Movie Reviews
Spirited Away
There is spiritualism and weirdness aplenty in "Spirited Away," an animated film that is among the most delightful, imaginative stories I've seen all year.
It is the highest-grossing film in Japan's history, which may be due more to a quirk of pu...
Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever
Even by dumb action-movie standards, "Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever" is a dumb action movie. It is yet another film whose director (Wych Kaosayananda) believes using slow-motion is enough to create excitement, and that fighting is the same thing as advan...
Secretary
You may be required -- grudgingly, perhaps -- to admire "Secretary" for its devotion to its concept. It posits that no relationship should be considered taboo or unacceptable as long as both parties are getting fulfillment out of it, and that include...
The Banger Sisters
If you could somehow rewind "The Banger Sisters" past its starting point, back to what happened 20 years earlier, then you'd have a juicy story to watch.
Alas, we don't have that technology. Instead, we must remain in the present and listen to th...
The Four Feathers
There are so many good things in "The Four Feathers" that it's a shame to see them wasted in such an ineffective movie.
Take Heath Ledger, for example. After hinting at his true abilities in "Monster's Ball," he now emerges fully formed as an act...
Trapped
"Trapped" is a sour and unpleasant movie, a 90-minute ordeal that seems, in its small way, as torturous as the ordeal suffered by its characters.
For most of the film, not a single character is happy or even content. The film starts with a kidnap...
Igby Goes Down
As "Igby Goes Down" ended, I said to my friend, "What a good movie." My friend replied, "What a depressing movie."
We're both right. For me, the film's merits -- fine performances, sparkling dialogue, believable pathos -- make up for its overridi...
Barbershop
"Barbershop" is a surprisingly gentle and light-hearted comedy about neighbors who work together to create a community and overcome adversity.
It is an unusual entry in the genre of films about African-American culture in that, despite taking pla...
Quitting (Chinese)
From the "it's true, and isn't that interesting enough?" line of thinking comes "Quitting," a Chinese film that, in fact, is NOT interesting enough.
Actually, its premise is intriguing. Jia Hongsheng was a successful young actor in China in the 1...
Stealing Harvard
The first 10 minutes of "Stealing Harvard" are raucously funny, full of zip and energy and surprises.
Then Tom Green shows up and puts an end to all mirth and goodness. He is the brick wall to the film's speeding automobile. His presence, like ar...
City by the Sea
In "City by the Sea," Manhattan police detective Vincent LaMarca (Robert De Niro) is a tough cop who, years ago, walked out on his wife and young son. The movie reminds us of this approximately every 30 seconds.
"You walked out on us!" someone wi...
Swimfan
Let us discuss Jesse Bradford, the 23-year-old actor whom we first noticed in the snappy teen film "Bring It On."
Since then, he seems to have chosen his projects based on what he gets to do in them. In "Clockstoppers," he was the lead character a...
FearDotCom
The premise of "FearDotCom" is that people who visit a certain Web site are turning up dead two days later. The idea of a Web site killing people may sound preposterous, until you consider that I nearly died watching this movie.
This is a relentl...
Possession
Neil LaBute's fourth film, "Possession," marks his entry into the ranks of mature Hollywood directors. His previous films ("In the Company of Men," "Your Friends and Neighbors" and "Nurse Betty") have been proficient and intelligent, but now he has c...
Simone
"Simone" is a 90-minute farce that refuses to accept its identity, tries to be serious, and stretches itself into two hours. Except for a few choice moments, the writer and director, Andrew Niccol, seems unaware that he was even making a comedy.
...
Little Secrets
We watched "Little Secrets" on a screener tape provided by the distributor. I thought, "This looks like a Disney Channel movie." A friend watching it with me said, "This looks like a Disney Channel movie." Halfway through, another friend walked in, t...
Serving Sara
The humor in "Serving Sara" is desperate, sad and pitiable. The screenplay, by sitcom hacks Jay Scherick and David Ronn, sets it up so that everyone the main character meets is overweight. Why? So he can make fat jokes.
"Kiss my (butt)!" his riva...
One Hour Photo
Robin Williams has a deep, soothing voice that has too often been used in movies to quietly tell us how we can save ourselves. "Patch Adams," "Jakob the Liar," "Bicentennial Man," "Jack" -- all of these (and others) were sanctimonious pictures where ...
Blue Crush
"Blue Crush" is an average film with above-average direction, acting and cinematography. Imagine a cadre of gourmet chefs taking over the kitchen at McDonald's and you'll get the idea: They'll gussy it up as much as they can, but it's still just a Bi...
The Last Kiss (Italian)
"The Last Kiss" ("L'Ultimo Bacio") was one of Italy's most acclaimed movies in 2001, and perhaps it will follow in the recent footsteps of "Cinema Paradiso" and "Life is Beautiful" to become beloved in America. It is not as good as either of those mo...
Blood Work
One hundred years of cinema means that by now, we've already seen almost every plot you can come up with. The truly original filmmakers still manage to surprise us now and then, but the average flick playing at the multiplex -- especially between Mem...
XXX
The makers of "XXX" (pronounced "Triple X") would have you believe the title character is the James Bond for the new millennium. I'm afraid I will have to agree with them. Old Mr. Bond's debonair attitude has no place in the Age of Irony. Triple X co...
Spy Kids 2: Island of Lost Dreams
"Spy Kids 2: Island of Lost Dreams" suffers from the same syndrome as 99 percent of all sequels in that we've already been there and done that. The novelty of children acting as spies has worn off, and "Island of Lost Dreams" doesn't add anything new...
The Good Girl
The men behind "The Good Girl" do not view their characters as real people. They are a means to an end, pawns in a game, punch lines to a joke. The director, Miguel Arteta, and the writer, Mike White, do not take them seriously, and neither should yo...
Late Marriage (Hebrew)
The Jewish people in "Late Marriage," set in Israel, are traditional in the sense of allowing tradition to dictate much of their behavior, but decidedly unorthodox in their manner of speech and general demeanor.
For example, it is not because of ...
The Master of Disguise
It makes sense that Dana Carvey should have a star vehicle in which he does nothing but make silly faces and use goofy voices. After all, he is one of the hottest comic talents of the day!
This is 1991, right?
What, it's not? Dana Carvey has ...
Signs
M. Night Shyamalan makes movies that are not really about what you think they're about.
I don't mean the advertising is misleading or anything like that. I mean that while you're watching the film, you believe it's about something supernatural or...
Full Frontal
Give Steven Soderbergh credit for doing something a bit different with "Full Frontal." A filmmaker of his caliber and renown doesn't have to experiment, but he did it anyway. He gets an A for effort.
For actual output, however, Soderbergh and his...
Austin Powers in Goldmember
The trouble with the last Austin Powers spy-spoof film, "The Spy Who Shagged Me," was that it squandered all its cleverness on gross-out gags and sexual references. Those jokes work once, if you're not too embarrassed to laugh, but they can't propel ...
The Kid Stays in the Picture (documentary)
"The Kid Stays in the Picture" is not a documentary. Documentaries, as a rule, aim for objectivity, or when they are biased, they at least interview several subjects to support that bias.
This film, on the other hand, has one source: Robert J. Eva...
The Country Bears
"The Country Bears" is bearable. Barely.
This is actually something of a ringing endorsement, considering how awful the movie sounds based on its premise. There is a reason the genre of "movies based on theme park attractions" has gone untapped: ...
Who Is Cletis Tout?
"Who Is Cletis Tout?" seeks to be a pastiche of other movies, especially old ones. It wants to be a TYPE of movie, rather than a movie -- a template, if you will, of old-fashioned movies about bad guys and diamond heists and getting the girl.
Why...
Lan Yu (Chinese)
"Lan Yu" earns points for addressing a subject that is considered taboo in Chinese culture, enough to get the film banned in its native land. Of course, I don't think it's especially hard to get banned in China, but as a matter of principle, this is ...
Tadpole
Demure farce and smart, almost scholarly comedy are the order of the day in "Tadpole," one of the more delightfully entertaining films to emerge from this year's Sundance Film Festival.
The title character -- though no one calls him that anymore ...
K-19: The Widowmaker
"K-19: The Widowmaker" causes me to swell with pride and patriotism for the Communist Party and the Motherland.
No, wait, that's what it would do if I were Russian. As an American, I think, "Huh. So the Soviets had some trouble with their first nu...
Stuart Little 2
The first "Stuart Little" seemed to exist in a world apart from other movies. Its special effects were seamless, its humor guileless, its story well-told, its messages sweetly overdone. The acting, even among the humans, was gently cartoonish and sty...
Eight Legged Freaks
"Eight Legged Freaks" is a film without ideas. It is a modern-day B movie, but it does nothing with the genre other than re-create it, and if we needed re-creations of formulaic, predictable movies, that need was not widely publicized.
For there ...
The Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course
If you love Steve Irwin the Crocodile Hunter but have always felt like a thief, a common thief, for watching him for free on TV, you're in luck. Now you can go to a movie theater and PAY to watch his hilarious antics!
I said the same thing a week...
Reign of Fire
The screening times conflicted, and I had to choose between seeing "Reign of Fire" or "Stuart Little 2." Naturally, I chose the movie about dragons over the one about a talking mouse.
As movies about dragons go, "Reign of Fire" is a pretty good o...
Road to Perdition
"Road to Perdition" is a film where all the elements come together so organically that you can't imagine it succeeding without every part intact.
Calling it a Tom Hanks vehicle doesn't do justice to the director, screenwriter, cinematographer or ...
Halloween: Resurrection
In the very popular deleted scenes found on the "Waiting for Guffman" DVD, there is a scene where Libby Mae uses a monologue from an unnamed, non-existent play to audition for the show. In the monologue, a woman lectures her brother, now insane and d...
Me Without You
"I don't know who I am when we're not us!" cries Marina (Anna Friel) in Sandra Goldbacher's "Me Without You," a piercing examination of poisonous friendships and the reasons we persist with them.
Who Marina is without Holly (Michelle Williams) is...
Read My Lips (French)
Carla the frumpy secretary and Paul the harsh parolee have little in common, which in many films would result in an opposites-attract romance. Refreshingly, "Read My Lips" keeps that possibility in the distance, though each party certainly entertains...
Like Mike
"Like Mike" appeals to young viewers without talking down to them, provides a few uplifting messages, and is generally a pleasant 100-minute diversion. It contains no real profanity and not a hint of crudeness. It's a wonder it ever got made.
Take...
Men in Black II
You'd think that with five years between movies, they could come up with a better script than what they got for "Men in Black II." This plays like an episode of the "Men in Black" cartoon series (indeed, we understand it's based on one), and not like...
The Powerpuff Girls Movie
I chuckled a lot during "The Powerpuff Girls Movie." But I kept remembering that I also chuckle when I happen to see a few minutes of the "Powerpuff Girls" series on TV, and that's only for a few minutes at a time, and it's free.
Even at a minuscu...
Notorious C.H.O.
Fans of comedienne Margaret Cho will find it no surprise that her latest concert film, "Notorious C.H.O.," is candid, earthy and gloriously funny.
Her very first joke relates to her post-Sept. 11 activities and cannot be printed in a PG-rated new...
Pumpkin
"Pumpkin" is a dark comedy that deals with diversity and tolerance in a whacked-out way. It has elements of "Bring It on" and "Heathers," and it also has handicapped people.
Carolyn McDuffy (Christina Ricci) is a popular, perky blonde at Southern...
The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys
The peril referred to in the title of "The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys" has literal meaning in the film. But more precisely, it's a spiritual and emotional danger, the danger faced not just by altar boys but by all adolescent males.
The kids in...
Hey, Arnold! The Movie
"Hey, Arnold!" is one of Nickelodeon's many, many cartoon series, and "Hey, Arnold! The Movie" is one of Nickelodeon's many, many kids' films that are big on kiddie appeal but short on wit or brains.
The Disney animated features and the old-schoo...
Mr. Deeds
We movie critics are supposed to begin our reviews of Adam Sandler films by reassuring the audience that we have no particular ill will toward Mr. Sandler, and that we take each of his films on a case-by-case basis. We liked "Wedding Singer" OK, but ...
Crush
"Crush" is a women's movie, yet was written and directed by a man, John McKay. One wonders if this is what he REALLY thinks women are like when men aren't around -- crass, vulgar and low. One wonders, in fact, if this IS what women are like when men ...
Lovely & Amazing
Nearly everything that happens in "Lovely & Amazing" is sad & awful -- or would be, if the characters didn't react to it humorously. It's a perfect example of the fine line between comedy and tragedy: It's usually the same events; what's diff...
Sunshine State
Superficially, "Sunshine State" is about the war between people who have lived someplace forever and the developers who want to tear it all down and build resorts and strip malls. Underneath it, though, "Sunshine State" is about making bad decisions,...
Minority Report
There have always been two Steven Spielbergs. The Oscar-prone Spielberg directs serious, important films like "Saving Private Ryan" that bear the mark of a highly skilled director. The fun Spielberg directs things like "Jurassic Park," well-made but ...
Juwanna Mann
There's a man who dresses as a woman, and Juwanna Mann is the fake name he comes up with. It's a jokey name, obviously, up there with Seymour Butts and Amanda Huggenkiss. But NO ONE in the film notices it. No one ever says, "'Juwanna Mann'? What a fu...
Lilo & Stitch
The other studios are making progress, but I still say Disney has a lock on reliably entertaining animated features. They produce at least one a year -- "churning them out," you could say, except that implies an assembly-line mentality that is not ac...
The Emperor’s New Clothes
Napoleon Bonaparte, after his defeat at Waterloo, was exiled to the island of St. Helena, where he died in 1821. "Or so the history books tell us," we are told smirkily in the opening moments of "The Emperor's New Clothes."
This is a charming "wh...
The Salton Sea
It's about a man haunted by the death of his wife, and bent on revenging himself upon her killer. It begins at the end of the story, with the main character narrating and looking at a photograph. But it is not "Memento."
It's about a man with at l...
Gangster No. 1
At the center of Paul McGuigan's remorselessly violent and gruesomely funny "Gangster No. 1" is a character who only understands his existence as it pertains to his idol, a ruthless London gangster named Freddie Mayes.
Freddie is suave, handsome,...
Joshua
The makers of the religious film "Joshua" seem sincere in what they're trying to do. The problem is, it's hard to tell what that is, exactly.
It is a parable about a man named Joshua (Tony Goldwyn), a mysterious stranger who ambles into a small t...
Chasing a Good Day to Die (documentary)
A recent controversy in Utah surrounded James Mooney and his American Indian ceremonies that used peyote. Peyote is a hallucinogen that is illegal except when used in authentic Indian rituals. The problem here was that Mooney was allowing non-Indians...
The Bourne Identity
I was just jotting in my notes that "The Bourne Identity" has an intriguing start but then falls into a rut, when suddenly a man in the film leaped through a window and started shooting at people.
This led to a visceral, bone-crunching fight, aft...
Windtalkers
If "Windtalkers" were just about the Windtalkers -- the Navajo Indians whose encoded language helped America win World War II -- it would be a great film. That story is noble, and not often told. It has drama inherent in it.
But director John Woo...
Scooby-Doo
Scrappy-Doo is in this movie, too. He urinates on Daphne. In another scene, Scooby and Shaggy have a belching contest that regresses into a flatulence contest.
Now, why were you thinking of watching this? Nostalgia, was it? Or were you hoping the...
Cherish
A mischievous visual style and oodles of charm from the principal cast make "Cherish" a very good (but not great) movie that will especially inspire enthusiasm among people in their late '20s.
Zoe Adler (Robin Tunney) is a lonely single girl in Sa...
Bad Company
"Bad Company" unites director Joel Schumacher ("Batman & Robin") and producer Jerry Bruckheimer ("Armageddon") for the first time, and it perfectly showcases their individual gifts. It's uneven like a Schumacher film, and loudly stupid like a Bru...
Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood
Rebecca Wells' novel "Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" is about two things. One is the sublime nature of life-long friendships. The other is how the gaps between us and our parents may be bridged by understanding where they came from.
Neit...
Enigma
A reader at Internet Movie Database observes that "Enigma" is "history without histrionics." This is meant as a compliment, and I agree the film's low-key attitude is admirable -- in theory. In practice, perhaps some histrionics might have been prefe...
The Importance of Being Earnest
If you have the opportunity to see a production of Oscar Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest," you should take advantage of it. Even reading the play is enjoyable, so full of witticisms and quotable dialogue is it.
If you have the opportunit...
The Sum of All Fears
"The Sum of All Fears" is a quaint film. It makes the Russians bad guys, and uses Nazis (well, neo-Nazis) as foils, too. It's about a nuclear bomb. The technology and the presence of Ben Affleck will assure you of its modernity, but otherwise, you'd ...
Undercover Brother
Perhaps the most admirable thing about the overall very admirable comedy "Undercover Brother" is that in it, race relations are distilled down to nothing more than tiny cultural things like blacks' disdain for mayonnaise, which white people seem to l...
Sleepy Time Gal
Few movies are enhanced by having a character die of cancer, but "The Sleepy Time Gal" pulls it off OK, largely because the development is not just a third-act attempt to wring tears from the audience, but is introduced in the beginning and is the dr...
Elling (Norwegian)
"Elling" was nominated for a Best Foreign Film Oscar, and it's easy to see why it didn't win. It takes its characters on a pleasant, funny journey through life. Its scope is small and its people are lovable. It's light and airy. It's just like "Ameli...
CQ
Roman Coppola, son of Francis Ford Coppola, shows potential in "CQ," his writing/directing debut about a man who wants to be a filmmaker.
Coppola ably and smartly corrals his crew of cinematographers, production designers and music supervisors to...
Enough
I think everything that happens in "Enough" happens only within a nightmare had by the protagonist, a California waitress named Slim (Jennifer Lopez). There is no internal evidence for this theory -- she never wakes up and says, "Thank goodness I was...
Insomnia
"A good cop can't sleep because a piece of the puzzle is missing. A bad cop can't sleep because his conscience is bothering him."
So says Ellie Burr (Hilary Swank), a rookie cop in the remote fishing village of Nightmute, Alaska. But she's quotin...
Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron
"Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron" is as simple and innocent a movie as you can imagine. It's hard to believe it was made in the 21st century, without a trace of irony or self-awareness. This is a movie you can trust.
It is the story of a wild ho...
Thirteen Conversations About One Thing
What is the one thing that all these conversations are about? Happiness, probably, or maybe fate. Or maybe how fate determines our happiness, and there's not a darn thing we can do about it.
This interesting, multi-storied film, written by sister...
The Believer
"The Believer" is based on the true story of a Jewish kid who grew up to be a neo-Nazi skinhead. Such an incredibly ironic turn of events practically begs to be made into a film, and first-time director Henry Bean guides this one very well.
Ryan ...
Lucky Break
"Lucky Break" is about convicts scheming to sneak out of prison by putting on an inmate-produced musical as a distraction. It is from the director of "The Full Monty," so it ought to be full of wacky characters and delightful plot twists. Instead, it...
About a Boy
"About a Boy" takes the shopworn premise about a shallow adult whose life is changed by a child, and infuses it with irresistible humor and life. It's "Big Daddy" or Disney's "The Kid," but with the added bonus of being watchable.
Based on a nove...
Star Wars: Episode II — Attack of the Clones
The two big questions, we'll answer first.
Yes, Jar-Jar Binks is in the movie, but his role is small.
And yes, it's better than "The Phantom Menace." Though I liked that film, I recognize its faults. "Star Wars: Episode II -- Attack of the Cl...
The New Guy
All that can be said for "The New Guy" is that it has a sequence in which Eliza Dushku tries on a variety of swimsuits. Aside from that, you're drowning in a sea of woeful incompetence, my friends.
The title character is Dizzy Gillespie Harrison,...
Unfaithful
At the exact mid-point of the two-hour "Unfaithful," the husband finds out his wife has been cheating on him. It is easy, then, to divide the movie into halves: the good hour and the not-so-good hour. "Unfaithful" starts smart and then chickens out. ...
Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India (Hindi/Bhojpuri)
Movies like "Lagaan" make me glad I'm a film critic. If I were a civilian, I probably wouldn't see a four-hour Indian film set in 1893 and centered around the game of cricket. I would believe all the critics who told me it was a great film, but I wou...
Deuces Wild
I accuse films of being generic and unoriginal on a regular basis, but rarely have I seen a movie so determined to check off every cliché on the list as "Deuces Wild." It has every element of the kind of movie it is, and none of the heart, personali...
Hollywood Ending
Woody Allen continues his descent into comedic toothlessness with "Hollywood Ending," a weak-willed but likable film that should have been brilliant.
It is a parody of movie-making, and Woody Allen is capable of writing and directing a magnificen...
Spider-Man
"Spider-Man" is probably the best superhero movie ever made. It has the right blend of action, humor and humanity, an appropriately insane villain, and a hero whose motivations are simple but whose character is complex.
Sam Raimi ("Army of Darknes...
The Mystic Masseur
"The Mystic Masseur" is not as dull as you'd expect, coming as it does from Ismail Merchant, half of the Merchant/Ivory team of stuffy-film makers. At times, it is lively and entertaining.
But the rest of the time, it is stiff, meandering stuff. ...
Green Dragon
"Green Dragon" falls prey to some threadbare Hollywood conventions, but otherwise maintains a high level of maturity and emotion as it examines the lives of Vietnamese refugees entering America in 1975.
At Camp Pendleton, Calif., Jim Lance (Patri...
Dogtown and Z-Boys (documentary)
Dogtown was a lower-income section of West Los Angeles in the '60s and '70s, and the birthplace of modern skateboarding. "Dogtown and Z-Boys" is a fine, interesting documentary about the group of youngsters who were the pioneers of the sport.
Dir...
Some Body
In "Some Body," Samantha (Stephanie Bennett, also co-writer) is a 20-something kindergarten teacher who breaks up with her boyfriend of seven years so she can discover who she really is. Who she really is, it turns it, is someone who is always either...
Life or Something Like It
"Life or Something Like It" is an example of synergy at work. There are myriad problems with the film -- a pat, too-perfect ending, for example, and some pretty sloppy writing -- but when seen as a whole, it has charm and grace. More than it should, ...
Jason X
Consider now "Jason X," the long-awaited sequel to Spike Lee's "Malcolm X," this time biographing the militant Muslim's even more unreasonable brother.
I am kidding, of course. No one could be more unreasonable than Malcolm X.
In truth, "Jaso...
The Cat’s Meow
"The Cat's Meow" makes the point that Hollywood types look ridiculous, but they have so much fun doing it -- and besides, if they didn't look ridiculous, they wouldn't be worth noticing at all.
The film is a little like that itself: it's not a ba...
Rain
Janey, the 13-year-old protagonist and occasional narrator in "Rain," tells us her family's summer home was right on the beach -- well, with just a small patch between it and the beach. Also, "it was sunny ... mostly." In other words, things were nea...
World Traveler
"World Traveler" is a character study about a man who seems to have everything but for some reason wants more. Perhaps because Cal has a lovely family, nice home and good job that he leaves behind in order to explore the open road, it is difficult to...
Murder by Numbers
There are two movies going on in "Murder by Numbers." One is a fairly interesting thriller about two bored, privileged teens who plan a perfect murder because they have nothing else to do. The other is a generic crime flick about a police detective b...
The Scorpion King
The question isn't whether "The Scorpion King" is bad, because of course it is. The question is whether it's the enjoyable kind of bad, or the tedious kind. For me, it's the latter.
There are battles, yes, but most of the hand-to-hand combat susp...
