It’s a sorry commentary on the state of contemporary film that the script for the best-written movie so far this year is more than a century old. It’s arrant nonsense, of course, but even this hundred-year-old nonsense is fresher, sillier, more vibrant, more delicious than anything of recent vintage. Combine that classic play with an … more…

The Fantasy Film Library contains flicks like MANT, Sand Pirates of the Sahara, Habeus Corpus, and the Tom Baxter adventure The Purple Rose of Cairo: movies that exist only within other movies, ideally movies you’re dying to see. Add a new one to the archive: Codename: Dragonfly, which looks like the best kind of glorious … more…

Even the constant daylight at the top of the world feels relentless, depressing. Of course, Will is convinced that it’s the sunlight creeping around the window shades that’s keeping him awake through the bright Alaskan nights, and not the secrets that plague him.

So, what’s the verdict, my fellow faithful? ‘Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones’ is not great… but it’s great. Sure, it’s got problems, most of them stemming from the facts that George Lucas is a terrible writer who should never be allowed anywhere near Final Draft ever again, and a mostly terrible director who should never be allowed anywhere near a camera ever again. But these are minor quibbles.

I haven’t read V.S. Naipaul’s novel, but I’m shocked to learn that it clocks in at a slim 224 pages — this film adaptation has the feel of a huge, sprawling novel too greatly condensed. Director Ismail Merchant — one half of Merchant-Ivory — and screenwriter Caryl Phillips cram the tale of Ganesh (Aasif Mandvi) … more…

Ugh. Woody Allen has officially become unbearable with Hollywood Ending. The icky, uncomfortable, skirt-chasing dotage into which he began to sink in last year’s The Curse of the Jade Scorpion continues unabated here, and it’s compounded by a blatant disregard for logic, humor, or character development when such might take the focus off Woody himself.

The question was raised round this time last year: Would Memento have been as interesting run forward? As here’s the answer, kinda, in The Salton Sea, a stylishly brutal tale of revenge, trumpets, and exploding meth labs. Val Kilmer is a burnt-out speed freak who snitches to the cops. No, wait, he’s a grief-stricken musician … more…