AltWeeklies Wire
Shyamalan's a Ding Dongnew
M. Night Shyamalan aims to evoke 9/11 fear with The Happening but the result is anything but shocking.
New York Press |
Armond White |
06-19-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: M. Night Shyamalan, The Happening
Two Docs Examine the Love and Politics of Christopher Isherwood and Derek Jarmannew
Chris & Don: A Love Story and Derek are elegies to gay cultural figures, novelist Isherwood and filmmaker Derek Jarman, but they also uniquely chronicle lives of affection and rebellion -- personalities that are rarely found in the gay films that break into today's mainstream.
New York Press |
Armond White |
06-12-2008 |
Reviews
Guy Maddin Explores His Hometown and Childhood in New Docufantasianew
When someone grows up on tales of stampeding racehorses being frozen in a river, leaving just their rearing heads above the ice, how can they not be a little off-kilter in their sensibilities?
New York Press |
Mark Peikert |
06-12-2008 |
Reviews
With Ed Norton, Marvelites Get the Movie Monster They Deservenew
This Bruce Banner has the same soft-voiced, nerdy naturalism Ed Norton brought to Fight Club. The idea is to upgrade The Hulk from comic book teen dream to boomer alter ego.
New York Press |
Armond White |
06-12-2008 |
Reviews
Adam Sandler is No Jewish Superheronew
Nothing sticks beyond the notion of Adam Sandler as Zohan, a super-efficient commando in Israel's Mossad. Not even Zohan's pacifism makes much impression; it's a momentary shtick that sets up gags rather than character motivation.
New York Press |
Armond White |
06-05-2008 |
Reviews
'The Strangers' Offers No Kindness to Liv Tyler and Scott Speedmannew
If Kristen (Tyler) and James (Speedman) listened to their first instinct, we wouldn't have the sleek, stripped down new thriller The Strangers, the movie that accomplishes everything that Michael Haneke tried to do with his sadistic hostage-takers in Funny Games earlier this year.
New York Press |
Mark Peikert |
05-29-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: The Strangers, Bryan Bertino
Intelligent Steroid Doc Sees Both Sides of the Issuenew
Without endorsing use of the drug, Chris Bell, who's a bodybuilder himself, dives into the heated debates surrounding the maligned practice and finds something pretty damn close to an even-handed portrait, if not a fair and balanced one.
New York Press |
Eric Kohn |
05-29-2008 |
Reviews
'The Foot Fist Way' Shows the Way of the Idiotnew
It's Napoleon Dynamite meets Hot Fuzz set in the world of martial arts.
New York Press |
Armond White |
05-29-2008 |
Reviews
The Incest of 'Savage Grace' Knocks Julianne Moore from Her Gay Cinema Thronenew
Moore plays a woman who is the target of her gay son's frustrations in Savage Grace -- the story of Barbara Baekeland, the unbalanced wealthy socialite who led her son to incest and murder in 1972.
New York Press |
Armond White |
05-29-2008 |
Reviews
The 'Sex and the City' Movie isn't Egregious, It's Worsenew
Like that bottle of whiskey stereotypical newspaper editors keep in their desk drawer, Carrie Bradshaw is the Barbie doll recessed in the handbag of contemporary white-collar women -- she fortified their gaudiest Cinderella dreams through weekly televised teasings of possibility.
New York Press |
Armond White |
05-29-2008 |
Reviews
Uwe Boll's 'Postal' Fails to Comprehend Its Own Corrupt Naturenew
Based on the mindlessly violent series of first-person shooters, Postal contains the same intensely farcical bloodshed, but it's Boll's knuckleheaded misinterpretation of topical humor that really gets me.
New York Press |
Eric Kohn |
05-22-2008 |
Reviews
'The Children of Huang Shi' is Lovely to Look Atnew
But that's about it. The real star of Huang Shi is the cinematographer, Zhao Xiaoding, who was a camera operator on the breathtaking epic Hero and director of photography on House of Flying Daggers.
New York Press |
Raphaela Weissman |
05-22-2008 |
Reviews
The New Indiana Jones is More than Commercial Gimcracknew
The pressing challenge of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is for Spielberg to address the generation that grew up with Indiana Jones and may now feel they have outgrown him. But to avoid that fickle self-loathing, Spielberg has to raise their appreciation of action-movie tropes.
New York Press |
Armond White |
05-22-2008 |
Reviews
Illegal Immigrants Find Out that Brooklyn isn't All Skinny Jeansnew
Sangre de Mi Sangre is decidedly not a fun, sexy summer movie, eschewing as it does romance for tentative connections forged in desperation, and fight scenes dripping with money for gritty life-or-death lunges on the streets of a Brooklyn rarely seen on film.
New York Press |
Mark Peikert |
05-15-2008 |
Reviews
Brits Behaving Badly Aren't Enough to Keep the Sexy Spark From Being Dousednew
Indian director Sivan's Before the Rains feels less Satyajit Ray than Lifetime, using Sajani and Moores' ill-fated love affair as a metaphor for the travesty of colonialism. Prepare to be schooled.
New York Press |
Felicia Feaster |
05-15-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: Before the Rains, Santosh Sivan
