AltWeeklies Wire
Wretched of the Earth: Peepli Live and Scott Pilgrim vs. the Worldnew
What do a pair of poor farmers in India have in common with a young geek in Toronto? How much time have you got?
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
08-11-2010 |
Reviews
The Runaways: Kisses and Winnebago Mannew
Two unwanted kids and one grumpy old coot.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
08-02-2010 |
Reviews
Girls, Girls, Girlsnew
Anybody can wear a dragon tattoo, play with fire, or kick a hornet's nest, but there's only one Noomi Rapace.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
07-09-2010 |
Reviews
Time Killersnew
The Killer Inside Me doesn't pull its punches. But Cyrus and Air Doll do.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
06-23-2010 |
Reviews
An Outrage Porn and a Decorously Hammy Frou-Frounew
The Stoning of Soraya M. is cheap and degrading and it stinks from here to Tehran. Meanwhile, Cheri is an insubstantial bit of fluff.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
06-24-2009 |
Reviews
Rudo y Cursi': Confusion in the Southnew
Rudo y Cursi is not a typical comic buddy flick about the misadventures of two rancheros from the sticks. As conceived by writer-director Carlos Cuaron, the brothers' picaresque story is a sharp social satire of contemporary Mexico, held together by the slapstick glue of their country-boy antics.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
05-13-2009 |
Reviews
'Absurdistan' is Full of Village Peoplenew
Filmmaker Veit Helmer's dusty, imaginative yarn Absurdistan is a fable so curious even Benjamin Button might hesitate to tell it.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
02-18-2009 |
Reviews
Tags: Absurdistan, Veit Helmer
'Slumdog Millionaire' is One of the Best Films of the Yearnew
At first glance just another Third World children-of-the-slums weepie, it transcends the limitations of that slender genre in leaps and bounds.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
11-12-2008 |
Reviews
'Trouble the Water': The Big Uneasynew
This new documentary goes into the eye of the Hurricane Katrina disaster that wiped out a community.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
09-04-2008 |
Reviews
Ready for '90s Nostalgia? 'The Wackness' is Ill to the Corenew
Writer-director Jonathan Levine's ingratiatingly funny comedy does more than just riff on a time and place -- it belongs to that great fraternity of novice-and-mentor films, a la Cinema Paradiso, in which an inexperienced person comes of age with the help of a kindly and more worldly friend.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
07-10-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: The Wackness, Jonathan Levine
Gone with the 'Gonzo'new
Remember when journalism was cool and everybody wanted to be a reporter?
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
07-02-2008 |
Reviews
'Tuya's Marriage', 'Savage Grace' and 'Brick Lane': A Trio of No-Hanky Women's Picsnew
Three unhappy marriages, three desperate wives, three drastically dissimilar circumstances. Whom to feel sorry for? The bored spouse of the American plastics heir in Savage Grace? The homesick Bengal immigrant confined to her claustrophobic London council flat on Brick Lane? How about the eponymous protagonist of Tuya's Marriage, a woman who lives in a yurt on the Mongolian steppes, caring for her disabled husband and two children by herding sheep and running a farm by herself?
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
06-25-2008 |
Reviews
'Bigger, Stronger, Faster' Explores Steroid Culturenew
Our cultural obsession with hulking heroes explains widespread steroid use, according to filmmaker Chris Bell.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
06-04-2008 |
Reviews
The Fourth Indy Jones Adventure is Arguably OKnew
We could call Crystal Skull the senior citizens' special of the year. Or an amiably expensive timewaster. Or loads of fun for the easily amused -- no, that's probably too dismissive. Or the Boomers' Revenge. Or perhaps it's just a popcorn movie made from, uh, mature corn.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
05-22-2008 |
Reviews
'Dark Matter' Explores Strange Territorynew
Chen Shi-Zeng wrote Dark Matter to investigate the unhappy flip side of the immigrant experience, in particular the forces at work beneath the cheerful surface of cross-culturalism that he lampoons so devastatingly in the film.
East Bay Express |
Kelly Vance |
05-01-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: Chen Shi-Zeng, Dark Matter
