See this low-budget triumph not because it breaks new ground or because it’s emotionally devastating—it doesn’t, really, and it isn’t—but because its twin lead performances are so fantastically sincere. Continue reading
Michel Hazanavicius’ film charms for most of its 90-minute run time, but relies on a number of spectacular scenes to hold aloft a bare-bones plot. The film is, in the end, more of a pastiche than a genuine, heartfelt love-letter to silent cinema. Continue reading
There’s nothing particularly interesting or exciting about a story this uninspiring told in so relentlessly safe a manner. No wonder Alexander Payne’s comfy new indie finds itself near the top of the heap of Best Picture nominees. Continue reading
Wayne Wang’s twentieth motion picture—a story of sisterhood illustrated by the same duo of actresses, playing three generations of themselves in three eras: 1829, 1997, and 2011—is something of a flop. Continue reading
Steven Soderbergh, arguably one of the more interesting (and certainly among the most prolific) of modern American directors, attempts to give the virus-outbreak film a new sheen, but give us nothing much worth talking about, and way too many name-actors doing the talking. Continue reading
The new film by writer-director Andrew Niccol—as much a star vehicle for Justin Timberlake as it is another of the director’s attempts at melding thought-provoking sci-fi to a plausible concrete reality—is a silly, laughably poorly written piece of work. Continue reading
Justin Kurzel’s début feature, a dramatization of Australia’s most notorious serial-murder crime spree, is exceptionally well-crafted but, at its height, ill-advisedly trades palpable suspense for torture-porn. Continue reading
Michael House’s film is a handsomely produced and informative chronicle of the inner and outer life of Monsieur Hulot; an enjoyable appreciation of a man whose idiosyncrasies, it was once said, embody “everything that commercial cinema doesn’t have time or space for.” Continue reading
He may have adored New York City, but with his forty-first feature film—his warmest and most inviting in many years—it’s now clear that Woody Allen probably always wanted to live in Paris in the ’20s (in the rain). Continue reading
Michael Shannon delivers yet another solid performance in Noah Buschel’s functionally flawed but visually arresting neo-noir. It first toured the festival circuit two years ago and is finally being issued on DVD locally. Continue reading
