Non-Stop review: your popcorn bucket doubles as a floatation device
There’s a delicious cleverness to this very silly but very entertaining flick.
suspense/thriller
Stranger by the Lake review: a cautionary tale about bad boys
As an exercise in style, this minimalist noir erotic thriller is pretty cool. But it loses its way somewhere around the midpoint and never quite finds it again.
Easy Money and Easy Money: Hard to Kill review: easy money… isn’t
Easy Money is a smart, affecting, slow burn of a movie, a spectacular example of Nordic noir. The sequel suffers by comparison, though.
The Monuments Men review: saving private collections (and public art)
As jaunty as Jean Dujardin’s beret, but in a sincere, old-fashioned kind of way. It could almost have been rediscovered from the 1940s…
After the Dark review: most illogical
A thrilling combination of drama, near-science-fiction, suspense, coming-of-age agita, and intellectual exploration of ideas. Pity it derails itself.
Oscar Nominated Live-Action Shorts (86th Academy Awards) review
My favorite of the five films is the British “The Voorman Problem,” starring Martin Freeman and Tom Hollander in a hilarious and provocative bit of speculative fantasy…
Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit review: CIA you again
Why reboot remains a question, but this is a smart popcorn thriller with a surprisingly sensitive performance by Chris Pine, and a wonderfully badass one by Kevin Costner.
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.
Gravity movie review: nowhere to go but down (London Film Festival)
Stunningly accomplished space survival adventure: heartstopping and heartbreaking; the best film of 2013. Just don’t call it science fiction.
Trap for Cinderella review
This overblown melodrama mistakes sensationalism for story, and is yet another repulsive tale of women’s friendships as toxic.
