Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | Movies+TV | Reviews | AAN.org

2011 Film Preview: 25 Films Mike Leigh Didn't Direct (plus one that he did)new

The movies chill out to start the year.

Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | 01-05-2011 | Reviews

The Controversial 'Antichrist' Is 'Saw VI' As Told By Carl Dreyernew

I'm torn between dismissing the film as gross-out juvenilia and regarding it as raw religious mythmaking. Either way, you won't find a livelier time at the movies these days, if only because of the outraged groans and dumfounded gasps from the audience.

Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | 10-23-2009 | Reviews

Tags: Antichrist, Carl Dreyer, Euripides, David Lynch, Lars von Trier, Willem Dafoe, Charlotte Gainsbourg

'Up': Raising the Art to a Higher Levelnew

The future of movies? No, it's not 3-D — it’s Up's limpid storytelling, thrilling visuals, endearing characters, and respect for the audience.

Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | 05-29-2009 | Reviews

Tags: Pete Docter ; Bob Peterson, Pete Docter and Bob Peterson, Up, animated films

'W.' Gets a Bnew

Maybe it's because Sarah Palin has put the bar so low, but Oliver Stone's Bush seems to have credibility, and he evokes sympathy.

Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | 10-16-2008 | Reviews

Tags: George W. Bush, Oliver Stone, W.

Lifting the Veilnew

If we've learned anything in the past five or so years of our foreign policy, it's that we should know a few things about a country -- its history, people, culture, and religion -- before bombing the crap out of it.

Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | 01-10-2008 | Reviews

Tags: Persepolis, Vincent Paronnaud and Marjane Satrapi

The Eyes Have Itnew

We've come a long way from Kieslowski's Red, in which a retired judge falls into disgrace for listening in on his neighbors -- now, spying on citizens is a virtue, no more so than in Britain, where it's estimated that the average person appears on camera some 300 times a day.

Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | 05-10-2007 | Reviews

Tags: Andrea Arnold, Red Road

The Feel-Good Movie of the Summernew

Stone makes a movie on a politically loaded subject and tries really, really hard not to make it political, and he's still called a conspiracy nut, this time for not politicizing his subject.

Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | 08-10-2006 | Reviews

Tags: Oliver Stone, World Trade Center

War Is This and Thatnew

Two new documentaries about veterans from two wars serve up significant differences but also universal truths.

Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | 06-29-2006 | Reviews

Tags: Christian Bauer ; Deborah Scranton, The Ritchie Boys ; The War Tapes

Does the World Need Superman?new

The mastery of cinematic form that director Bryan Singer exhibited in his X-Men movies carries the super narrative and then some.

Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | 06-28-2006 | Reviews

Tags: Bryan Singer, Superman Returns

Truth and Consequencesnew

For a film consisting mostly of a middle-aged guy pointing to charts and lecturing about complex, controversial, and world-challenging ideas, this makes for a more entertaining thriller than The Da Vinci Code.

Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | 06-01-2006 | Reviews

Tags: An Inconvenient Truth, Davis Guggenhein

Triple Ploynew

Three Times unites his themes of the recalled past and the scattered present, and it may be Hsiao-Hsien's most profound, if enigmatic, film to date.

Boston Phoenix | Peter Keough | 04-27-2006 | Reviews

Tags: Hou Hsiao-Hsien, Three Times