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
Mortal Engines
⭐️⭐️1/2 WARNING: Possible Spoilers Ahead! Fantasy has always been one of the most popular genres for storytellers to work in, and audiences to experience. The advantage to fantasy is that the world in which the [...]
Anna and the Apocalypse
Do you like High School Musical or La La Land, but wish they had more… zombies? If you answered yes, then boy do I have the perfect movie for you. Anna and the Apocalypse is [...]
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ by Ben Rothrock With the rise of live action superhero movies, we often forget the true nature of characters’ comic book origins. We associate our favorite heroes with a more serious environment thanks to [...]
The Favourite
Acclaimed director Yorgos Lanthimos blends a mix of delirious humor with his usual approach of bleakness and despair in this unique period piece that is filed with skillful direction, astonishing visuals, along with effective and [...]
Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle
⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2 The Jungle Book has been a staple in children’s literature for many decades. Even though the book is comprised of many stories with different characters, the three stories about the young boy Mowgli are [...]
The House That Jack Built
Currently being sanctioned by the MPAA, Lars von Trier's new film is certainly going to stir up controversy among audiences and critics. It is an audacious and deeply disturbing film with a career defining performance [...]
The Possession of Hannah Grace
⭐️⭐️ When it comes to demonic possession, most movies portray the initial effects of said possession. It’s become common place for films to focus on the character and their encounters with an evil force bent [...]
At Eternity’s Gate
Aesthetically impressive to the eye and fragmented by design, artist and filmmaker Julian Schnabels interior exploration of Vincent Van Gogh's final years of his life is a artful, roving, and richly experimental film that avoids [...]
Ralph Breaks the Internet: Wreck-It Ralph 2
by Ben Rothrock In 2012, Disney gave us Wreck-It Ralph; the story of a video game villain who sets out on a journey to prove he can be a hero. One of the best of [...]
The Ten Best Films of 2017
The DeFacto Film Reviews chief film critics, Robert Butler and Noah Damron share their favorite films of the year. As the country continues to be more divisive and polarized everyday than it has in [...]
Blade Runner 2049
Blade Runner 2049 (2017, USA, d. Denis Villeneuve, 163 minutes) 3.5/4 Stars 1982’s Blade Runner has become one of the most polarizing and discussed films of the past several decades. From numerous re-edits [...]
TIFF 2017 Review: I, Tonya
I, Tonya (2017, USA, d. Craig Gillespie, 119 minutes) 3.5/4 Stars Anyone who was alive in the early 90’s remembers the giant scandal involving figure skater, Tonya Harding, and the vicious attack against [...]
TIFF 2017 Review: mother!
mother! (2017 USA, d. Darren Aronofsky, 121 minutes) 4/4 Stars To quote TIFF Artistic Director, Cameron Bailey, mother! essentially begins where Black Swan ends. If that doesn’t intrigue you at all, then this [...]
Tulip Fever
Tulip Fever (2017, USA, UK, d. Justin Chadwick, 107 minutes) 1.5/4 Stars Tulip Fever is a hot mess, there’s no way of getting around it. As a film that has sat on the [...]