I think it’s possible that Steven Soderbergh will never make another great movie. I don’t mean to imply that his efforts won’t be significantly better than most of what crosses multiplex screens, or that he won’t continue to be one … Continue reading I intentionally wrote it out to be an illegible mess
The Women (Diane English, 2008). This remake of the 1939 George Cukor-directed comedy had been in development for so long that I swear we reported on it on the movie review radio show I co-hosted in college. That show ended in 1993. Watching the finished product, it’s easy to understand what inspired the reluctance. Similarly, the easiest explanation for the project finally coming to fruition is sheer attrition: Diane English must have simply outlasted the studio execs with sounder taste. As nice as it is to see the rarity of a movie filled with female characters, it would be nicer … Continue reading Theatre goddess, film destroyer, New York girls are sure to enjoy her
At it’s best, science fiction is all about ideas. Shrewd philosophical debates and trenchant social commentary are housed within fantastical tales of space travel and futurescapes. That’s harder to discern from the offerings in the multiplex, where the default approach … Continue reading I am a visitor here…I am not permanent
Swing Vote (Joshua Michael Stern, 2008). Stern builds his soft political satire around the notion of a contentious U.S. presidential election coming down to one vote, an entirely ambivalent, freshly unemployed middle-aged scamp. That role, as it must, goes to Kevin Costner, who tries to find a new side to the die he’s been casting periodically ever since Bull Durham. It doesn’t work, in part because he can’t quite get a handle on how this guy’s charm should be balanced against his more problematic behavior. It’s mostly due to the tepid script, though. The raw material is there to tackle … Continue reading It’s just another movie, another song and dance
(500) Days of Summer seems to aspire to nothing less than reinventing the typical romantic comedy. It doesn’t subvert the form or offer some sort of deconstruction. Instead, it seems to want to take something familiar and dose it with … Continue reading Summer, summer, summer, it’s like a merry-go-round
There’s a moment in Kathryn Bigelow’s new movie, The Hurt Locker, which is predictably tragic and tragically predictable. A military man who’s stationed in Iraq, but largely unversed on the dangers that exist on those sun-scorched streets, tags along on … Continue reading When the day is long and the night, the night is yours alone
Writer-director Judd Apatow’s new movie Funny People has a lot of dick jokes in it. A lot. If you’re an undiscerning fan of dick jokes, finding each and every one of them hysterically funny, then this movie may actually be … Continue reading Whatever went away, I’ll get it over now, I’ll get money, I’ll get funny again
So much attention and outrage has been leveled at the sorry state of the American food industry in recent years, from the meticulous reporting of Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation to Morgan Spurlock’s Super Size Me up through the hugely … Continue reading Warning sign, warning sign, I see it but I pay it no mind
Michael Mann likes to make movies about men. Men who speak tersely and intently, conveying their views and plans with a creased-brow seriousness. Men who stride purposefully through the world. Men who stare each down across diner tables or through … Continue reading I got so much trouble on my mind, I refuse to lose
So the cinematic adventures of the world’s most popular boy wizard come one film closer to the end. Harry Potter and his favorite classmates at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry continue their academic pursuits while remaining vigilant against the … Continue reading Gettin’ down with your royal badness
Coffee for Two 