Review Day

There are no major spoilers in these reviews.

Dope (R):
This movie is about a nerdy group of friends obsessed with 90s hip-hop culture who inadvertently get caught up in a drug deal. Hilarity ensues although the movie teeters on the edge of being too serious sometimes. Free on Netflix.

Final Grade: B

Imitation Game (PG-13):
I enjoyed this movie about World War II codebreakers although it wasn't rigorously factual. It does a good job of explaining the encryption problem in simple terms and keeps the plot moving. Benedict Cumberbatch does a good job being an asshole, while Keira Knightley has a mostly empty role designed to keep the movie from being a sausagefest.

Final Grade: B

The Big Short (R):
I didn't care much for this movie, maybe because I watched it too close to Margin Call. The movie is stylish and I understand the framing device of using distracting cinematography to compare to how everyone was distracted when the mortgage crises was actually happening, but no amount of talking down to the audience will ever make the dry details of the underlying scam interesting.

Final Grade: C+

Self-Explanatory by Classified:
This is a fun CD by a Canadian hip-hop artist with 3-4 catchy tunes on it. The album is hindered by the fact that it's supposedly a Choose Your Own Adventure story where you skip to different tracks at certain decision points. However, this just pads out the CD with unnecessary dialogue, and I'll probably never listen to the songs in album order once it's on a USB drive.

Final Grade: B-