Reviews HEAVEN IS FOR REAL. So it’s right out there in the clumsily worded title. Although the premise of the movie — that a 4-year-old visited heaven, sat on the lap of the Christ and met the sister he never knew he had because she died in utero — includes a crisis of faith, ultimately […]
film
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Touchdown
Reviews DRAFT DAY. I don’t particularly care for or about the National Football League. And over the years, I’ve come to view professional athletic organizations and their sanctioning bodies with an ever more jaundiced eye. Recently, in the middle of some cavernous, anonymous, Midwestern chain restaurant, lamenting my lot, I realized that the many giant […]
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Role Models
Reviews BAD WORDS. Since his resurgence on TV’s Arrested Development (a handful of hilarious movie cameos notwithstanding), Jason Bateman has been remade as a sort of put-upon everyman/icon. With Ben Stiller becoming a victim of his own newfound sincerity, Bateman the new face face of frustrated good intentions, the likeable loser destined to catch a […]
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The Fast and the Short
Reviews THE OSCAR NOMINATED SHORT FILMS 2014: LIVE ACTION. It is a happy thing, tinged with sadness, to have the opportunity to see these shorts in a theatrical setting. Anybody who makes movies cut their teeth on short-form experiments; they represent imagination directly expressed, unburdened by the need for three-act story structure or overarching character […]
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Greek Weak
Reviews 300: RISE OF AN EMPIRE. Apparently 300 (2006), Zack Snyder’s misbegotten, highly stylized adaptation of Frank Miller’s graphic novel, made enough money and fans to drive the studio back to the well. Even though there is ostensibly a bigger story being told here, clearly profit, rather than art or narrative, is the motivating factor. […]
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Non-Stop Takes Off
Reviews NON-STOP. I bashfully admit that this marks my first experience with the recently reminted Liam Neeson as action hero. My impression is that he has thrown himself into this late-career badass period to combat his grief at the tragic death of his wife Natasha Richardson in 2009. I’m not sure whether it’s the workmanlike […]
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Canned
Reviews ROBOCOP. Slick, not too long, a little bit of fun — RoboCop hits a few notes right, but never gets better than its visuals. That the ’80s version remains satirically relevant (and endearing) makes the remake even more hollow. Alex Murphy, a Detroit cop is set up and nearly killed by his coworkers when […]
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Lego Blocked
Reviews THE LEGO MOVIE. My childhood was littered with Legos. They were a constant fixture, as well as a sort of passively administered personality test for pre-adolescents. Some preferred their construction sets impeccably organized, either still in the original packaging or carefully assembled to match the example on the box. Others took a less clinical […]
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Growing Boys
Reviews LABOR DAY. At first it seemed odd that a movie by Jason Reitman (Young Adult, Up in the Air) would be relegated to the dumping ground of mid-winter release. Reitman’s become something of a prestige director in recent years, gathering up commercial success, critical accolades and major award nominations along the way. But as […]
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Franken-fail
Reviews I, FRANKENSTEIN. It would be a deliciously nasty irony if this movie were as horrendous, as cobbled together a monstrosity as its famous protagonist. But alas, it isn’t even bad enough to be enjoyable. Instead, it’s bad in a cold, dully familiar, unremarkable way: the white noise of crappy graphic novel adaptations. This extrapolation […]
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Intelligence
Reviews HER. Almost 15 years are gone since Spike Jonze brought his sweetly cracked sensibility to the big screen with Being John Malkovich in 1999. In the intervening period, Jonze directed a second Charlie Kaufman screenplay (Adaptation, 2002) and adapted Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are (2009). This is the first time he’s directed […]
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Highlight Reel
Reviews The only new release this past weekend, Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones, struck me as a depressing way to ring in a new year. Had I not closed out 2013 laid low by pig flu or whatever it was, I might have had the energy to have fun with a bad movie. Instead, I’ve […]