trailer break: ‘12 Rounds’

Take a break from work: watch a trailer… How is this not Die Hard with a Vengeance, with the tests and the tricks and all? How shameless can they be about reminding you that the whole movie is stolen from another movie? Or maybe they prefer that you equate this in your head with Die … more…

“you racist melon farmer”

Die Hard With a Vengeance is on TNT right now, and since that’s a basic cable channel all the profanity has been tamed way down. And so Samuel L. Jackson just called Bruce Willis a “racist melon farmer.” I don’t know what that means, but it’s pretty funny. MORE: Somehow, “Yippie-kai-ay, my friend” just doesn’t … more…

16 Blocks (review)

Harrison Ford should take some lessons from Bruce Wills: this is how you do “action” after, um, a certain age…

Mr. & Mrs. Smith (review)

Oh my god could this be any more delicious? It’s hot and sexy and stuff blows up real good and there’s genuine *wit* and smarts and luscious allowance for the mysteries of lusty attraction and even lustier strife between men and women and did I mention it’s hot and sexy even though there’s hardly any actual sex worth mentioning actually in the movie?

Bad Boys II (review)

Of course it’s Michael Bay-ariffic in that adorably ultraviolent, homophobic kinda way, all vehicles exploding for no apparent reason and deeply repressed male emotions, the kind of stuff that can’t help but lead one to the conclusion that Michael Bay is denying that he has some serious issues with, really, just about everything he comes into contact with: women, men, cars, swimming pools, family pets, home electronics.

The French Connection (review)

The French Connection is Patient Zero in Hollywood’s epidemic of blood, guts, and mayhem, the Typhoid Mary that spread gunplay, car chases, and psychotic cops throughout filmdom. Like Typhoid Mary, though, The French Connection has only a mild, nonfatal case of the sickness that continues to rage through movies. This film demonstrates how smart action movies can be, and points out how dumbed down most of them have gotten.