You’d think that in 86 minutes of screen time that the makers of THE AMITYVILLE HORROR’s 2005 incarnation could come up with at least one genuinely scary moment. Even if it’s just by accident aided and abetted by the law of averages. Alas, this dreary Z-grade schlock-fest is capable of producing only titters and yawns… Read More »
FEVER PITCH
In an alternate universe where all such daring experiments work, this might have seemed like a good idea. Alas, here in our little corner of space/time, the uneasy melding that is FEVER PITCH of the directing team of the Farrelly Brothers and the writing team of Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel is a bust, even… Read More »
THE UPSIDE OF ANGER
From an evolutionary sense, anger makes sense. It might have sent civilization teetering off balance, but in individuals, it insures that you got enough to eat and a good seat by the fire, not to mention a better shot at having your chromosomes play in the genetic pool. Like most stuff that did us all… Read More »
THE INTERPRETER
My friend Daisy, an enthusiastic but discriminating cinema fan, has a way of summing up her movie-going experiences with a succinct take, and so it was as we exited the preview screening of THE INTERPRETER. It almost seemed, she opined, as though something was on the verge of happening. Alas, director Sydney Pollack’s lugubrious pacing… Read More »
THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN
While Ridley Scott was busy filling THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN, his saga of the Crusades, with sweeping vistas of warfare, oceans of soldiers bent on carnage, and forests of siege engines gliding purposefully towards embattled Jerusalem, he forgot to add a story that would engross an audience. Or even work up a ripple in interest.… Read More »
HOUSE OF WAX
My favorite moment in HOUSE OF WAX comes when Carly (Elisha Cuthbert), our heroine in peril, is fleeing from the crazy person who is brandishing the sharp and dangerous something or other and she smacks right into the wall of the eponymous house. I like it because under the circumstances, that’s what would probably happen.… Read More »
MONSTER-IN-LAW
There is nothing wrong with a light comedy, even one as formulaic as MONSTER-IN-LAW. At least not in principle. Alas, when the makers rely on the formula to carry the day, and they are stuck with the self-absorbed performances of their two starring actresses, who are more concerned with image than character, well, there is… Read More »
STAR WARS EPISODE III — REVENGE OF THE SITH
STAR WARS EPISODE III — REVENGE OF THE SITH is marginally better than its two predecessors. But to put that in the proper perspective, that’s like saying that typhoid fever is marginally better than the ebola virus. It is a difference without a meaningful distinction. The point of EPISODE III is to explore the specifics… Read More »
MADAGASCAR
As I was watching MADAGASCAR, the new animated flick from Dreamworks, it occurred to me that there just aren’t enough lemurs in films of any kind and that’s a darn shame. Not just because as primates they’re our cousins, distantly, but also because there is something intrinsically and compellingly absurd in their large eyes and… Read More »
DOMINION — PREQUEL TO THE EXORCIST
I can see why the folks at Warner Bros. watched the screening of Paul Schrader’s version of the EXORCIST prequel and panicked. They were, after all, working under the curse of the franchise sequels, which had all more or less tanked to critical brickbats and, further which, they might have hoped to avoid by making… Read More »
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