessentially 80s as Top Gun. This film made a superstar, launched a major directing career, and added to one of the great producer runs of all time. I personally was very late in ever getting around to watching Top Gun. By the time I did, probably a good decade after it came out, I largely knew the movie through its brilliant parody Hot Shots. I mean, I still can't watch Top Gun without chuckling at some of the moments directly spoofed.  Tom Cruise had already had a couple of notable movies, but this was his first blockbuster smash, that cemented him as a major movie star. He's certainly given better performances, but he's so effortlessly good here as the cocky flyboy that it stuck as his screen persona for a long time. Tony Scott was almost a total unknown as a director, having made only 1 film to that point, but he was a perfect choice by producers Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer. Scott's style wa...

In theaters: MICHAEL Like almost every "controversial" movie these days that riles up the internet, Michael is really neither good enough nor bad enough to be worth all the fuss. The good: Both actors playing Michael are good. Some of the recreations of performances are enjoyable. A handful of scenes actually try to make us understand Michael as a person. The bad: Even if you don't know anything about the production, it has a veneer of inauthenticity. And it's so uncreative, just following the biopic formula every step of the way. MORTAL KOMBAT 2 I remembered virtually nothing about the original of this rebooted franchise from a few years ago, but I don't think that mattered much. This is a to the point movie that delivers a bunch of crazy fights and some wild kills.  IN THE GREY The ever prolific Guy Ritchie's latest, a way too convoluted thriller about covert ops and Middle Eastern bad guys and a bunch of stuff that I didn't follow. Worth it mostly for a...

Guess what, everyone! A new Star Wars movie is here! Which means only one thing anymore: CULTURE WAR!!!! Yes, because no franchise (not even Marvel) has become more of an object for internet fandoms to whine and argue about incessantly, often for political reasons. Yes, how DARE a franchise that began as a Vietnam allegory and featured bad guys called "stormtroopers" insert anything even vaguely political into its product! I loathed the discourse around the prequels back in the day, but at least that was mostly left to the films themselves. The Disney Star Wars era has proven that the prequel era was not an outlier. Star Wars fans exist to bitch. They hate everything. If it came out after 1980, it is shit. And now in this era we have all the added whining from the deplorables, the ones who hold extra disdain for all things Star Wars now that there were projects fronted by women, or prominently featuring any non-straight white male 100% of the time. And when the overseer of al...

Just over 2 weeks ago, Minnesota sports had one of the coolest nights we have ever had, a truly unique convergence of teams and stakes, with the Timberwolves and Wild both clinching 1st round playoff series wins at home. But the problem with winning in the 1st round is that you then have a 2nd round. Never before had the Wolves and Wild both advanced in the same year. Could they do it again and against superior competition?  Well, this IS Minnesota sports. Even when we DO get some playoff success (Minneapolis Miracle, the Twins 2023 wild card win), it doesn't sustain itself. And in the span of 3 days this week, the championship-less (hell, finals appearance-less) Wolves and Wild were once again brushed aside, so some other team that isn't from Minnesota can win a championship. Each found their own way to add to our state's big 4 misery. The Wild, in the 2nd round for the first time since 2015, faced the Colorado Avalanche, league leaders in points, and generally believed to...

Every other major sports market gets these days at least somewhat regularly. Forget titles, just advancing in the playoffs. Many get this joy through multiple teams.  Not us.  Minnesota is a cursed sports market, a reality that becomes more and more of a burden through every season of unfulfilled expectations and misplaced hope, and absurd circumstances that lead to losses. There was little reason to think the last night of April would be any different. But there was a wrinkle this time, a very rare coincidence of scheduling that had both the Timberwolvea and the Wild at home, both playing a game 6 up 3-2, and thus both in position to advance to round 2 in their respective marathon playoffs. The Wild had the more hopeful situation, since they were healthy. The Wolves, man, they were already down Anthony Edwards and Donte DiVincenzo, and then we found out Ayo Dosunmu was going to be out too. How were the Wolves possibly going to get this done? The Wolves game had some reasonabl...