AltWeeklies Wire
'There Will Be Blood' is Anderson's 'Citizen Kane'new
With There Will Be Blood, Paul Thomas Anderson has taken a stab at making The Great American Movie -- and I daresay he's made one of them.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
12-28-2007 |
Reviews
'The Kite Runner' Doesn't Flynew
Kites fly high over the San Francisco Bay and Kabul (okay, China), but not much else soars in Marc Forster's flaccid adaptation of Khaled Hosseini's vivid 2002 novel, which covers three decades of Afghanistan's misery under serial totalitarian rule.
L.A. Weekly |
Ella Taylor |
12-14-2007 |
Reviews
Tags: Marc Forster, The Kite Runner
Will Smith: The Stuff of 'Legend'new
Moment for moment, Smith is simply dazzling, and for all the undeniably impressive work the actor has done on his physique for this role, what's most appealing about Smith is his native intelligence -- the way you see him thinking his way through a role -- and his capacity for human weakness.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
12-14-2007 |
Reviews
Tags: Francis Lawrence, I Am Legend
Strike Up the Bandnew
Eran Kolirin, the 34-year-old writer-director of The Band's Visit, has a sense of humor as dry as Bet Hatikva's arid desert wind and is too smart to bore us with ham-fisted humanistic bromides.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
12-07-2007 |
Reviews
Tags: Eran Kolirin, The Band's Visit
John Cusack Enters the Iraq Weepstakesnew
Grace is Gone wants to massage liberal sensibilities about the war without alienating the church-going, Wal-Mart-shopping Middle Americans who might see, in Stanley Phillips, a reflection of themselves.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
12-07-2007 |
Reviews
Tags: Grace is Gone, James Strouse
Knocked-up Knockoutnew
Tart of tongue and sweet of disposition, Juno offers living proof that crisp writing, graceful directing and an abundantly poised young lead can perk up a premise that’s been bludgeoned to death.
L.A. Weekly |
Ella Taylor |
12-07-2007 |
Reviews
Tags: Juno, Jason Reitman
Savage Lovenew
Tamara Jenkins plumbs the depths of choosing a nursing home in her new film, The Savages, and jacks it up a few notches by asking what it's like to care for a demented father who never cared for you.
L.A. Weekly |
Ella Taylor |
12-04-2007 |
Reviews
Tags: Tamara Jenkins, The Savages
Iron 'Butterfly'new
There is more directing per square inch of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly than one is likely to find in any other movie released this year.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
12-04-2007 |
Reviews
'Starting Out in the Evening': Intelligent Designnew
If Starting Out in the Evening is a movie about how little we know and how much we presume, it is also about transformation, and heartbreak and halting renewal.
L.A. Weekly |
Ella Taylor |
11-26-2007 |
Reviews
Family Matters in 'Margot at the Wedding'new
Everyone is on the brink of something in Noah Baumbach's latest -- marriage, divorce, puberty -- and by the time one character huffs, "I'm out of breath," you'll have a reasonable idea of how she feels.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
11-26-2007 |
Reviews
Tackling Pop Culture's Greatest Enigmanew
I'm Not There turns out to be a triumph of intellect and cinematic imagination that feels light rather than heavy, and such a novel approach to film biography as to leave every Ray and Walk the Line looking especially clueless.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
11-26-2007 |
Reviews
Tags: I'm Not There, Todd Haynes
'Southland Diaries': Re-Cut but Not Improvednew
Richard Kelly seems to think that to merely mention Fallujah or global warming -- or to name a bank after Karl Rove -- is the same as actually having an opinion about them, and his all-you-can-eat buffet of cinematic in-references operates on pretty much the same superficial level.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
11-16-2007 |
Reviews
Tags: Richard Kelly, Southland Tales
'Mr. Magorium': Small Wondernew
Like most Christmas movies, Mr. Magorium's stocking comes stuffed with PSAs (albeit well-written ones, by the spiritless current standards of the genre) alerting children to what they of all people already know.
L.A. Weekly |
Ella Taylor |
11-16-2007 |
Reviews
Coen Brothers to Audience: 'Hold Still'new
The Coen brothers transcend themselves with No Country for Old Men.
L.A. Weekly |
Scott Foundas |
11-09-2007 |
Reviews
Bad Things Happen to Bad People in 'Before the Devil Knows You're Dead'new
That sly old elf Sidney Lumet opens his new movie with a sexual encounter you might associate with a man spending his frustration on a compliant hooker.
L.A. Weekly |
Ella Taylor |
11-02-2007 |
Reviews
