If anyone could have saved HOT PURSUIT, it would have been Reese Witherspoon and Sofia Vergara. Aside from having scads of talent and audience appeal, they both have a keen understanding of their strengths as performers, yet they never quite cross the line into becoming caricatures of themselves. Here, the co-stars and co-producers have found… Read More »
FOUR CHRISTMASES
The most interesting thing about FOUR CHRISTMASES, and it is slim pickings at best, is that from the dull farce that starts it, it so precipitously takes a steep nosedive into melodrama of the most predictable, sloppy sort. Vince Vaughn and Reese Witherspoon, game and able players as are the rest of the veteran cast,… Read More »
MONSTERS VS ALIENS
Its hard to love a cockroach. Yet, as demonstrated by WALL-E, in the hands of the gifted storytellers and animators, its not an insurmountable hurdle. With the fine folks who created MONSTERS VS ALIENS, the unlovable insect has once again been redeemed. Unlike WALL-E, a different sort of film altogether that gave us something that… Read More »
HOW DO YOU KNOW?
George (Paul Rudd) is perhaps the last honest man in working in the financial sector. Its not a trait that has done him any good as HOW DO YOU KNOW opens. In fact, his sense of honor has put him in the way of an SEC investigation. The particulars are a mystery to him, but… Read More »
WATER FOR ELEPHANTS
WATER FOR ELEPHANTS, based on the novel of the same name by Sara Gruen, is a grand romantic daydream of a movie. Suffused as it is with a bitter edge of melancholy of lost souls scrabbling for a happiness that they believe to be right around the corner, it is saved from the excesses of… Read More »
THIS MEANS WAR
THIS MEANS WAR is a frothy romp of a popcorn flick brightened by witty writing and a cast that get laughs by expertly playing it straight with a plausibly implausible plot. That would be how a product-tester inadvertently comes between two top-flight CIA agents who are also best friends. Yes, its ridiculous. Its also designed… Read More »
LEGALLY BLONDE 2 : RED, WHITE AND BLONDE
The reason LEGALLY BLONDE II: RED, WHITE, AND BLONDE works is the same reason the original film did, Reese Witherspoon as Elle Wood, the fluffy blonde with the serious brains. She’s still a fashionista viewing the world through the rosy glow reflected from her pink wardrobe, but this time, having conquered Harvard Law School, she’s… Read More »
JUST LIKE HEAVEN
JUST LIKE HEAVEN is an irresistible and unpretentious morsel of old-fashioned romance with a dash of weltschmerz and metaphysics tossed in for good measure. It’s not so much boy meets girl, as boy meets ghost, though they don’t let that stand in the way of falling in love in spite of themselves. He is David… Read More »
RENDITION
RENDITION takes a subject worth a stark examination and turns it into a long, rambling, and unexpectedly dull tale unredeemed by its good intentions, its twist at the end or Meryl Streep as the prissy and persnickety CIA rendition-meister. It takes a great deal of effort to make that combination fail and this earnest effort… Read More »
VANITY FAIR
Mira Nair’s telling of Thackery’s classic, VANITY FAIR, is a lush, sprawling, sensual film that totters unevenly under the weight of its own ambition. It’s an apt metaphor considering that its heroine, Becky Sharpe, has the same Achilles Heel. Blithely skipping through so many decades of necessity leads to a feeling of sketchiness in some… Read More »