If we are to accept that “42,” a Hollywood-financed Jackie Robinson biopic, was going to be manipulative no matter the talent involved—which is to say, dramatized to the hilt, with constant reminders (swooning musical score, over-the-top dialogue) that the sociopolitical stakes of each scene are higher than Cheech and Chong—then this Brian Helgeland-directed film is […]
Didn’t the “Scary Movie” films used to be parodies? It has been 13 years since the first one came out, so my memory is admittedly a bit foggy, but I seem to remember the Wayans Brothers taking pointed jabs at “Scream,” “The Blair Witch Project,” “The Sixth Sense,” and other ‘90s horror staples. They made
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At the exact same time that “Evil Dead” first unspooled on over 3,000 screens across the country—last Thursday at 10 p.m.—NBC premiered another new spin on a horror staple, the series “Hannibal.” This was perhaps the most gruesome hour in the history of network television, complete with a murder re-enactment, the discovery of corpses, the
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There is no doubt that DreamWorks has established itself as a film-brand nearly as recognizable as Pixar, but the value of such is debatable, given that the brand is essentially “The Big Animation Studio That Isn’t As Good as Pixar.” That’s not to say that the animators at DreamWorks don’t execute a good idea well
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“G.I. Joe: Retaliation” has nary a single moment in its 110 minute runtime that doesn’t qualify as idiotic in some capacity. It’s yet another mega-budget film that serves as an assault on logic and realism, with each scene seemingly trying to top the previous one in terms of how ridiculous it can get. This process
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While Tyler Perry’s five previous “serious” movies (that is to say, those that do not star Madea) contained no shortage of melodramatic plot developments—each boasts an amount comparable to that of an entire season of the average soap opera—“Temptation” marks the filmmaker’s first attempt at an all-encompassing, big twist. He fails miserably. Any viewer with
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The first sequence of Harmony Korine’s devilishly good new film “Spring Breakers”—comprised of intimate views of scantily clad, young female body-parts on a Florida beach, most of them gyrating—perfectly encapsulates the film’s modus operandi. This type of establishing shot has become commonplace in T&A-focused cinema, like the latest “Porky’s” knockoff (whatever that was) — to
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Antoine Fuqua’s “Olympus Has Fallen” might be the most patriotic movie ever that makes Americans look blazingly incompetent. Here we have a plot that sees a band of North Koreans launch a blistering attack on the White House by sea and air, one that kills hundreds and results in the capture of the president (Aaron
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“The Call” is three parts “Cellular” and one part “Buried.” It’s a phone-driven thriller that sees a 911 operator on the line with a kidnapped girl as the girl’s captor transports her to the site of what will be a gruesome death. The high-concept premise doesn’t yield much new outside of its unusual setting, but
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The world of egomaniacal, spray-tanned Las Vegas magicians in which “The Incredible Burt Wonderstone” takes place is perfect fodder for a comedy, and I have no doubt that Christopher Guest would have gotten a lot of milage out of this premise. But director Don Scardino and writers Jonathan Goldenstein, John Francis Daley, Chad Kultgen, and
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