About Defacto Film Reviews
Defacto Film Reviews is a unique site where the film critics are also filmmakers themselves. It will feature weekly reviews as well as lists and more.
Originally formed in 2002 under Defactoweb.com, our website’s chief film critic is Robert Joseph Butler. His top ten lists were featured under Movie City News. His reviews have also been published at Michigan Movie Magazine and on Michigan’s longest running film school website, MPIFilm.com. His reviews have also been featured and published in The Oakland Press as well, which is one of Michigan’s largest newspaper publications.
He later went on to become an award-winning filmmaker of several independent short films including such festival hits as The Spirit of Isabel and Within, which won the Audience Choice Award at the 2015 Cinetopia International Film Festival. His short film “The Girl on the Mat” won Best Screenplay at the 2017 Queens World Film Festival. His most recent feature length movie, “Blood Immortal,” won Best Horror Feature Film at the 24th annual Indie Gathering International Film Festival and is now available to own on DVD and is available on Digital streaming platforms.
Using grassroots support, the site is devoted to celebrating independent and art-house cinema, as well as to high-crafted films that tell engaging stories with vision, focus, and skill.
Defacto Film Reviews is a unique case where the film critics are also filmmakers themselves. We will give readers comprehensible, honest, and erudite analysis of each film.
Rating System–4 Stars
Masterpiece/Top 10 Worthy
Exceptional
Quality
Mediocre
Poor
Reviews published in
The Good Liar
When we first meet Roy Courtnay (Ian McKellen) and Betty McLeish (Helen Mirren), they are on a first date, having met via an internet dating service. Roy quickly states that what he hates most in [...]
Ford v Ferrari
Making quite the switch in gears from his critical and financial game-changer, 2017’s “Logan”, Director James Mangold has now decided to tackle an inspiring, true American story. Set in 1966, when the Ford motor company [...]
The Irishman
Martin Scorsese's "The Irishman" is truly a triumphant work of ambition and grandeur, and not just because of its groundbreaking de-aging digital effects that transform its older lead actors back into much younger looking men. [...]
Spotlight of the Week-The Sacrifice
Instead of resting at home, or laying up in a hospital bed, iconic director Andrei Tarkovsky was on set directing a film during the last stages of his life when he crafted his final masterpiece [...]
Last Christmas
What is Last Christmas about? Second chances, Brexit, the homeless crisis, or George Michael? It seems no one from director Paul Feig to screenwriters Byrony Kimmings and Emma Thompson knew. In the 103 minute runtime [...]
Doctor Sleep
Director Mike Flanagan has spent most of his career attempting to untangle the endless web that is the human psyche. Like many classic filmmakers, he attempts to untangle these webs through the genre landscape. With [...]
Spotlight of the Week-Once Upon a Time in America
Easily a piece of landmark cinema from the 1980's, the final film by Sergio Leone was truly his magnum opus. After taking 10 years to make, from the in-development process of numerous re-writes and drafts [...]
Dolemite Is My Name
Based on the life of Blaxploitation actor, comedian, and pioneering independent movie producer Rudy Ray Moore, Director Craig Brewer's (Hustle and Flow, Black Snake Moan) latest film "Dolemite Is My Name" chronicles the behind the [...]
Terminator: Dark Fate
"Terminator" sequels have largely not had the best reputation. Since 1991's "T2: Judgement Day", every installment in the decaying franchise has either flopped at the box office or been met with less-than-kind reviews from fans [...]
Motherless Brooklyn
In New York City during the 1950s, change is happening. The divides between races among the populace is causing protest and violence to spiral out of control. The rich are looking to the future, while [...]
JoJo Rabbit
Once you watch the trailer and read the concept of Taika Waititi's "JoJo Rabbit" your mind asks if this film will even work? Does it even have to work? Does it even have to [...]
Spotlight of the Week-Martin
Often when the name George A. Romero is brought up in a film discussion, such masterpieces that instantly come to mind are his zombie titles such as,"Night of the Living Dead", "Day of the Dead", [...]
The Lighthouse
After making a big splash with both critics and audiences with his directorial debut “The Witch”, writer/director Robert Eggers has returned with the anticipated nautical nightmare, “The Lighthouse”. Shot on actual 35mm Black and White [...]
Pain and Glory
Every so often do we see a great auteur do their own riff on Federico Fellini's "8 1/2", the 1963 masterpiece movie that ultimately launched the meta, film within a film approach that would be [...]
Maleficent: Mistress of Evil
Five years ago, Angelina Jolie starred in a live action remake of Disney’s classic film, Sleeping Beauty. But this time, the film told the origins of the film’s villain, the titular Maleficent. The film presented [...]
Gemini Man
Director Ang Lee has always been known to push boundaries in his work. Whether it be the breathtaking "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon", "Brokeback Mountain" or more recently with 2012's "Life of Pi". Lee has had [...]
Zombieland: Double Tap
Zombieland, USA, 2019. 10 years have passed since we last saw our heroes Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), Wichita (Emma Stone), and Little Rock (Abagail Breslin). In the time spent since the first film, [...]
The Laundromat
Steven Soderbergh explores the true-life, largely reported Panama Papers scandal with his second feature released this year, "The Laundromat", though with a first-rate cast, the end results are very dull and never cohesive. Taking the [...]