If you want to know what’s wrong with American comedies, look no further than the latest buddy film starring Vince Vaughn. I might sound like a broken record, but these films apparently have an imaginary check list that requires a drug sequence, separate male and female genitalia exposures, grotesque sex sequences, a car crash […]
Director John Madden (Shakespeare in Love) and the cast who survived the first film return to India to once again check into the Marigold Hotel. “Why die here when you can die there,” says hotel co-owner Muriel Donnelly played by Oscar winner Maggie Smith (Downton Abby, Harry Potter). It’s Smith’s charm and wit that keeps
His second bust in a row, South African filmmaker Neill Blomkamp exploded onto the scene in 2009 with District 9. Nominated for best picture that year, Blomkamp became the guy to watch. His second feature Elysium took him away from the small budget workings and put him in summer movie territory, where he delivered a
When director David Cronenberg is good, he is really good, but when he is bad, it’s difficult to sit through his films. A History of Violence will always be his modern masterpiece in my mind, and often his best work has been with Viggo Mortensen (Eastern Promises, A Dangerous Method). Mortensen dropped out of this
This is the first film Oscar nominated, mega-action star, Will Smith had opened outside of a summer release or a holiday since he became the go to guy for blockbusters. It seems After Earth, co-starring his son Jaden, knocked him down a few more notches then we realized. If the release date of late February
“Kill Bill” redefined the female action genre over a decade ago, now in 2015 filmmakers are still trying to recapture what Quentin Tarantino and Uma Thurman delivered. “Lucy” disappointed last year, and “Everly” is this latest attempt to combine sexy women and violence. It isn’t that we don’t want to see someone like Oscar nominated
To quote myself from my review of Hot Tub Time Machine back in 2010, “This is the dumbest script I have ever read, let’s get it made.” Likely what producers or a studio head told Josh Heald when he presented this idea. That rings just as true for the sequel which has abandoned original star
The way adults remember high school is very curious. The Duff is just another example in a long line of films where the cast is significantly older than the characters they are portraying. Both leads Mae Whitman and Robbie Amell (the Tom Cruise look alike) are 27 year olds playing 17 year old seniors; while
McFarland USA, from director Niki Caro (Whale Rider, North Country), is far better than I ever expected from a Disney film. What looks from the trailer like another inspirational sports film, this time centered on cross country, is far from it. McFarland USA is about just what the title says it is: an unheard of
Wild Tales is a remarkable film from Argentina showing in six vignettes a range of human emotions and coping techniques in response to stress. In all the tales, emotional press (animal instincts, perhaps, in that beautiful close-ups of animals in the wild are shown during the initial credits) usurps logic and good old problem solving