movie reviews

May 17, 2012

Battleship

Liam Neeson, Rihanna, Taylor Kitsch

Directed by: Peter Berg

Confession: I'm usually in Peter Berg's corner. Friday Night Lights, The Kingdom and Hancock all show a director with a wild streak Hollywood can't totally tame. But Battleship, based on Hasbro's naval-combat game, shows Berg trying to transform into demon box-office machine Michael Bay. Can you aim lower? Battleship is all noise and crashing metal, sinking to the shallows of Bay's Armageddon and then digging to the brain-extinction level of the Transformers trilogy. ... | More »

What To Expect When You're Expecting

Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Lopez, Chace Crawford

Directed by: Kirk Jones

What's in the Hollywood water supply? First, director Peter Berg (Friday Night Lights), who should know better, clones himself as Michael Bay with Battleship. Now Kirk Jones (Waking Ned Devine) does a Freaky Friday body switch, becoming director Garry Marshall with the still-born What To Expect When You're Expecting, an all-star dud that could be easily confused with Marshall's Valentine's Day and New Year's Eve, except for the absence of Ashton Kutcher. Based on Heid... | More »

May 16, 2012

The Dictator

Sacha Baron Cohen

Directed by: Larry Charles

Say it isn't so. Is Sacha Baron Cohen, a.k.a. Ali G, Borat and Bruno, actually starring in a movie with a semi-coherent plot? Seems like it. There's not a mock-doc, improvised, caught-on-the-fly, "gotcha!" moment in all of The Dictator. Baron Cohen wrote the linear script with Alec Berg, David Mandel, and Jeff Schaffer. And Larry Charles, who directed Borat and Bruno, stages every scene with emotional maturity and military precision. Hell, I'm lying. The Dictator zigs and zags ... | More »

May 10, 2012

Dark Shadows

Johnny Depp

Directed by: Tim Burton

If you're not interested in what Johnny Depp and director Tim Burton are cooking up, you're missing out on one of the best go-your-own-way teams in screen history. Dark Shadows, their eighth collaboration to date, doesn't occupy the rarefied air of Ed Wood, Edward Scissorhands and Sweeney Todd. It's too scattershot for the pantheon, but at least as good as Alice and Wonderland and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Burton's visuals are a sumptuous treat, as is Depp�... | More »

Under African Skies

Paul Simon

Directed by: Joe Berlinger

By all means check out Joe Berlinger's unmissable Under African Skies, a documentary that shows how Paul Simon defied a U.N. cultural boycott to work in South Africa during apartheid to record his landmark Graceland album in 1985. Simon's virtuosity, intensified by a 2011 reunion concert with the South African musicians who helped him make history, raises the potent and still relevant question of artistic freedom versus realpolitik. Powered by Simon's brilliance, Under African ... | More »

May 4, 2012

A Little Bit of Heaven

Kate Hudson, Gael García Bernal, Kathy Bates

Directed by: Nicole Kassell

Kate Hudson, whose career has been sputtering on life support for years, plays a terminal patient in this droolingly stupid weepie.Useful tip: The movie dies way quicker than she does. | More »

May 3, 2012

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

Dev Patel, Maggie Smith, Judi Dench, Tom Wilkinson

Directed by: John Madden

The MTV Cribs peeps are probably not clamoring to see this tale of British retirees seeking a retirement haven in India. But screw them if they don't give a damn about watching Brit acting royalty nailing every nuance in this comedy laced with genuine emotion. Adapted by Ol Parker from a novel by Deborah Moggach, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel begins by lining up its cast of quirky characters. There's widowed, financially strapped Evelyn (Judi Dench), bigoted Muriel (Maggie Smith), ... | More »

April 30, 2012

The Avengers

Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Scarlett Johansson, Chris Evans, Tom Hiddleston

Directed by: Joss Whedon

Let me sprint right to the point: The Avengers has it all. And then some. Six superheroes for the price of one ticket: Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, Hawkeye, Black Widow and the Hulk. It's also the blockbuster I saw in my head when I imagined a movie that brought together the idols of the Marvel world in one shiny, stupendously exciting package. It's Transformers with a brain, a heart and a working sense of humor. Suck on that, Michael Bay. All hail the warrior king of this dizz... | More »

April 26, 2012

Bernie

Jack Black, Shirley MacLaine, Matthew McConaughey

Directed by: Richard Linklater

Texas-born Richard Linklater is one of those rare filmmakers whose work never fails to fascinate. Unconvinced? Here's a few titles: Slacker, Dazed and Confused, Before Sunrise, Before Sunset, Waking Life, School of Rock, A Scanner Darkly, Fast Food Nation, Me and Orson Welles. Now let's get on with his latest spellbinder. Bernie is based on a true story. It really is. Want just the facts? Here goes: In 1997, in the town of Carthage, Texas, the body of rich, notoriously bitchy widow... | More »

The Five-Year Engagement

Jason Segel, Emily Blunt

Directed by: Nicholas Stoller

IMAO (that's "In My Arrogant Opinion"), actor-writer Jason Segel and director-writer Nicholas Stoller crafted a sublime romantic soufflé in 2008's Forgetting Sarah Marshall. That dream partnership gets dinged a bit in the frustratingly uneven The Five-Year Engagement, which drags and sags at 124 minutes. Luckily, the movie never runs on sitcom empty. How could it, with a terrific cast, led by Segel as San Francisco sous chef Tom Solomon and the delectable Emil... | More »