Shadow Dancer (review)
Even the marvelous performances by Clive Owen and Andrea Riseborough are not enough to ratchet up the drama to the level of the totally gripping, which is a damn shame and something of a puzzler…
historical
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter movie review: met on a great battlefield
Timur Bekmambetov treats his pile-on of pulpy historical pseudo revisionism sincerely, but cheerfully so: its subversively gentle sense of humor is never so earnest that it stumbles over into cheese.
Rock of Ages (review)
The story is almost beside the point, because Tom Cruise’s nude torso that I could be running my hands all over and because the young kittenish leads in this story cobbled together around awesome 80s hair-band stadium anthems are the weakest part of it.
Free Men (Les hommes libres) (review)
I kept hoping to get caught up in this untold story of the French Resistance in more than a coolly intellectual way, but that never happened.
Men in Black III (review)
A time travel plot can feel like a huge narrative swindle if not handled correctly. But there’s no big do-over button hovering over this tale. Nope: the timey-wimey stuff here is clever, funny, thrilling, even poignant.
Dark Shadows (review)
Hoorah for Tim Burton and the new nadir of narcissistic awfulness he achieves here. Dark Shadows dares to be nothing but the wisp of its own conceit.
The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists!/Band of Misfits (review)
Implies that science! and scientists! could be fun! and adventurous! Oh noes, the kiddies! Brainwashed into thinking science is awesome! Who shall protect them from such horrors?
Titanic 3D movie review: a human story
I had just begun my career as a film critic when Titanic was first released in late 1997. So I missed it, back then, what it was about James Cameron’s magnificent movie that was (and still is) so extraordinary.
In Darkness (review)
It’s The Diary of Anne Frank, only with sewers. Elegantly presented, chock full of moments of dreadful suspense in a horrible milieu, and buoyed by strikingly naturalistic performances…
The Raven (review)
There is too much awesome in this fantastic (and fantastical) premise for a proper geek girl such as myself to be properly rational about her anticipation. I know I expected too much. But, you know, the movie, it sort of promised a lot.
