American Hustle review: the humor, it burns
Bursting with insanely engaging characters who are impossibly real and impossibly ridiculous whose stories you don’t ever want to end.
crime
Homefront review: ridiculous yet predictable yet kinda fun
Jason Statham teams up with another badass little girl… which makes him almost warm and charming as he kicks the crap out of villains.
Dom Hemingway review
Jude Law is wonderfully deranged and utterly plausible as a rage-filled moron, but the movie leaves him adrift amongst unrealized satire…
Parkland review (London Film Festival)
This poignant and painful ensemble drama about the lesser-known figures caught up in the JFK assassination reminds us that history happens to regular people, too.
The Counsellor review
Almost, but not quite, hilariously demented — if accidentally so — drama about sex and death, and why not to get involved with drug cartels.
Trap for Cinderella review
This overblown melodrama mistakes sensationalism for story, and is yet another repulsive tale of women’s friendships as toxic.
Anno 1790 review: Sherlock in 18th-century Sweden
So awesome that I almost can’t bear it. And so relevant to today: Are the battles between rich and poor, science and superstition, freedom and repression actually endless?
Closed Circuit review: cheating in the War on Terror
Eric Bana and Rebecca Hall are as engaging as ever, and the film raises intriguing issues concerning the “War on Terror”; pity the plot descends into the ridiculous.
Escape Plan review: old-fogey action
Nothing here is as clever as it is desperately trying to be, but Stallone and Schwarzenegger are game to give us a good time.
Blue Caprice (aka The Washington Snipers) review
Thoughtful performances and grim visual elegance aren’t enough to save this portrait of abuse and control twisted into banal evil from becoming too banal to have much bite.
