AltWeeklies Wire
'Burn After Reading' Has No Story Linenew
That's the joke of the film: There is no point.
Baltimore City Paper |
Cole Haddon |
09-16-2008 |
Reviews
'The Women' Remake is Disjointednew
Director Diane English's remake of George Cukor's 1939 adaptation of Clare Boothe Luce's satiric play keeps the men almost literally out of the picture.
Baltimore City Paper |
Wendy Ward |
09-16-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: Diane English, The Women
'Disaster Movie' Has That Not So Fresh Feelingnew
The pomposity of big-budget B movies can certainly be taken down a notch, but the writing/directing team of Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer rely too much on trailer moments for their broad comedy.
Baltimore City Paper |
Serena Donadoni |
09-09-2008 |
Reviews
'Elegy' Captures the Pathos of Love Lostnew
Elegy, based on the Philip Roth novel The Dying Animal, is a funeral song not just for a lost love, after all, but a lost man.
Baltimore City Paper |
Wendy Ward |
08-26-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: Elegy, Isabel Coixet
Anna Faris Produces Her Way to Ditsy Comedic Successnew
The twist here is that Faris not only conceived of the idea but also produced the movie for Adam Sandler's Happy Madison Productions -- a feat sure to inspire legions of young women, who are rarely taken seriously in big-screen comedy, even a woman who is one of her generation's funniest actresses.
Baltimore City Paper |
Cole Haddon |
08-26-2008 |
Reviews
Human Desire Becomes Almost Kinky In 'The Duchess of Langeais'new
If you've been feasting on a steady cinematic diet of superhero blockbusters this summer, this adaptation of Honore de Balzac's novel, directed by lesser known (in this country) French New Wave alumnus Jacques Rivette, is like switching to Melba toast after too many banana splits.
Baltimore City Paper |
Violet Glaze |
07-29-2008 |
Reviews
'Nim's Island' Stays Focused on Its Girl Heronew
Living out many a young person's fantasy, preteen Nim Rusoe occupies a tropic island with her scientist father, Jack, and assorted domesticated beach/forest/sea animals such as lizards, pelicans, and seals, but no monkeys--nor anyone else, since her beloved mother died at sea.
Baltimore City Paper |
Wendy Ward |
07-29-2008 |
Reviews
'Mamma Mia!' Cast Sings Much Evilnew
Like those freakish deep-sea creatures living happily in a toxic soup of methane brine miles beneath the water's surface, the cast of Mamma Mia! is unaware they're living in an equally noxious ABBA-rich environment.
Baltimore City Paper |
Violet Glaze |
07-22-2008 |
Reviews
Roger Spottiswoode's Western-Do-Gooder-in-the-Third-World Flick Lacks Heartnew
The script suggests that the whole point of the brutal Japanese invasion of China in the 1930s was the moral redemption of a cynical British journalist and a guilty American ex-army wife.
Baltimore City Paper |
Geoffrey Himes |
07-08-2008 |
Reviews
Young Novelists Navigate Ambition and Their 20s in Coming-of-Age Flick, 'Reprise'new
Although it has its moments, for the most part it is a shopworn story of young, well-off people who confuse celebrity with greatness and suffering with an unsatisfactory job.
Baltimore City Paper |
Martin L. Johnson |
07-01-2008 |
Reviews
German Director Matthias Glasner Crafts a Remarkably Human Examination of Fear and Desirenew
While its first 20 minutes, which include a lengthy, brutal rape scene, suggest leanings toward artsploitation, the rest of the movie, released straight to DVD this week, is sober and completely uninterested in shock value.
Baltimore City Paper |
Steve Erickson |
07-01-2008 |
Reviews
'Mongol' Desperately Wants to be 'Braveheart'new
You can see these aspirations in every shot, but its meandering, anti-climactic story arcs and an unrealized main character handicap the movie from early on.
Baltimore City Paper |
Cole Haddon |
06-24-2008 |
Reviews
'The Grand' Feels Like Inflated Sketch Comedynew
Writer and director Zak Penn's episodic comedy features a huge cast slouching toward and through a poker tournament, with every scene, from the table to the backstory inserts, feeling like an improv session.
Baltimore City Paper |
Bret McCabe |
04-15-2008 |
Reviews
Unpolished Actors Shine in 'The Year My Parents Went on Vacation'new
Director Cao Hamburger's key achievement in this finely crafted, rich, visually appealing, and absorbing story of an extreme latchkey childhood is in the unvarnished behavior of the youngest cast members.
Baltimore City Paper |
Joe MacLeod |
04-15-2008 |
Reviews
Contemporary French Horror Comes of Age with 'Inside''s Female Villainnew
With 2007's Inside, undistributed in the U.S. and out this week on DVD, France has finally made a horror movie of which it can be proud.
Baltimore City Paper |
Steve Erickson |
04-15-2008 |
Reviews
