As expected, “Paranormal Activity 4” earned the top spot at the domestic box office this weekend, but it did so without grossing anywhere near as much as the previous couple installments. #4’s $30.2m opening was down 42.5 percent from #3’s $52.6m and down 25.8 percent from #2’s $40.7m. Perhaps people heeded the advice of our […]
Weekend Box Office: “Paranormal Activity 4” tops unremarkable frame Read More »
If one were to graph the quality of the “Paranormal Activity” movies, the result would look much like a sine wave. The first film kicked off the series with great promise, thanks to the high tension that it was able to elicit from only two people, a camera, and a long, dark hallway. Its sequel
Review: “Paranormal Activity 4” Read More »
Historically, Robert Zemeckis’ dramas have worked by harnessing their thick characterizations and exaggerated situations to unabashedly play to the audience’s emotions. From Forrest Gump’s run across America to Chuck Noland’s bald-faced wailing at the loss of his beloved volleyball Wilson in “Cast Away,” Zemeckis’ finest work may be coated in Hollywood sheen, but it nonetheless
NYFF Review: “Flight” Read More »
“Good luck,” warned Jack Turner as he introduced “Compliance,” Craig Zobel’s squirmy new film, to a sold-out crowd at the Downer Theatre. Turner, a producer working on Zobel’s next project, reminded filmgoers at the Milwaukee Film Festival that “Compliance” provoked walkouts and charges of misanthropy at Sundance. Nervous energy rippled through the rows, but the
Notes from the 2012 Milwaukee Film Festival Read More »
Hello and welcome back to Box Office Beat, the column in which I predict the upcoming weekend’s box office grosses. After last weekend’s mammoth load of six new wide releases, which resulted in a lot of work for me, I’m incredibly glad that there are only two this time around. One is fairly easy to
Box Office Beat: Weekend of October 19 Read More »
“Seven Psychopaths” is not so much under- or over-written as it is written. It’s a comedic crime thriller that becomes about its own construction ala “Adaptation,” with writer/director Martin McDonaugh figuring as the lead. But unlike the Spike Jonze film, “Seven Psychopaths” never really gels right; its disparate elements, often strong on their own, chafe against
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Few things are more irritating than a movie that’s full of itself, a characterization that undoubtedly applies to Javier Rebollo’s “The Dead Man and Being Happy.” Sympathetic lead performances and pretty Argentinian locations help alleviate the aggravation of the experience, but the film’s smug self-satisfaction with its own quirkiness is ultimately irredeemable. The titular “dead
NYFF Review: “The Dead Man and Being Happy” Read More »
Lee Daniels’ “Precious” was a messy, vaguely impressionistic, swing-for-the-fences coming-of-age film that, against the odds, struck a chord with highbrow awards voters, at least in part due to the perceived social importance of its 1980s Harlem setting and the public support of Oprah Winfrey. Now, Daniels is back with an equally daring work–“The Paperboy”–that will
Review: “The Paperboy” Read More »
Miguel Gomes’ “Tabu” is a conventional story of forbidden love presented in a visually dazzling package that took me a full act to start enjoying. The reason for my delayed gratification was the film’s unusual structure: it begins with an ultimately irrelevant framing story that distracts from the meat. But once “Tabu” reaches its core
NYFF Review: “Tabu” Read More »
Films that traffic in the abstract can be difficult to objectively judge, because each viewer is either lured in by the style or they aren’t. “Leviathan” is one such film, so much so that I won’t even pretend to understand the viewpoint of those praising it. For the full 87 minute runtime, I tried to
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