Ex Machina movie review: damselbot in distress
There’s nothing fresh or even usefully true in its cartoonish dichotomy about men, but this pseudo-SF flick will expound upon it with pretentious tedium.
21st sci fi
Her movie review: manic pixel dream girl
It’s the rise of the machines as romantic dramedy, and the Singularity as romantic tragedy. It’s the nicest, gentlest sci-fi horror film ever.
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.
Seeking a Friend for the End of the World movie review: deep impact
The heightened emotions and outrageous urgency of rom-coms are actually appropriate here. All the absurdities that define the genre — not accidentally but deliberately — suddenly work in its favor.
Wall-E movie review: soul of the machine
Wall-E is practically religion. It’s spiritual in the secular sense, asking us to contemplate the great things we are capable of, and how we so frequently fail to even try to live up to that potential.
Idiocracy movie review: stupid is as stupid does
‘Idiocracy’ is even more trenchant, more damning, more — hell, I’ll say it — ‘revolutionary’ than ‘Office Space.’
The Day After Tomorrow movie review: disaster therapy
Compulsively compelling, in the same way that you just can’t help but glance through the Weekly World News while you’re standing online at the supermarket checkout.
Twister movie review: storm troopers
One of my very favorite movies, a superb example of the genus Popcorn Flick, unforgettable as it puts onscreen imagery we’ve never seen before. This is as close as I get to turning my brain off at the movies.
Last Night movie review: TEOTWAWKI
But if you knew when we as a species were going to buy the farm, how would you spend your final hours? That’s the question Canadian filmmaker Don McKellar asks in Last Night, which he wrote, directed, and stars in. Sort of the flip side of movies like Armageddon and Deep Impact, Last Night focuses not on the heroes trying to save the planet from certain doom but instead peeks in at how ordinary people are facing the end of the world.
