Movie Reviews
Blue Valentine
I believe the song "Breakfast at Tiffany's," by Deep Blue Something, said it best: "It's plain to see we're over/And I hate when things are over/When so much is left undone." I also hate when things are over when so much is left undone, especially wh...
Another Year
Mike Leigh, often a chronicler of hapless middle-class Londoners, went light with his last film, 2008's "Happy-Go-Lucky," which focused on a relentlessly chipper Pollyanna type. His new one, "Another Year," heads back in the direction of somberness, ...
The Way Back
"The Way Back" begins with a spoiler: In 1941, three men trudged into India after walking 4,000 miles from Siberia. This is their story. Our question as we watch the movie: which three will it be?
The film is loosely based on Slawomir Rawicz's 195...
Gulliver’s Travels
The word "yahoo," meaning a crass or stupid person, comes from Jonathan Swift's 1726 novel "Gulliver's Travels," where the Yahoos were a race of human-like brutes encountered by the title character. The dumb new "re-imagining" of the book, starring J...
The Illusionist (2010)
"The Illusionist," about a magician, is itself the product of a magical collaboration. The screenplay was written by Jacques Tati, the great French mime and filmmaker, who died before he ever got a chance to film it. It's now been adapted and animate...
True Grit
"I do not entertain hypotheticals," says a man in "True Grit." "The world as it is is vexing enough." His world is the American frontier, circa 1875, and his sentiments are probably shared by most of his contemporaries. But life is about to become mo...
Country Strong
To prepare for her role as an alcoholic singer in "Country Strong," Gwyneth Paltrow spent months learning how to play the guitar, and probably also drinking a lot. Seeing her on stage in the movie, strummin' and singin' like an old pro, you'd never k...
Little Fockers
"Little Fockers" would be a lot less painful to watch if its cast of victims didn't include so many beloved actors. Replace De Niro, Stiller, and Hoffman with a bunch of D-listers and it would still be terrible -- the screenplay is unsalvageable -- b...
How Do You Know
"How Do You Know" is only the start of the question. The rest of it is "... when you're in love, and when the person you're in love with is right for you?" Which, if you think about it, is the same question asked by every romantic comedy, not just th...
Tron: Legacy
Was any movie from the 1980s more ripe for a sequel than "Tron"? Its digital graphics were state-of-the-art in 1982, and people wondered if someday in the far-distant future movies might be made entirely on computers. The movie's plot addressed the i...
Yogi Bear
Whenever they announce something like a Marmaduke movie, or a Smurfs movie, or a -- sure, why not? -- Yogi Bear movie, people's reaction is always the same: "Who wanted THAT?!" Well, I hate to break it to you, but we've reached the point where it doe...
Rabbit Hole
"Rabbit Hole" is the movie equivalent of deep-tissue massage: painful but cathartic; exhausting but satisfying. It is also, like massage, more enjoyable if you disrobe first, but that's true of most things.
We are making jokes because "Rabbit Hol...
The Fighter
It seems that as long as there continue to be boxers, there will continue to be movies based on their true stories. That so many of these stories are similar to one another hardly matters. He's poor; he's a nobody; he just needs a chance; someone is ...
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
After Disney gave up on distributing the "Chronicles of Narnia" films, disappointed that what should have been a gold-pooping goose had failed to poop sufficient piles of gold, Twentieth Century Fox stepped in to save the day. Not that you'll be able...
The Tourist
Even if we accept that Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp are incredibly charismatic Tinseltown luminaries of the highest possible wattage, that doesn't guarantee they'll be any good together -- especially if you just throw them into something generic an...
Black Swan
It's fitting that Darren Aronofsky had to struggle for years to get "Black Swan" made. A movie about a ballerina's agonizing quest for perfection might seem a little hollow if it were effortlessly cranked out on the Hollywood assembly line; "Black Sw...
The Warrior’s Way
"The Warrior's Way," according to the narrator, is "the story of a sad flute, a laughing baby, and a weeping sword." All of that is true, but the narrator has buried the lead! "The Warrior's Way" is also the story of an Asian swordsman hiding in the ...
The King’s Speech
If there was any question about whether I loved Colin Firth's performance as Prince Albert, Duke of York in "The King's Speech," it dissolved when Albert's speech therapist asked if he could call him "Bertie." Here is a commoner -- an Australian, eve...
Tangled
For their 50th feature-length cartoon, the Disney animators have returned to the genre that defined the studio: fairy-tale princesses. The nostalgia is a bit weird, though, since "Tangled" -- based on the Rapunzel story -- is computer-animated and in...
Faster
I'm going to explain what "Faster" is about, so pay attention and try to keep up. It's about a man who gets out of prison and goes around killing the people responsible for putting him there. The end.
If it seems like I have glossed over some of ...
The Next Three Days
A few weeks ago, "Conviction" told us the true story of a woman who goes to law school and becomes an attorney just so she can defend her brother, who's in prison for a murder she believes he didn't commit. "The Next Three Days" begins in a similar m...
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1
Was "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" split into two movies so that the franchise could make more money? Well, yes. But maybe not just for that reason. As it turns out, "Deathly Hallows: Part 1" is a quietly thrilling and artful chapter in the e...
Unstoppable
Look, nobody knows why Denzel Washington keeps starring in Tony Scott films, or why the pair of them would make two consecutive movies about runaway trains. It is pointless to speculate. The fact is, "Unstoppable" is here, 15 months to the day after ...
Skyline
Colin and Greg Strause are brothers who have worked together as visual-effects technicians on dozens of movies, so you'd think that a movie they co-directed would, if nothing else, have cool special effects. Yet here's "Skyline," a "Cloverfield"-meet...
Morning Glory
Early-morning TV news shows like "Today" and "Good Morning America" tend to be a random mix of features, interviews, entertainment, and some bursts of actual hard news. Perhaps it's fitting that "Morning Glory," a comedy about one such program, shoul...
Four Lions
A lot of movies have been made about terrorism, but you have to admit that most of them haven't been very funny. In fact, many of them have been real downers. This deficiency is rectified in "Four Lions," a gutsy, hilarious comedy that turns terroris...
Megamind
If I didn't know better, I'd swear "Megamind" was the work of people who were making it up as they went along. The story doesn't "build" so much as it meanders from one scene to the next. I picture a little kid improvising a story: "So THEN the bad g...
Due Date
Todd Phillips' wildly uneven career as a comedy director takes another dive with "Due Date," an oddly somber "Planes, Trains and Automobiles" rehash that cannot be saved even by the combined quirky talents of Robert Downey Jr. and Zach Galifianakis. ...
Fair Game
Well, here's a can of worms. "Fair Game" is a dramatization of the Valerie Plame scandal from a few years ago, in which a White House insider leaked the identity of an undercover CIA operative to the press, supposedly in retaliation for the agent's h...
For Colored Girls
For some people, learning that Tyler Perry was going to write and direct the movie version of "For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf" must have been like finding out Garry Marshall was going to film "Death of a Salesm...
127 Hours
Do you recall the story of Aron Ralston, the man with the tragically misspelled name who also, somewhat tragically, got trapped between two rocks in Utah in 2003? If you do not recall the story, and if you can avoid having its details revealed to you...
Saw 3D
The people responsible for the "Saw" franchise have said that the seventh entry, "Saw 3D," will be the last one. If that's true -- and there's no reason to believe it is -- then it's a fitting conclusion. Part 7 takes us back to the beginning in many...
Paranormal Activity 2
When "Paranormal Activity" hit theaters a year ago, it was constantly compared to "The Blair Witch Project," and not unfairly. Both were made on tiny budgets with small casts, and both purported to be "found footage" shot entirely by the characters. ...
My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend
Among my many failures as a movie critic is my overuse of the word "pleasant." It's because I have a limited vocabulary and to me, "pleasant" is one of the best things a movie can be. Sure, I love thrillers and horror movies and the occasional feel-b...
RED (2010)
"RED" arrives at an inopportune moment, coming as it does on the heels of so many other action comedies about rogue groups of trained killers banding together for a mission. This one is better than "The Losers," "The A-Team," and "The Expendables," a...
Jackass 3D
The "Jackass 3D" crew has been joking with mock pretension that their brand of frat-boy prankery and stunt-making is the reason 3D was invented, but that's actually pretty close to the truth. The gimmick is most worthwhile when it's being used to mak...
Conviction
The story in "Conviction" is indeed told with conviction. There isn't much more to say about it than that. It's a true story, it has underdogs fighting against the odds, and its message is noble and worthwhile. I found it to be generally engaging and...
Hereafter
Whatever lies beyond this life, let us hope it is more thoughtful and interesting than "Hereafter," which is a lot of dull hooey about mankind's search for answers. Mankind's slow, interminable search for answers.
Directed by Clint Eastwood and wr...
My Soul to Take
A new horror film written and directed by Wes Craven should be a joyous event. The legendarily twisted mind behind "A Nightmare on Elm Street" hasn't written a feature since 2007 ("The Hills Have Eyes II"), hasn't directed one since 2005 ("Red Eye"),...
Life As We Know It
"Life As We Know It" stars Katherine Heigl and Josh Duhamel as two people who can't stand each other but must raise a child together after the baby's parents die. In the process of caring for the kid, they fall in love. What's amazing is that despite...
Secretariat
Penny Chenery, the genteel Virginia-born owner of the title racehorse in "Secretariat," might be the first movie character I've seen who is composed entirely of speeches. She has something stirring and passionate to say for every occasion, even occas...
It’s Kind of a Funny Story
"Sometimes I wish I had an easy answer for why I'm depressed," says Craig, the 16-year-old protagonist of "It's Kind of a Funny Story." The movie, which is indeed kind of a funny story and is based on a semi-autobiographical novel by Ned Vizzini, doe...
Tamara Drewe
Don't be misled by the title of "Tamara Drewe." Though there is a character by that name who figures prominently in the story, the film is an ensemble piece. Tamara herself is not the most sympathetic or likable part of the group -- though she's hard...
The Social Network
Whether "The Social Network" defines its generation I don't know, but it isn't a stretch to say that social networking itself does. People who came of age in the online era are accustomed to the Internet playing a significant role in almost every asp...
Let Me In
Fans of atmospheric, Gothic horror were jubilant when "Let the Right One In" arrived from Sweden two years ago, a balm to soothe the pain left by so many lackluster monsters and sparkling teenage vampires. Many hearts sank when it was announced that ...
Enter the Void
Thanks to "Irreversible," the notoriously graphic film that stirred up Cannes and Sundance audiences a few years ago, Gaspar Noé is already well known as a pusher of buttons and a churner of stomachs. His latest, "Enter the Void," is certainly not a...
Buried
To set your film entirely in one room is to risk being visually boring. How do you avoid stagnation when there's a limited number of different angles to shoot from? Usually we're obliged to focus on the story and dialogue and accept that there won't ...
Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole
Have you ever gotten really stoned and hallucinated about owls? Neither have I! But I bet it would look like "Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole," a beautifully animated and entirely goofy fantasy film directed by Zack Snyder ("300") and b...
Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps
Unlike most sequels, Oliver Stone's "Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps," has a legitimate reason to exist: to make us consider how different the world is now from the way it was in Gordon Gekko's "greed is good" heyday. The financial malfeasance of the...
Waiting for ‘Superman’ (documentary)
For his latest documentary, "Waiting for 'Superman,'" director Davis Guggenheim has chosen a subject far less controversial than that of his last major work, which was "An Inconvenient Truth." There is much disagreement on the topic of global warming...
Howl
For the hip and formerly hip among us, here is "Howl," a colorful docudrama with three goals. One is to present a brief biography of beat poet Allen Ginsberg. The second is to bring his most famous work, called "Howl," to life. The third is to dramat...
You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger
It is generally held that the Woody Allen comedies in which Allen does not appear tend to be inferior to the ones in which he does -- maybe because there's usually a character who represents him, and nobody plays Woody Allen better than Woody Allen. ...
Catfish (documentary)
Considering that "Catfish" is a documentary about how you can use the Internet to lie about who you are, I suppose it's only fitting that the film's trailer grossly misrepresents what kind of movie it is. It's not a thriller. It isn't scary. It has m...
The Freebie
Katie Aselton has turned up in a few indie films in recent years, including "The Puffy Chair," where she played the girlfriend of Mark Duplass. Duplass is now her husband, and a fairly significant force in the indie film world himself, but he might h...
The Town
"The Town" proves that "Gone Baby Gone" was not just a Ben Affleck fluke (or a Ben Affluke, as the kids call it). The actor and erstwhile punchline has now directed two Boston-set crime dramas that demonstrate his confidence and skill as a filmmaker....
Easy A
Ten years from now, when Emma Stone is one of the most popular and respected comic actresses of her generation, "Easy A" will be a useful artifact showing when her talent first manifested itself. Sure, she was good in "Superbad" and "Zombieland," but...
Devil
There's nothing wrong with the premise of "Devil," which is that five apparently random people are trapped in an elevator and one of them might be dangerous. In fact, there are several things right with that premise -- notably that it involves strang...
Never Let Me Go
Those who have read Kazuo Ishiguro's novel "Never Let Me Go" already know what a sad, poignant story it is, and they have been careful not to say too much about it as they recommend it to others. But the superb film adaptation isn't as concerned abou...
Lovely, Still
I can't imagine a more apt title for "Lovely, Still" than the one it has. This sweet, surprising story about romance between senior citizens is uncommonly lovely, and a serene stillness rests over most of it. Of course, the title works the other way,...
Resident Evil: Afterlife
I remember having a lot of unanswered questions at the end of "Resident Evil: Extinction." What did I just watch? Why did I watch it? Is it too late to change to a career that will not require me to watch things like this? None of those questions are...
I’m Still Here (shmocumentary)
Coincidentally, I saw "I'm Still Here" the night before it became official public knowledge that Joaquin Phoenix's behavior in the film was an act. Nearly everyone suspected as much, but Casey Affleck, the film's director (and Phoenix's brother-in-la...
Going the Distance
Long-distance relationships. Romantic comedies. Love stories starring real-life couples. Things Drew Barrymore does. All of these have a high rate of failure, so the success of "Going the Distance" isn't just pleasing, it's almost miraculous.
In ...
Machete
In some ways, "Machete" is what "The Expendables" would have been if "The Expendables" had been written and directed by someone with a sense of humor, i.e., not Sylvester Stallone. Both films are self-conscious throwbacks to bygone genres; part of th...
The American
George Clooney plays a professional assassin in "The American," but please don't take the words "George Clooney" and "assassin" to mean that this is an action thriller. Good heavens, no! It's actually a quiet, contemplative, old-fashioned melodrama -...
Takers
"Takers" is the kind of movie where tough guys walk away from an explosion, in slow-motion, without looking behind them. But don't worry! It is also the kind of movie where a man leaps sideways, in slow-motion, while firing two guns at the same time!...
The Last Exorcism
More than 35 years -- half a lifetime! -- have passed since "The Exorcist," and horror movies about casting the devil out of people have become quaint. So it's nice to see a little jolt put back in the old formula with "The Last Exorcism," a tense an...
Piranha (2010)
If you're going to see the cheesy, over-the-top, '80s-style bloodbath that is "Piranha," 3D is the way to go. I don't care what the fancy-talking apologists say, THIS is what 3D was made for: in-your-face gore and nudity. "Piranha" plays up the third...
The Switch
For a movie with such a distasteful premise, "The Switch" is refreshingly funny and surprisingly sweet. It's about a man whose platonic lady friend is being artificially inseminated, who secretly replaces the donor's contribution with his own, result...
Vampires Suck
In "Vampires Suck," the "Twilight" spoof by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, the Bella character points out the Cullen family and asks a classmate about them. The classmate says:
Their skin is ice-cold, they feed on human flesh, and they all sl...
Eat Pray Love
Among Julia Roberts' many talents is the ability to be likable even when she's playing a character who isn't. She'll star in something dreadful like "Runaway Bride" or "Mona Lisa Smile," and despite what a shrill stereotype the character is, Roberts ...
The Expendables
It is true that 2010 has already seen two movies about soldiers of fortune, "The Losers" and "The A-Team," and that neither of them was any good. But those movies didn't star some of the biggest action heroes of the '80s, '90s, and today, all togethe...
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
If a movie that looked and sounded like "Scott Pilgrim vs. the World" had come out 40 years ago, people would have burned the director at the stake for witchcraft. Even by 2010 standards, the way it's written, performed, shot, and edited is supremely...
Animal Kingdom
In "Animal Kingdom," 17-year-old Josh Cody is watching a TV game show when he calls his grandmother with this emotionless report: "Mom's gone and OD'd and she's died." Mom's body is on the couch next to him. What may sound like an almost sociopathic ...
The Disappearance of Alice Creed
No matter how carefully you plan, no matter how efficiently you work, there's always a chance you'll be thwarted by that most treacherous of villains: your own emotions. That is the lesson of "The Disappearance of Alice Creed," and of my experience w...
The Other Guys
Goodness knows Will Ferrell has diluted his brand by starring in more movies than he should have, causing all but his most diehard fans to grow weary. But it's important to note that when he sticks with Adam McKay, the results are solid. McKay was a ...
Dinner for Schmucks
Hollywood rarely does farce right. A pure, all-out farce usually has something dark at the center (death and adultery are common favorites), broad physical gags, clever misunderstandings, and buffoons in need of comeuppance. Most importantly, a farce...
Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore
I don't know why it took them nine years to make a sequel to "Cats & Dogs," an amusing but largely forgettable family flick that had domestic canines and felines running a secret war against each other. I don't know why they made a sequel at all,...
Charlie St. Cloud
Zac Efron is too pretty and has starred in too many films with the words "High School Musical" in the title to be taken very seriously as an actor, but he's getting there. He acquits himself fairly well as the title character in the sentimental, teen...
Get Low
Robert Duvall was 30 years old when he played Boo Radley, the reclusive man who set all the townsfolk tongues a-waggin' in "To Kill a Mockingbird." Now, almost half a century later, he plays a similar role in "Get Low." The two movies are perfect boo...
Ramona and Beezus
As you probably know if you were born anytime after 1950, Ramona Quimby is an imaginative, spunky little girl who's always getting into trouble without meaning to. She was a central figure in eight novels written by Beverly Cleary between 1955 and 19...
Salt
"Salt" has most of the ingredients for a tasty, Bourne-style espionage casserole. It just doesn't have them in the right amounts. You need action sequences, of course, and a butt-kicking hero, and a certain degree of uncertainty about whether the goo...
Inception
Not to sound like one of those super-cool hipsters, but I've been a Christopher Nolan fan since "Memento," which I thought was the best film of 2001 and maybe the whole decade. You people who didn't start loving him until he made some Batman movies ....
The Sorcerer’s Apprentice
"The Sorcerer's Apprentice," from Disney, has the same kind of all-ages appeal as ABC's old "TGIF" Friday-night sitcom lineup. Parts of it are genuinely entertaining; it occasionally shows signs that it's aware of how corny it is; and it's agreeable ...
Despicable Me
If computer animation were still an expensive and painstaking process, "Despicable Me" wouldn't exist. It isn't worth that kind of effort. But when it's fairly cheap, fairly quick, fairly easy? Eh, sure, here you go, kids, here's your cartoon about a...
The Kids Are All Right
The relationship at the center of "The Kids Are All Right" is unorthodox -- spoiler alert, they're lesbians -- but it's depicted more realistically than most movie relationships are. It turns out you can be loving and committed and still have disagre...
Winnebago Man (documentary)
At first glance, "Winnebago Man" seems to be based on the thinnest of premises: What if we found one of the poor souls whose embarrassing moments have made him a YouTube celebrity and learned more about him? Yet what sounds like a silly lark that's b...
Predators
The 1987 Schwarzenegger semi-classic "Predator" spawned a sequel, called "Predator 2," plus crossover films "Alien vs Predator" and "Aliens vs Predator: Requiem," not to mention a comic book. The new sequel, simply called "Predators," ignores all of ...
The Last Airbender
The first chapter of M. Night Shyamalan's career had the Indian-American filmmaker laboring in obscurity, writing and directing his own original stories without mainstream success. In the second chapter, his "Sixth Sense," "Unbreakable," and "Signs" ...
Eclipse
Looks like the third time's the charm with the young-adult fantasy franchises. It wasn't until "Prisoner of Azkaban" that the Harry Potter films really came into their own, and now "Eclipse" brings the "Twilight" series into the big leagues. It still...
Grown Ups
There is one thing that "Grown Ups" does well, and that's portraying the affectionate teasing that comprises a huge part of how male friends communicate. Watching these guys sit around and joke with each other, you can believe that they're old friend...
Knight and Day
The thing about Tom Cruise is that even though he's kind of a nutjob in real life, put him in a movie that plays to his strengths and he'll dazzle you the way he did 20 years ago. "Knight and Day" is a reminder that he still has his movie-star appeal...
Cyrus
The Duplass brothers, Jay and Mark, helped establish the mumblecore sub-genre of independent film with "The Puffy Chair," a low-key comedy that amused Sundance audiences in 2005. Their next joint effort, "Baghead," cleverly satirized the very genre i...
Jonah Hex
"Jonah Hex" is based on a comic book, but instead of a superhero it's about a tortured soul who lost everything and now pursues justice by killing people. This puts it in the sorry company of movies like "Ghost Rider" and "The Punisher," where grim h...
Toy Story 3
I don't want to oversell this. I waited a couple days after seeing the movie before writing the review, to give myself time to collect my thoughts and present them without hyperbole. If I talk it up too much, your expectations will be impossibly high...
The A-Team
Fans of the "A-Team" TV series will want to know whether the new movie version is faithful to it -- which is to say they're hoping the film is cheesy, preposterous, and brimming with catchphrases. And it is. Mission accomplished there. But while that...
The Karate Kid
Look, I don't want to be difficult here, but at no point in the new "Karate Kid" does anyone learn karate. It's kung fu. The characters call it kung fu. The film is set in China, which is where kung fu is practiced. Except for a brief instance of the...
Winter’s Bone
Perhaps the most significant accomplishment in Debra Granik's "Winter's Bone" is the way she conveys a sense of place. The film, a compelling story of steely determination, is set amid ramshackle houses and meth trailers in rural Missouri, and it pra...
Splice
I've often wondered what Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" would have been like if it had been rewritten by Charles Darwin and turned into a movie by David Cronenberg. Now I do not have to wonder! It would probably be a lot like "Splice," a delightfully ...
Get Him to the Greek
One of several scene-stealers in 2008's "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" was Aldous Snow, the hedonistic, hard-partying rock star played by Russell Brand. It was the British comic's first major exposure in the U.S., and it led to a regimen of MTV gigs and...
Killers
It's a bad sign when the things you learn about a movie are more interesting than the things in the movie. But did you know that Ashton Kutcher and Katherine Heigl are the same age?? They were both born in 1978! This is interesting because Kutcher ha...
