reviews

What is the Matrix? If you have to ask, just take a blue pill and put a cold cloth on your forehead and go lie down and take a nap, cuz there’s no way you’re gonna be able to catch up here. *The Matrix Reloaded* jumps head-first without explanation into, well, it’s kinda too much to go into.

So you think you saw *Daddy Day Care* 20 years ago, when it was called *Mr. Mom*? How wrong you are, my friend — how wrong you are. Just refer to this handy chart to discover all the differences between these two films.

It’s cuz I’m such a dork myself, I think, that Christopher Guest’s movies always ring so true to me, for all that they’re sublimely, subtly silly — they’re about people so immersed in doing what they love that they have no idea how absurd they are (which doesn’t bode well for me, I know).

Too bad for everyone who’s not a geek, who’ll dismiss *X2: X-Men United* as nonsense without even checking it out because it’s comic-booky or “just” a summer blockbuster or aimed at The Kids. Too bad for them, because they’ll miss out on one of the more germane metaphoric portrayals of the terrifying political and social landscape we’re living in today in the United States.

But it’s gotta be a parody, right? I mean, all horror movies are pretty much parodies of themselves by now, and this is gonna turn out to be a sly and subtle commentary on our expectations for horror films and will bring us some enlightenment about the kind of demented people who say things bloody murder onscreen can be ‘really really gross and cool.’

In our hyperkinetic entertainment environment, where fast and loud and obvious is never fast, loud, or obvious enough, Neil Jordan’s languorous *The Good Thief* is even more decadently delightful than it might otherwise be. Not that there’s anything necessarily inherently wrong with having your ears assaulted and your heart pounding while you hover on the edge of your seat… but too much of it can be exhausting.

There are enough Douglases onscreen here — Michael (One Night at McCool’s), dad Kirk as his dad, son Cameron as his son, mom Diana (Planes, Trains and Automobiles) as his mom — that it’s easy to imagine we’re getting the inside scoop on the real-life Douglas soap opera. We’re not, but Jesse Wigutow’s fictional screenplay … more…

As slick and sharp as an Armani suit, this scam of a flick is so in love with the art of the con that it forgets to make us care about the con artists. Still, there’s a certain joy to be had in watching fine artists at work. Wiseass grifter Jake Vig (cool, assured Edward … more…

It’s bitingly ironic and casts a cold, contemptuous eye on things like hypocrisy and racism and cruelty, and the unknown kid actors are terrific and the adult cast — pretty big names, all of them — are having a blast, and you know, you could sneak in without a kid and still have a good time even if you haven’t read the book and had never even heard of it and have to slink down in your seat feeling really old and out of touch with what the kids are into today.

Ancient Chinese secret, huh? A Tibetan monk (force-of-nature Chow Yun-Fat: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) charged with protecting a scroll with deadly powers takes on a streetwise pickpocket (appealing doofus Seann William Scott: Evolution) as his apprentice on the same day the ex-Nazi (a scenery-chewing Karel Roden: 15 Minutes) who needs the scroll to take over … more…