With some films, the 3-D effect is tacked on to generate a few extra bucks at the box office. And then there are the ones like A VERY HAROLD AND KUMAR 3-D CHRISTMAS. The wisps of smoke coming off those funny cigarettes so dear to the title characters hearts become prehensile as they float off… Read More »
LOVE! VALOR! COMPASSION
LOVE! VALOR! COMPASSION! is a romantic comedy, full of great one-liners, that, nonetheless is not shy about taking on serious subjects, such as the human heart. Forget space, this is the real final frontier. Nothing else has such an infinite capacity to delight, destroy, and surprise. The story takes place over three holiday weekends during which a… Read More »
THE PIRATES! BAND OF MISFITS
PIRATES! BAND OF MISFITS is a gleefully revisionist take on pirates, royalty, and the early 19th-century scientific community. Brought to animated life by the fine folks at Aardman Studio with their distinctive stop-motion brilliance, and a dash of CGI, the film also features 3-D that is used cleverly but without ostentation. Clever is the byword… Read More »
KILLER JOE
There are truths about human nature that only brutality in its rawest form can depict. Such is the concept embraced with both verve and style by William Friedkin in KILLER JOE, a tale of moral compasses gone askew, dysfunctional family dynamics taken to their logical extreme, and human life reduced to a commodity on a… Read More »
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING
During the years when he was diligently bringing the world Buffy and Angel et als, Joss Whedon was also inviting the cast members of said shows over to his house for Shakespeare readings. Its only fitting,then, that Whedons film version of MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING should be filmed in that very house. Working at a… Read More »
COOK, THE
Take note silent film fans and devotees of comedy, silent or not. Milestone has released a sterling collection of short silent films featuring Roscoe Fatty Arbuckle in two of its three selections. Arbuckle had a brilliant and lucrative career as a top box office attraction that ended when he was tried for causing the death… Read More »
2003 GOLDEN RASPBERRY AWARDS
Celebrating 23 years of performing its valuable public service, the Razzie Awards once again helped to make up for the wasted time and insulted intelligence we as moviegoers were forced to endure in 2002. John Wilson, founder and Head Raspberry of the Golden Raspberry Awards Foundation, along with his merry band of muckracking mirthmakers, gave… Read More »
BRUCE ALMIGHTY
Jim Carrey wants it both ways. He wants to be the heir apparent to The Three Stooges, but he also wants to tug at our heartstrings. Until now, hes divided those aspirations between films, the silliness of ME, MYSELF, AND IRENE and the carefully calibrated corn of THE MAJESTIC. Perhaps sensing that his audience has… Read More »
SHAUN OF THE DEAD
SHAUN OF THE DEAD is a crisp and lethally funny blend of B-movie monsters and those “kitchen sink” dramas from Britain’s theatrical renaissance of the late 50s and early 60s. Our angry young man is the Shaun (Simon Pegg) of the title, a feckless drone with a dead-end job that is a daily, even hourly… Read More »
LEMONY SNICKET’S A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS
When I heard that Jim Carrey would be starring in A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS, based on the first three installments of the deliciously arch and ironic series of the same name by Lemony Snicket, my heart sank. Obviously, I thought, it was doomed to be a vehicle for Carreys brand of broad physical humor… Read More »