The Hunger Games (2012, Gary Ross)
Just like the book, plus a bunch of good actors (hello, Jennifer Lawrence and Woody Harrelson), minus all depth or feeling, and with the worst camerawork I’ve seen in years. Ross made Pleasantville and...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Captain America (2011, Joe Johnston)
Chris Evans (Human Torch in the Fantastic Four movies) is a scrawny wannabe soldier who doesn’t want to kick ass to show the world that America is #1, he just wants to end global bullying. Against the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Berberian Sound Studio (2012, Peter Strickland)
Squeamish British sound engineer Toby Jones arrives in Italy to work on a movie called The Equestrian Vortex, not realizing it’s an extra-bloody horror film. Supposedly he was hired because the film’s...
View ArticleCatching Fire (2013, Francis Lawrence)
Lawrence (who made Water For Elephants and the music video for Gone Till November) turns in a much better Hunger Games movie than the last guy did. This movie will, of course, be best remembered for...
View ArticleTale of Tales (2015, Matteo Garrone)
Not the best fantasy English-language debut by a Cannes jury prize winning European filmmaker starring John C. Reilly I’ve seen in theaters this week. Hard to believe this was even worse than Reality....
View ArticleAtomic Blonde (2017, David Leitch)
What verve, what style! Super-paranoid triple-agent action spy thriller starring all the best people, every scene awesome. Sure, a couple of dialogue clunkers and an overall feeling that, despite the...
View ArticleFirst Cow (2019, Kelly Reichardt)
Opens with a William Blake quote, features Gary Farmer… and solo guitar music (by William Tyler, not Neil Young) and has in Cookie the most self-conscious man in the West since Depp in Dead Man. Even...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Indiana Jones 5: The Dial of Destiny (2023, James Mangold)
Maybe everyone’s doing the best they can with an ill-begotten concept, but this looks especially poor and cartoonish after seeing Mission Impossible 7 this month. There’s more nazi and jesus stuff...
View Article