In Israeli writer-director Nir Bergman’s Broken Wings, we never see an automatic weapon, a military roadblock or a horrific explosion on a city street. Rather than dealing with the volatile politics of the Middle East, this quiet, soul-wrenching film examines the unresolved traumas of one middle-class family trying to cope…
When we first see the title characters of Connie and Carla, a penny-dreadful imitation of one of Hollywood’s most inimitable comedies, they are loud-mouthed junior high girls mugging in the school cafeteria. A minute later, they are loud-mouthed grown-ups (well, they’re the size of grown-ups) screaming out show tunes in…
Up front, it’s “full disclosure” time. Let it be confessed here, publicly, that I have never been a religious Neil Young fan. Always liked him OK, always appreciated his adventurous spirit, never bought his albums. But since I’ve also never met a Canadian I didn’t like (apart from Mike Myers),…
It is, to those of us born and raised in Texas, the Greatest Story Ever Told and Retold; who can forget the Alamo when it’s on every Texas history class final exam? At 5 a.m. on March 6, 1836, some 189 Texian soldiers and volunteers were slaughtered while trying to…
She’s a pre-med farm girl intent on administering to the world’s suffering children. He’s a car-racing Danish prince looking to shed the burdens of royal duty. They’re both in America’s heartland, where they share a chem lab, an employer and a penchant for driving fast. What, pray tell, is going…
The Golden Age of the Comic Book Movie has turned the color of tarnished copper. But there is no going back, not when comic shops have become movie studios’ research and development labs. But no moving forward, either; the comic-book movie has become a cinematic smudge once more, one blurring…
As a proud sponsor of the Colin Farrell media blitz, Intermission opens on the lad’s salable mug, basically sporting the same buzz-cut ‘n’ tats look from his punky cameo in Veronica Guerin. It’s a cunning editorial move, pushing the product from the get-go, yet it gets interesting as Farrell’s dumb…
Those of us who grew up in the United States may be weary of our country’s claims of freedom and opportunity. Faced with a wobbly quote from our leader attributing terrorism to envy, we might roll our eyes, aware of a reality far darker and more complex. But there are…
Jersey Girl, the sixth film by writer-director Kevin Smith, is the least Kevin Smith-y film he’s ever made, which will be welcome news to those exhausted by Smith’s everlasting obsession with his dick, fart jokes and stack of comic books and bad news to those enamored of Smith’s everlasting obsession…
The Ladykillers is the second film in as many years made by Joel and Ethan Coen to fill space between pet projects that seem to run off leash; it’s their time-killer, if you will. But even their recent paychecks reflect the brothers’ restlessness: Their movies have grown more manic and…
Viewers rightfully marvel at the colorful CG seascapes of Finding Nemo and the unique drawing style of The Triplets of Belleville, but when it comes to the actual stories told in contemporary animated films, no one’s pushing the boundaries quite like anime auteur Satoshi Kon. Having taken a page from…
The appeal of a quirky little Norwegian film called Kitchen Stories arises from the unlikeliest of sources–a series of domestic studies conducted in the early 1950s by a group of Swedish efficiency experts. The mission of the Home Research Institute, as far as anyone could tell, was to chart the…
Oh, dear. Angelina Jolie’s made another bad film. Is it too soon to give up on her yet? There’s no denying that Jolie is sexy as hell. The tattoos, the knife collection, the exhibitionist streak, the bisexual vibe she gives off…totally hot, no question. Given her work with the U.N…
If you were a college-aged East Berliner in October 1989, chances are that your time was occupied by one of several things. Protesting comes to mind, as does hacking at long-reviled concrete. Perhaps you caroused, or lit fireworks, or sang with joy as you coursed through the newly open streets…
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, in which a man has recollections of a soured relationship erased from his brain, may be the most romantic movie in recent memory, if you will pardon the unforgivable pun. Written by Charlie Kaufman and directed by Michel Gondry, it’s about many things–how we’re…
Remember Omar Sharif? He’s been all but absent from the silver screen in recent years (though he has been seen–or at least heard–on television). According to the actor, he left the trade by choice: “Let us stop this nonsense, these meal tickets that we do because it pays well, unless…
It’s a bit unorthodox to ladle superlatives all over a film in the opening paragraph, but The Reckoning deserves them. Moving, gripping and powerful, suspenseful, stylish and literate, this exploration of justice and art may be set in 1390s England, but it resonates today. This is a brilliant and unpretentious…
The problem with Spartan isn’t so much that it’s mediocre, but that it could be a whole lot better. Unlike writer-director David Mamet’s last movie, Heist, a film with such a generic plot and predictable Gene Hackman performance that it never had a chance, Spartan has a reasonably compelling story…
If you were expecting the first film to emerge from Afghanistan since the defeat of the Taliban to be even remotely celebratory, you’ll have to adjust your expectations. Radically. In Osama, filmed in 2002 and 2003 in a “suburb” of Kabul, writer-director Siddiq Barmak is not interested in showing us…
Maybe the most amazing thing about the big-screen version of Starsky & Hutch is how much smaller it feels than its predecessor, the William Blinn-created, Aaron Spelling-produced cop series that ran on ABC from 1975 to ’79. Everything about this cineplex variation feels rinky-dink, like some extended variety-show skit that…
At first glance, Hidalgo seems to be nothing more than an old-fashioned, flat-footed adventure epic plunked down on a vast stretch of desert and amply furnished with the usual Hollywood conventions–a strong, silent cowboy on horseback, a couple of villains with nasty black mustaches, a killer sandstorm and a cloud…
It is so very nice when a movie completely outstrips the expectations conjured by its trailer, as is the case with The Dreamers. At first blush, this tale of three passionate youths caught up in the late-’60s Parisian countercultural revolution looked downright trite. Never mind that esteemed veteran director Bernardo…
