Walking with Dinosaurs: The 3D Movie review: where is an extinction-level event when you need one?
Sub-vaudeville 1950s sitcom humor and a horrifically dated message about boys as heroes and girls as the heroes’ property. You know, for kids!
coming of age
Carrie review: women who hate women
I’m struck by the perversity of a story four decades old about religious misogyny and basic feminism and the perniciousness of bullying that still feels fresh and relevant…
Frozen review: I have chills
The showstopping central musical number is a glorious anthem to female power and ability… and so, in fact, is the whole wonderful movie. Disney is finally getting it. (new DVD/VOD US/Can)
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire review: reluctant heroine
A devastating indictment of pop culture as propaganda — about its power and the limits of its powers — and an upending of the typical teen-girl romance movie.
Trap for Cinderella review
This overblown melodrama mistakes sensationalism for story, and is yet another repulsive tale of women’s friendships as toxic.
Chasing Mavericks review
This gentle father-son(ish) tale about an expert surfer and his teen apprentice is a rare “family” movie that isn’t preachy or insipid.
Ender’s Game review: big ideas, small heart
My soul was never stirred. My spirit did not soar. My intellect did twitch a bit in ways that made my heart ache disagreeably, however.
Blue Is the Warmest Color review (London Film Festival)
There’s nothing particularly surprising here. Not even the rather tediously obvious 15-minute all-nude lesbian fuckfest.
Side by Side review (London Film Festival) (world premiere)
Misses more marks than it attempts to hit, but there’s a refreshing sweetness to this child’s-eye view of grief and tragedy.
Camp 14: Total Control Zone review: George Orwell was an optimist
The only person known to have escaped from a North Korean re-education camp reveals some 1984-level shit, except it’s worse, because it’s not fiction…
