And so we come full circle in the Indiana Jones saga as Indy once again faces the Nazis, this time while going in search of the Dial of Destiny. It’s a bittersweet farewell (unless it makes enough money to tempt all concerned with another installment), rife with complicated action sequences that don’t all succeed in… Read More »
STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS
What you really want to know is whether or not J. J. Abrams has worked his magic and saved the Star Wars franchise. The answer is not just yes. But, rather, YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It is perfection. That is all you really need to know and, while I will not do this film the disservice of lessening… Read More »
MORNING GLORY
MORNING GLORY is an uneven concretion of at least three different films each existing in a universe mutually exclusive of the others that have, nonetheless, somehow found a way to meet, merge, and form a whole that is geometrically smaller than the sum of it parts. And this is a shame, because at least one… Read More »
COWBOYS & ALIENS
COWBOYS & ALIENS is an exhilarating and stunningly successful exercise in the improbable. It trips the light fantastic ambling through idioms from classic westerns while piling on the CGI of nasty creatures from another world driving the action. In classic western tradition, the hero, Jake Lonergan (Daniel Craig) is a laconic loner, quick with his… Read More »
PARANOIA
PARANOIA is a flabby congealed thing that is in no way helped by lackluster direction and a derivative script. The hook is industrial espionage in the high-stakes, and even higher-egos, of hi-tech. Based on the novel of the same name by Joseph Finder, it is a morality tale with no sting, and a thriller with… Read More »
ENDER’S GAME
ENDERS GAME presents the viewer with just the sort of philosophical conundrum posed in the film itself. What to do with a film that is a refreshingly intelligent, morally challenging tale , but based on a novel by Orson Scott Card, a man whose views on gay rights are repugnant? It is perhaps jejune to… Read More »
THE EXPENDABLES 3
To say that THE EXPENDABLES 3 is the best installment of the franchise is sort of like saying that having hayfever is better than contracting bubonic plague. Theyre both unpleasant, but one is infinitely preferable, not to mention survivable, than the other. Theres also the fact that the former is caused by posies (as well… Read More »
HOLLYWOOD HOMICIDE
You can just picture it. Someone comes up with this great idea to make a fun, hip flick about cops in Hollywood full of cameos by stars that ends with a chase down Hollywood Boulevard. And one day theyll make that film. In the meantime we have HOLLYWOOD HOMICIDE, a film so bad that the… Read More »
INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL
INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL has been a long time in coming and, as it turns out, more than worth the wait. This return to the old-fashioned action/adventure/fantasy genre is more than an homage to those implausible but irresistible serials of yore, it’s more than a superb revisiting of the homage… Read More »