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Recent Reviews
- Good Kill – An artistic exploration of drone assassinations
- Citizenfour – a fascinating and important topic, but a disappointing documentary
- Interstellar – Probably the best film of the year, certainly the most enjoyable!
- Laggies – a delightful little film about late-blooming misfits
- Two Days, One Night – it’s (almost) exactly what you expect it to be
- Whiplash – a disgusting, stupidly manipulative piece of absurdity.
- Still Alice – big stars, big production, but still just a Hallmark movie of the week
- Wild – it’s surprisingly well-made and fun to watch
- Black Sea – diverting, but sadly predictable
- Birdman (Or the Expected Emptiness of Pretension)
- Mr. Turner – Planet of the Ape
- The Imitation Game – It’s an abomination
- A Brief Word on the 2014 Oscar-Nominated Animated Shorts
- Kill The Messenger – The important and tragic story of Gary Webb, the mainstream media, and the CIA
- This is Where I Leave You – the latest in a long line of “family reunion” movies
- A review of summer cinema – it was pretty grim!
- The Trip to Italy – It never should have been made
- A Most Wanted Man – Superficially entertaining, but poorly-made and overrated
- Magic in the Moonlight – It’s pissing me off!
- The Purge: Anarchy – Surprisingly, it’s rather good
- I Origins – ambitious and entertaining
- Boyhood – a bit one dimensional, but its one dimension is lovely, impressive and fun to experience
- Obvious Child – cute, dignified and gutsy
- Snowpiercer – a fantastic, riveting science fiction action allegory
- Edge of Tomorrow – it’s fairly entertaining
- Begin Again – confronting the future of pop music head-on
- The Fault in Our Stars – not super-moving, but definitely enjoyable
- Hellion – a gritty tale of fucked up parents and children
- Night Moves – a cool, subtle portrayal of hippy-liberal activism turned violent
- Cold In July – an outstandingly fun and unusual film, and a paean for the 1980s
- Austenland – so horrible, I’m speechless
- Elena – 80 minutes of torture
- Lucky Them – Toni Collette takes center stage and lights up the screen!
- Belle – it means well, but God is it slow (and dull)
- Finding Vivian Maier – an okay documentary on a fascinating artist
- The German Doctor (Wakolda) – Diverting, but feels more than a little contrived
- Chef – it’s heart is in the right place
- Jodorowsky’s Dune – a bizarre and amazing documentary
- Hateship, Loveship – it goes down well
- Divergent – entertaining, but there’s a lot wrong with it
Category Archives: 2013
Philomena – A nice little movie
Philomena is a nice little movie, there’s no other way to put it. It has the light feeling of a B-film, but a good B-film, an enjoyable one. It’s based on a true story that is both interesting and surprising, … Continue reading
Posted in 2013
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Oblivion – a good story idea, diluted by unfocused and uninspired execution
Last night I finally caught up with Oblivion on DVD. Oblivion has a pretty solid and reasonably compelling story idea, laid out in the film’s initial narration: 60 years ago, Earth was attacked by aliens who were beaten through the … Continue reading
Posted in 2013
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About Time – a cute, charming, unmanipulative little film
My wife and I went to see About Time under the mistaken impression that it was a Mike Newel film. Actually, it’s a Richard Curtis film, the same guy that made the extremely manipulative yet undeniably trendsetting film Love Actually, … Continue reading
Posted in 2013
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The Motel Life – exploring the tension between family obligation and personal dreams
The Motel Life is not your average movie, nor is it your average modern indie film. It definitely made quite an impression on both my wife and me. It reminded us of the gusty old indie films of the 1990’s. … Continue reading
Posted in 2013
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Capital – a dazzling film from the master of the political thriller
Costa-Gavras’ Capital is an amazing film, really amazing. I saw it in theaters twice in the span of a week – I can’t remember the last time a movie struck me enough to warrant a second theater viewing. I often on this … Continue reading
Posted in 2013
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Dallas Buyers Club – a really good film about the early AIDS crisis
Dallas Buyers Club is a movie about social injustice and the power (and limitations) of anarchic social activism. It’s a fascinating (and true) story, well-told and featuring brilliantly acted lead roles. I’m sure Jared Leto will win Best Supporting Actor for his … Continue reading
Posted in 2013
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Don Jon – It was so close to being great!
Don Jon is Joseph Gordon Levitt’s first film as a writer and a director, and he came so close to making a great film. But my wife and I both felt he lost his nerve at the critical juncture, and … Continue reading
Posted in 2013
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Escape Plan – fabulous fun, and quite subversive
Escape Plan was panned by the critics, but normal people seem to like it. And they should: the movie is just plain fun, start to finish. The very entertaining story presses on without much regard for total believability or tying up … Continue reading
Posted in 2013
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The Counselor – Another pointless, idiotic film about Mexican drug cartels
Cormac McCarthy clearly wrote The Counselor as a kind of grand poem, mentally inflating his subject to the level of Greek tragedy. The dialog has a disorienting quasi-philosophical snappiness to it that I must admit I found kind of enjoyable, at … Continue reading
Posted in 2013
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Kill Your Darlings – a movie without much substance
Kill Your Darlings is the story of the murder that linked Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, and Lucien Carr, during the time they all knew each other at Columbia University. It’s also, to a small extent, about the birth of the … Continue reading
Posted in 2013
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