|
2.5/4
|
71%
|
Frankenstein's Army (2013) |
"
We never care about any of the soldiers. What we do care about are the monsters, and with good reason: They're pips."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 23, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
34%
|
Adore (2013) |
"
'Adore' has received mostly negative reviews. The dismissiveness suggests a discomfort with the subject matter -- an unwillingness to process this particular fiction by writers who on other days grapple agreeably with haunted houses and singing chipmunks."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 23, 2013
|
|
2/4
|
31%
|
Austenland (2013) |
"
Surely any real aficionado of Jane Austen would reject the film's notion that the author's literary masterworks are essentially wish-fulfillment fantasies for women too timid for the red-blooded bodice-rippers of the Harlequin line."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 23, 2013
|
|
3.5/4
|
——
|
Sudoeste (Southwest) () |
"
Clarice's life may be no longer than that of a fruit fly, but its brevity, Nunes suggests (not through words but through the emotional and psychological effect of his images), does not diminish its value"
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 23, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
74%
|
The Source Family (2013) |
"
An entertaining and fascinating documentary about the Southern California cult that 'transformed sex, drugs and rock and roll into a genuine religious formation.'"
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 20, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
95%
|
The Hunt (2013) |
"
Credibly generates suspense and maintains interest, even if one wonders why the filmmakers felt compelled to pursue this particular subject matter for their tale of a wronged man. "
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 20, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
92%
|
Museum Hours (2013) |
"
Most successful at its most hushed and explicitly 'artful,' in the museum; less interesting when it becomes more casual, as when Johann and Mary hang out and discuss general topics at coffeehouses. (Mary is nice, but, frankly, a bit of a bore.) "
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 20, 2013
|
|
3.5/4
|
100%
|
I Am Divine (2013) |
"
Hard to beat for sheer enjoyment,as when Divine's mother remembers: 'I used to always say, Glenn, don't do anything to embarrass us' -- a sound bite juxtaposed with footage of Divine being raped by a giant lobster in 'Multiple Maniacs.'"
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 9, 2013
|
|
4/4
|
100%
|
Valentine Road () |
"
One of the most powerful films you'll see this year or maybe any year. "
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 9, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
——
|
Continental () |
"
Entertaining but overlong and undercooked..."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 9, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
80%
|
Any Day Now (2012) |
"
If the movie preaches to the converted, in the manner of period films about racial civil rights, it never becomes soapy or pious, thanks in part to the tart performances of Alan Cumming and Garrett Dillahunt..."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 9, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
——
|
G.B.F. () |
"
A cheerful, colorful sitcom of a high-school comedy in which a trio of sassy 'mean girls' vie for the attentions of their first 'out' classmate, after reading in their style magazines that gay sidekicks are 'the hottest new trend' for teen queen bees."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 9, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
——
|
Bridegroom (2013) |
"
Highly emotional, even sentimental..."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 9, 2013
|
|
3.5/4
|
81%
|
Ain't Them Bodies Saints (2013) |
"
An outlaw saga of undying love distilled to its emotional essence, as if it were something to be inhaled or applied to the skin, to work at the level of the blood and bypass the cynical defenses of the intellect..."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 9, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
——
|
Hands of a Stranger (1962) |
"
Body, mind, soul -- can one exist without the others? Is the 'self' determined by one or a combination of all three? These age-old questions are examined more directly in even B horrors, such as 'Hands of a Stranger,' than in most other entertainments."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 9, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
75%
|
You're Next (2013) |
"
Mumblecore may be dead but mumblegore is alive and, well, pretty grisly, judging from this tongue-in-cheek, blender-in-head home-invasion horror thriller notable for its go-for-broke brashness and what-the-hell spirit."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Sep 9, 2013
|
|
2/4
|
46%
|
Closed Circuit (2013) |
"
I wonder if the constant repetition in an entertainment context of the idea that government is corrupt and deceitful inspires weariness, resignation and even acceptance in the public mind, rather than outrage or a demand for reform."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 30, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
84%
|
Fill the Void (2013) |
"
Eventually reveals itself to be a sort of Jane Austen romance -- a tale of matchmaking and marriage motivated by the ritual and decorum of Haredi Judaism in modern Tel Aviv rather than by the social strictures of 19th-century England."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 30, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
74%
|
The Grandmaster (2013) |
"
More impressive than its flurry of fists is its sleight of hand, the misdirection that perhaps conceals for some the truth that this is not primarily a decades-spanning historical drama but a romance of unrequited love."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 30, 2013
|
|
2/4
|
30%
|
Kick-Ass 2 (2013) |
"
Offers a convenient punching bag for critics who want to equate the youth violence in movies with its manifestations offscreen, even if teenagers probably represent the ideal audience to both enjoy and see through this contradictory, nuance-free cartoon."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 26, 2013
|
|
2/4
|
64%
|
Epic (2013) |
"
Boasts sometimes photorealistic animation and some cool concepts (the heroic 'Leafmen' ride hummingbirds like horses), but it's grounded by the cliche aspects of everything else."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 26, 2013
|
|
2/4
|
38%
|
Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters (2013) |
"
The most memorable scene doesn't showcase Confederate zombies or the reawakened Kronos but 'Firefly' star Nathan Fillion as Hermes, god of speed, dressed like a parcel messenger and bemoaning the fact that the best TV shows are 'of course, canceled.'"
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 26, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
70%
|
Student (2013) |
"
'Crime and Punishment' transplanted to post-Soviet Kazakhstan, where a ruthless new capitalism is creating millionaires and gangsters; the film suggests there isn't much difference between the two."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 26, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
——
|
Shyamal Uncle Turns Off The Lights () |
"
Very modest and fairly wonderful..."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 26, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
——
|
Parada (The Parade) () |
"
As slick and corny and sitcom-esque as 'La Cage Aux Folles'; but if its message seems obvious and unchallenging for the typical U.S. viewer, it's not so easily digested in post-Soviet Eastern Europe, as recent events in Russia have demonstrated."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 26, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
91%
|
The Spectacular Now (2013) |
"
Unfortunately, an odd paradox emerges. The more we learn about Aimee -- the more she is presented in depth, as a complicated character -- the more she is revealed to be, in fact, just a prop for Sutter's rehabilitation and redemption."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 26, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
89%
|
The World's End (2013) |
"
Says the Rosamund Pike character: 'You come back (home), and everything is the same, but different.' The science-fiction element of the story, when it appears, offers a clever literal explanation for this unsettling, uncanny feeling."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 26, 2013
|
|
4/4
|
91%
|
Blue Jasmine (2013) |
"
Jasmine may no longer be a trophy wife, but she remains a sort of trophy: Something on display, cold and golden, for us to admire. "
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 26, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
88%
|
In the House (2013) |
"
The convoluted yet familiar narrative games become somewhat tiresome. The movie works best as a straight suspense drama about a frustrated teacher and his devious star pupil..."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 26, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
73%
|
Lee Daniels' The Butler (2013) |
"
It's another of the film's ironies that while Gaines owes his success to an ability to make a room feel empty, Whitaker, even at his most still and silent, fills the frame with life -- with presence."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 16, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
83%
|
Berberian Sound Studio (2013) |
"
A movie that may whisper dark secrets into your ears at night, when you're trying to forget it. "
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 16, 2013
|
|
3.5/4
|
69%
|
The Wolverine (2013) |
"
A superior, even adult Marvel Comics adaptation that plays almost like a straight gangster/yakuza thriller for much of its length, until the obligatory climactic superhero/supervillain dust-up."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 16, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
64%
|
2 Guns (2013) |
"
Director Baltasar Kormakur keeps the pace and patter loose and lively; the result is almost refreshing -- a run through a sprinkler on a summer movie-season lawn cluttered with junked blockbusters."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 16, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
87%
|
The Conjuring (2013) |
"
America's stealth auteur, James Wan, directs unpretentious, inexpensive, stylistically consistent horror movies that spook audiences and scare up enormous profits; he embraces the genre's tropes and demonstrates why they continue to unnerve."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 16, 2013
|
|
3.5/4
|
68%
|
Elysium (2013) |
"
Blomkamp has taken note of the growing gap between the world's have and have-nots and made it literal."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 9, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
54%
|
Lovelace (2013) |
"
The grim second half of the movie is not just a 'reveal' for viewers unfamiliar with Lovelace's biography but a sort of hangover (or STD?) that punishes moviegoers for enjoying the sexual soap opera and salacious horseplay of the first half."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 9, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
93%
|
Still Mine (2013) |
"
Takes full advantage of the ornery authority and distinctive Thomas Hart Bentonesque physiognomy of its star, James Cromwell, in a rare lead role."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 9, 2013
|
|
2/4
|
14%
|
R.I.P.D. (2013) |
"
The movie might best be enjoyed by kids, although parents won't appreciate the 'comic' moment when Roy reports that the coyote that ate his carcass 'made love' to his skull."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 8, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
98%
|
Blackfish (2013) |
"
Whatever its flaws, 'Blackfish' seems likely to be the rare film that inspires real reform and that helps awaken viewers to their kinship and responsibility to the animal kingdom."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 8, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
47%
|
I'm So Excited! (2013) |
"
This isn't just camp, it's existential camp -- or, more precisely, an acknowledgment that the camp impulse is one way of dealing with the absurdity of life. 'We're flying around aimlessly,' a man says, 'and we don't know where or how we're going to land.'"
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 8, 2013
|
|
2/4
|
14%
|
The Smurfs 2 (2013) |
"
At this week's preview screening, a young girl who apparently was experiencing her first 3D movie complained: 'It's in my face!' Child, I feel your pain. "
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 8, 2013
|
|
2/4
|
8%
|
Grown Ups 2 (2013) |
"
This Happy Madison remedial-school version of 'This Is 40' is as insane and dumbfounding and worthy of WTF mock-cult status as 'The Room' or 'Manos, Hands of Fate,' even if it did earn $42 million its first weekend."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 1, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
72%
|
Pacific Rim (2013) |
"
It's del Toro's squarest, least interesting film. It's as if the sense of fun and wonder collapsed beneath the gargantuism of the budget, in an esthetic equivalent of the square-cube law that makes the story's monsters impossible in real life."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 1, 2013
|
|
4/4
|
94%
|
Fruitvale Station (2013) |
"
In the wake of the Trayvon Martin verdict, this compassionate film reclaims the humanity of victims transformed into political symbols and provides context for those who think the media and not Zimmerman's bullet 'injected race' into the Martin killing."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 1, 2013
|
|
3.5/4
|
82%
|
Crystal Fairy (2013) |
"
Like the hallucinogenic brew the film's American drug tourist painstakingly distills from a purloined San Pedro cactus, it demonstrates that a simple formula can produce a potent effect."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 1, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
68%
|
The Fog (1979) |
"
Released four years after the Bicentennial, 'The Fog' might be a jaundiced corrective to the often uncritical self-congratulation of America's birthday celebration, with the ghosts as manfestations of manifest destiny's bloody heritage."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 1, 2013
|
|
3.5/4
|
89%
|
The Angels' Share (2013) |
"
As unlikely a fable of redemption as any that Hollywood might deliver, elevated by Loach's insistence on naturalism."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Aug 1, 2013
|
|
2.5/4
|
——
|
El fantástico mundo de Juan Orol () |
"
Unlike Tim Burton's 'Ed Wood,' it doesn't make a convincing case for Orol as an artist, even a demented or incompetent one. The film shows us little of Orol's work; we don't know why critics hated his movies, or why the public liked them."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Jul 29, 2013
|
|
3/4
|
42%
|
Red 2 (2013) |
"
It's witty and satisfying, but I wish it was not so gleefully gun happy and that it did not treat the loss of life entirely as a joke."
—
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Posted Jul 22, 2013
|
