More to life than action movies


If you as an adult attended Batman vs Superman and Deadpool, but you couldn’t find time to watch Concussion or The Big Short by now, you haven’t prioritized well.

Some folks will see that and have a problem, like there is some legit reason they only watch superhero movies or something. But seriously, these other movies were masterpieces of filmmaking even if you somehow don’t care about the issues. I’m not writing reviews here, or any kind of worthy synopsis; you should watch these.

In Concussion, Will Smith plays a brilliant doctor who uncovered the crippling and life-ending effects of playing pro football. The acting is incredible and gritty, and the story itself is truly fascinating. I was really angry by the end of the movie, learning how the NFL fought to suppress medical evidence that these athletes were dying from football. Unfortunately, now that this information is out there, people are treating it like climate change: “Oh, I think I’ll just ignore that and hopefully I’m gone before my progeny pays for all my mistakes.”

It was an excellent movie, though.

The Big Short is an extremely well-done explanation of the events that led to our most recent financial crisis. You need to watch this one some time soon, because the way that corporations are raping our democracy, they will have to start on a ‘part 2’ soon. Oops, I didn’t mean to start ranting.

The Big Short has a superstar cast of actors and appearances, and even better it is informative and accurate. You can actually learn something useful from watching a movie like this. It’s also really funny, and of course the acting is amazing with all these all-stars. I can probably count the number of movies I instantly re-watched on 1 hand- this is that level.

Nobody’s perfect, though. I felt like Concussion was too soft on the NFL, and didn’t really end with any incredible statement, and of course I’m disappointed in the ultimate exposure of the film. In The Big Short, I think there was a bit of artistic license built into the ‘douchey’ characters to make them worse than they needed to be, but now that I think about it, they might be.

Each movie is a great pic. They are very entertaining to someone who wants to be mentally engaged the whole time. Don’t get me wrong, though- I LOVED Deadpool.