We’ve been deluged, it sometimes seems, with portraits of troubled musicians. The musical biopic has become a popular sub-genre; it sells soundtracks by the millions and raises familiar public figures up to a level of adoration and/or scrutiny that we’re all comfortable seeing. It’s just so easy to watch the dissection of a rock star’s … Continue reading
It’s Casey Affleck’s face you’ll remember. His expressions are crude oil: unrefined, shifting, impenetrable. His eyes and lips slide and scrabble for purchase on some honest display. As the coward Robert Ford, Affleck brings a quiet arsenal to bear on a man whose personality was as thin as prison gruel. By making Ford empathetic, he’s … Continue reading
Not the movie we were promised.
Remember that Simpsons episode where Homer buys a gun and proceeds to use it as an all-purpose tool to turn off lights, change the channel, crack nuts and so on? The protagonist of Michael Davis’s Shoot ‘Em Up, Mr. Smith, approaches firearms with a likewise sense of versatility, only Smith is a lot handier with … Continue reading
This will not be a long review, as Jeremy and Devin and Alex have already unloaded on this truly terrible film in far more delicious ways that I ever could want to. That said, I felt like it’d be a lost opportunity not to bring my take to the mix just to soil your eyes … Continue reading
"John Carpenter’s The Thing is a foolish, depressing, overproduced movie that mixes horror with science fiction to make something that is fun as neither one thing or the other. Sometimes it looks as if it aspired to be the quintessential moron movie of the 80’s – a virtually storyless feature composed of lots of laboratory … Continue reading
Before I get to the business of calling Rob Zombie’s Halloween the worst movie of the year so far, let me talk about the usage of that phrase. First of all, it should be obvious that I am talking about it being the worst movie I have seen this year; while Jason Statham and Jet … Continue reading
When a legendary outlaw and a mild mannered rancher set on bringing him to justice lock horns, who wins? Up and coming actor Ben Foster. While Christian Bale and Russell Crowe are the above the title talent in this film, it’s Foster who’s the real draw, stealing the spotlight from the charismatic man from Down … Continue reading
Ben Garant’s Reno 911!: Miami was tolerable because it at least delivered on the modest promise of the TV show, i.e. it featured bizarro sights like Paul Rudd as a Scarface-like drug lord torturing a hostage with a weed whacker. On a yacht. Prompting one of this year’s more memorable snatches of dialogue: "Who brings … Continue reading
Thanks to an inopportune slot in the August release schedule, I can’t help stacking The Ten up against Superbad, and it’s never going to win that contest. The difference is that while The Ten, a comic collection of stories based on the ten commandments, is funny and unwilling to set arbitrary content limitations and taboos, … Continue reading