The Way We Die Now

Part of the renascent body-count action industry, Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning mere existence might shock many Americans. “There are four Universal Soldier movies?” those shocked Americans would say. They might also be taken aback by the bracing violence that marks the film from stem to stern: the gangland-style execution…

Comedian and Former Dallasite Wyatt Cenac is Leaving The Daily Show

The Daily Show with Jon StewartGet More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on FacebookSo. Good. After four great years, Dallas-raised writer/comedian Wyatt Cenac has announced that he’ll be leaving his position as correspondent on The Daily Show. His final report will coincide with the last…

11 Holiday Films That Haven’t Been Totally Ruined by the Holidays

Every year Hollywood cranks them out — saccharine remakes of A Christmas Carol or It’s a Wonderful Life, with minor plot tweaks and overused actors. They’ve ruined the dial, filling it with cinema’s version of re-gifting. Meanwhile, original movies that were great the first few hundred times play on a…

10 Vampirey, Teen-Angsty Things That are Cooler Than Twilight

Tweens, shut-ins, cat ladies and frustrated housewives too timid for 50 Shade of Grey entered their final throes of Twilight-related delirium last week. Apparently, not all vampires live forever. As fans search for another fantasy franchise to fill the emotional void, the rest of us see simply the end of…

Path of Khan

“I can’t think of a more pathetic situation for an actor than to do a film and not connect to it,” Irrfan Khan says. “And I pray to God that I never face that situation.” Khan might not be one of the most prominent stars in Bollywood, especially not when…

Life of Pi: The Story of How Important Life of Pi Is

A stacked-deck theological inquiry filtered through a Titanic-by-way-of–Slumdog Millionaire narrative, Life of Pi manages occasional spiritual wonder through its 3-D visuals but otherwise sinks like a stone. It’s no shock that Ang Lee brings to his high seas adventure graceful and refined aesthetics devoid of any unique signature or pressing…

Mostly Cloudy

Silver Linings Playbook, which stars Bradley Cooper as a manic-depressive man-child attempting to get his life back together after a breakdown, won the Audience Award at the Toronto International Film Festival in September and subsequently shot to the top of most Oscar prognosticators’ Best Picture short list. The film’s pre-release…

Christ, It’s Another Red Dawn

America has had its national traumas — its Antietams and Pearl Harbors and 9/11s — but what we haven’t faced since the Battle of New Orleans is a proper ground invasion, a shooting war with a foreign occupying army. Rather than accept this as good fortune, the absence of this…

Tonight’s Final, Free Rooftop Movie is Garden State

Well all, it’s been a great run. These weekly collaborations with the Dallas Film Society and Sundown at Granada have turned Wednesday evenings into amazingly fun, community events. Plus, there’s booze. (Who ever thought it could be so good?) Tonight, step away from the turkey. Wipe the stuffing off your…

Check Out this New NSFW Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3D Clip

Picking up where the original film left off, Leatherface returns to sling his gas-powered weapon in 3D this January. The crew just released a new, extra Texas-y clip from the upcoming release, and it’s piled high with curse words and night terror potential. Man, too bad barns are made of…

The Dallas Chamber Symphony Knows How to Put Music to a Movie

It’s getting easier and easier to find movie screenings with live musical accompaniment these days. It’s harder to find it done well. On Tuesday night, the Dallas Chamber Symphony proved they know exactly how to create a well executed, interactive and entertaining live music/film screening experience. Artistic director and conductor…

Good Spielberg’s Bad Moments

The first few minutes of Lincoln play out like a parody of the expectations of Steven Spielberg’s detractors. The Great Emancipator rests like a humble Solomon upon a hard wooden chair, surrounded by freely mixing black and white soldiers of that great war of his. One black soldier dares to…

Holy Motors Creates the Cinema History It Laments

Unclassifiable, expansive and breathtaking, Holy Motors, the first feature-length film from Leos Carax since Pola X (1999) — and only his fifth in 28 years — received a log line of sorts from its writer-director at the press conference following the movie’s world premiere at Cannes. “This is a film…

Tonight’s Free Rooftop Movie: The Big Lebowski

You’ve got to wonder if the Cohen brothers were able to predict the pop-culture trajectory of The Big Lebowski. It’s spawned a nationally touring tribute festival, created a new generation of white Russian drunkards and even made the word “nihilist” trendy. Plus, it’s got everyone: John Goodman at his absolute…