Movies
Movie Review
Stone Sour
This confusing new film makes good actors go bad
October 28th, 2010
Nothing changes overnight. Which, I guess, explains why the sad decline of Robert De Niro’s acting has taken so long to witness. It’s been too many years to count since Taxi Driver and Raging Bull, and despite a few honorable but quickly forgotten roles in flops, this once-revered actor has done nothing worth writing home about. Read more »
Movie Review
A Hornet’s Nest of a Story
The third film adaptation of Stieg Larsson’s famous trilogy stings the viewer
October 28th, 2010
The same decrease in quality between the first and second installments of Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy continues here. Where the first story, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, had taut criss-crossing subplots of boundless significance, the final act of the trilogy is little more than a tepid courtroom drama with some willy-nilly spectacle thrown in for good measure. Read more »
Movie Review
Jackass 3D (R)
★★★★☆
October 28th, 2010
What began as a juvenile MTV series in 2000 has gone on to inspire laughter via the Jackass franchise’s ever-funnier movies. As with the first two films, a carnival atmosphere of perverse male-centric performance art comedy pervades. It’s just funny watching people who are willing to get stung by bees. Yes, it’s over-the-top-gross-out humor but if you can’t laugh at this, you can’t laugh at nothin’. Read more »
Movie Review
Beyond the Veil
Director Clint Eastwood is the angel of death in this fascinating film
October 21st, 2010
Shifting gears to a softer, gauzier mood, Clint Eastwood’s Hereafter finds the masterful icon charting new terrain. Slavish fans of his rugged Westerns, left-wing war canvases and kidney-punch gangster epics may be appalled to find him in a reflective frame of mind about life after death and the supernatural. Truly, romantic confections with soft marshmallow centers are not his strong suit (remember the god-awful Bridges of Madison County?), but not to worry. Read more »
Movie Review
Three Dimensions of Gross-out Humor
Johnny Knoxville and team will make you laugh and gag
October 21st, 2010
What began as a juvenile MTV series in 2000 has gone on to inspire laughter and groans around the world via the Jackass franchise’s progressively more hilarious movies. Although in Jackass 3D director Jeff Tremaine doesn’t take full advantage of the third film’s 3-D effects, he does allow some window-breaking spectacle to deliver objects—a projectile dildo, for example—into the audience. Read more »
Movie Review
Conviction (R)
★★★☆☆
October 21st, 2010
Tony Goldwyn’s deceptively rote telling of one woman’s 18-year effort to exonerate her brother Kenny (a stellar Sam Rockwell) for a 1980 murder he didn’t commit packs quite an emotional punch. Kenny’s sister (Hilary Swank) studies to become an attorney for the sole purpose of getting her brother released. While Conviction is far from a refined real-life drama, it does pay off on its emotional promise. Read more »
Movie Review
It’s Kind of a Good Movie
This bright mental institution love story is good for a laugh
October 14th, 2010
Poor Craig. He’s depressed. He has suicidal dreams. His goes to the best school in New York City. And his friends love him. So what’s wrong? He’s 16! It’s Kind of a Funny Story opens with an entertaining dream sequence where Craig (Keir Gilchrist) walks out onto a bridge, ready to end it all. Before Craig can jump, his parents (Parenthood’s Lauren Graham and comedian Jim Gaffigan) and his little sister appear on the bridge, trying to talk him down. Not only do they love him, but they paid a lot of money for his bicycle and if he kills himself, who will take care of it? Read more »
Movie Review
Secretariat (PG)
★★★☆☆
October 14th, 2010
This dramatic film follows the relationship between Penny Chenery Tweedy (Diane Lane) and the thoroughbred she guides to racing success in the early ’70s. Crafted as a PG-rated entertainment, as opposed to the PG-13 Seabiscuit (2003), this is a polished family movie. Lane and John Malkovich (as a veteran horse trainer) deliver showcase performances, and choreographed horserace sequences capture the excitement of the races. Read more »
Movies
All Climax and No Impact
Red stands for ‘retired, extremely dull’ in this abysmal action flick
October 14th, 2010
Director Robert Schwentke’s adaptation of a DC Comics action/comedy graphic novel is nothing but a series of creaky narrative half-steps. The result, Red, leaves no cohesive story for an audience to invest in. Read more »
Movie Review
The Social Network (PG-13)
★★★★★
October 14th, 2010
Everybody will love David Fincher’s fast-paced drama about the meteoric rise of Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook. Jesse Eisenberg gives Zuckerberg an acid-tongued and fast-twitch cyberpunk attitude. And Justin Timberlake’s performance is awesome. Aaron Sorkin’s dazzling script toggles between law office depositions and flashback sequences that tell the whole story. Context and tone are everything in this pitch-perfect drama. Read more »
