Movie Review by Fr. Tom Condon, O.P.

Eighth Grade is an independent movie that’s getting a lot of buzz this summer. It tells the story of Kayla Day (Elsie Fisher), a shy girl, awkwardly trying to make it through eighth grade and on to high school. Kayla lives with her single dad Mark (Josh Hamilton), who is a bit of a nerd, but tries hard to be a good father.

Kayla spends a good bit of time making her own You Tube videos, giving advice to girls her own age. In the videos she tries to sound like the confident girl she wants to be. She’s actually trying to convince herself by the videos.
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Movie Review by Fr. Tom Condon, O.P.

I remember as a kid watching the classic Mission: Impossible 1960’s TV series. Each episode put agent Jim Phelps and his team in perilous situations in unnamed Eastern European or South American countries. They always made it back home safely in time to fight Cold War enemies again the following week. And of course, there was the iconic theme music, as exciting as the TV show itself.

In 1996 Mission: Impossible made it to the big screen, with Tom Cruise playing Ethan Hunt, head of the Impossible Mission (IM) team, choosing to accept dangerous secret missions. The first three movies of the franchise were fairly entertaining action films. However, just as the franchise was getting stale (MI 3 was the low point), and Cruise was showing his age, something amazing happened:  the movies got better. Way better! Parts 4 (Ghost Protocol) and 5 (Rogue Nation) and now Fallout have continued to get better and better. Despite being hard to follow at times, Fallout is a hugely entertaining summer blockbuster. At 56, Cruise insists on doing his own stunts, and he is absolutely amazing, jumping from one building to another in London and hanging from a helicopter over Kashmir. I understand that Cruise broke an ankle doing his stunts. I worry about him if the series continues!
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