Bolt (review)

I figured I was probably overthinking this, and should trust that it would all make sense, but I couldn’t help it. I knew that Bolt was about a dog who believes he has superpowers and actually fights crime alongside his beloved person, but he’s wrong because he’s just the canine star of a hit TV action show. I thought, How can a dog look at a green screen and see something that’s not there?

Street Kings (review)

I’ve been seesawing with myself on Street Kings since… well, since I was sitting in the screening room watching it. It’s not an easy movie to recommend — I can’t honestly be totally gung-ho on it — but it’s not an easy movie to dismiss, either.

Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang (review)

It’s something close to a stroke of genius that once-wunderkind screenwriter Shane Black sought out Robert Downey Jr. to star in his directorial debut. Not because Downey is so achingly sublime an actor and so funkily charismatic a screen presence that it near to makes you want to weep with despair at what brilliance we’ve missed from him over the years during which he wasn’t able to keep his shit together — though he certainly does give us one of the most deliciously shivery-great performances so far this year in *Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang.*

Rize (review)

You’ve heard of the great war between the Los Angeles gangs the Crips and the Bloods, right? But have you heard of the longstanding rivalry between the Clowns and the Krumpers? Neither had I, and I felt a bit like slinking down in my seat in embarrassment while watching *Rize,* the powerfully moving new documentary about this Southern California dance craze.

Entourage: The Complete First Season (review)

It’s very easy to puncture the self-importance of Hollywood types, and this HBO original series never fails to take that easy route, though it cloaks itself in a veneer of intelligence and insight. Vince Chase is the hottest thing to hit the movies since Johnny Depp, but Adrian Grenier (Hart’s War) fails to make us … more…

Constantine (review)

Fifteen years ago Bill and Ted took a seriously silly journey to the underworld, and this one is seriously freakishly disturbing. Imagine if Bosch and Dante were 21st-century geeks and they collaborated on a graphic novel (and maybe that’s a good description of Jamie Delano and Garth Ennis’s book *Hellblazer,* upon which this is based, but I don’t know cuz I’ve never seen it).