BRIAN BANKS is an earnest film that hits all the necessary and expected plot points as it makes its cogent indictment of the criminal justice system. It never becomes a screed, though the based-on-a-true story of 16-year-old who ended up serving time for a rape he didn’t commit certainly has all the elements to support… Read More »
GHOST TOWN
GHOST TOWN is a film about ghosts, but the focus is not on the afterlife. No, it is firmly in the life of here and now. The ghosts that populate the film are still all too caught up in the lives of those that they have left behind to move on. Unfortunately, for everyone involved… Read More »
I DON’T KNOW HOW SHE DOES IT
Chick-flicks, like the chick-lit on which some of them are based, are like comfort food. Not necessarily good from a nutritional standpoint, but soothing, predictable, and offering nothing challenging. The plot arcs will follow the accepted formula: cutesy and funny, before moving on to the inevitable conflicts, think of it as the crunchy topping on… Read More »
WE WERE SOLDIERS
General Harold Moore, a scholar and soldier, wears his devotion to the military on his sleeve. There is no sloppy sentimentality about it, nor is there a cynicism that someone who has spent his life under fire might harbor. Instead there is a quiet pride in the institution, his men, and their heroism that only… Read More »
GODSEND
GODSEND is a turgid little mood piece that manages to miss every opportunity to actually engage, much less terrify its audience. No doubt that the ethical, theological, and philosophical questions engendered by the prospect of human cloning are the stuff of heated debate and interesting conundrums. GODSEND, however, eschews all of that in favor of derivative… Read More »
BAD NEWS BEARS
My oh my, but what mess has been made of THE BAD NEWS BEARS. Not that it was ever a classic, except in a minor sense for fans of Tatum O’Neal and Walter Matthau, but what Richard Linklater, a man capable of producing works of unorthodox beauty and beautiful complexity such as WAKING LIFE, has… Read More »
INVINCIBLE
INVINCIBLE takes the daring step of making this “based on a true story” sports film more about the emotional journey of its hero, Vince Papale, rather than the standard tale of an underdog overcoming enormous odds. It’s that, too, considering that Papale, played by Mark Wahlberg, had the guts, or perhaps the desperation, to answer… Read More »
FAST FOOD NATION
Very bad things happen to cattle in Richard Linklater’s FAST FOOD NATION, a feature narrative based on the non-fiction book by Eric Schlosser. In that book, there is a graphic description of how a cow is turned into the burger at the local fast food franchise. The film, co-written by Linklater and Schlosser, is just as… Read More »
FEAST OF LOVE
After a promising beginning, FEAST OF LOVE devolves into a sloppy wallow in melodrama of the most turgid variety. It dallies with hyperbole, but refuses to commit to a conceit that might have made it all come together as a satisfying whole. Instead of magic, it is at best contrived. Morgan Freeman is our narrator.… Read More »
BABY MAMA
There were many ways to go with the premise of BABY MAMA. Writer/director Michael McCullers chose the toughest route of all: gentle yet smart. The result is a pithy deconstruction of both the trendy and the traditional, with well-aimed swipes at everything from designer parenthood to the redneck in the blue collar. The problem starts… Read More »