AltWeeklies Wire
Bush Gets Stoned in 'W.'new
While Oliver Stone's latest a messy movie without much momentum, it embraces a willful confusion -- one that history might prove to be a perfectly appropriate response to the last eight years.
'Secrecy' Investigates Executive Power and the Need-to-Knownew
Even as Secrecy's former operatives acknowledge the massive intelligence failures leading to 9/11, they're ready to make the case for the increased need for government subterfuge in the War on Terror: what secrecy begets, only secrecy will solve, and every time the gloves come off, the blinders will go on.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Max Goldberg |
10-23-2008 |
Reviews
In 'Noah's Arc' Movie, We Meet the Black Carrie Bradshawnew
The LOGO show makes the jump to the big screen -- showing a completely different African-American experience.
New York Press |
Armond White |
10-23-2008 |
Reviews
'Max Payne' Prefers Good Looks to Smartsnew
Gorgeously shot as a color noir (though the colors are more likely to run the gamut from gray to black than red to gold), Max Payne is one of those ludicrous action movies based on a videogame that's all style and little substance.
New York Press |
Mark Peikert |
10-23-2008 |
Reviews
Charlie Kaufman Turns to Philip Seymour Hoffman to Tackle His Neurosesnew
Entirely too "clever," this story about an upstate New York theater director parades all of Kaufman’s neuroses: sexual frustration, creative surfeit (not a creative block), body hatred and celebrity paranoia. What's missing is universality; that's swallowed up by Kaufman's intellectual egomania.
New York Press |
Armond White |
10-23-2008 |
Reviews
'Californication': So Freaky David Duchovny Had to Go to Rehabnew
Perception is a strange thing. Despite his narration of Showtime's softcore Red Shoe Diaries series, his recurring roll as a transvestite in Twin Peaks, and his recent time in rehab for sex addiction, I've never been able to disconnect Duchovny from his thoroughly asexual character Fox Mulder, whom he played on the X-Files for 10 seasons, two movies, and at least one video game.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
10-22-2008 |
TV
Jiri Menzel is Still Depicting How History Swallows Little Livesnew
Using accelerated motion, period music, and silent sequences in black-and-white to suggest history as farce, Menzel makes a mocking spectacle of Czechoslovakia in the 20th century.
San Antonio Current |
Steven G. Kellman |
10-22-2008 |
Reviews
'Saw' Killer Tobin Bell on Character-Acting and Torture Pornnew
Bell, who plays Jigsaw in the Saw movies, is a Hollywood "that guy" on par with the late J.T. Walsh and the comedic David Koechner -- one who now rivals the Freddy Kruegers and Jason Voorheeses of the world in terms of horror-icon status.
San Antonio Current |
Clint Hale |
10-22-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Mike Leigh Does a 180 with 'Happy-Go-Lucky'new
Leigh's films are usually brutal and uncompromising, challenging and, ultimately, painfully easy to relate to -- but he goes in the opposite direction with Happy-Go-Lucky.
San Diego CityBeat |
Anders Wright |
10-22-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: Mike Leigh, Happy-Go-Lucky
'Max Payne' is Like 'The Constant Gardener' After a Frontal Lobotomynew
Rather than focusing on making a kick-ass action flick, director John Moore and novice scripter Beau Thorne dress up their simplistic revenge yarn with various twists and turns -- all of which are absurdly easy to predict.
Creative Loafing (Charlotte) |
Matt Brunson |
10-21-2008 |
Reviews
'The Secret Life of Bees' is Buzz-Worthynew
The Secret Life of Bees is the sort of Southern-spun, honey-soaked confection that, in the wrong hands, could have turned out dreadful.
Creative Loafing (Charlotte) |
Matt Brunson |
10-21-2008 |
Reviews
'W.' is for Wimpynew
Love him or hate him, there's no denying that George W. Bush is a remarkably controversial figure, so how is it possible that Stone has managed to make a movie that's about as incendiary as Kung Fu Panda?
Creative Loafing (Charlotte) |
Matt Brunson |
10-21-2008 |
Reviews
Eastwood Examines a Chapter of LA's Sordid Past in 'Changeling'
Apart from a flashing neon light coda that extends the film 10 minutes too far, Eastwood's drama is an engrossing drama with a keen line of social commentary.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
10-20-2008 |
Reviews
'The Express' is Silly, Simplistic, and Absurdnew
Gary Fleder's film is an unspeakably twee and sanitized Ernie Davis biopic that transforms this tale of an athlete dying young into a work of groan-inducing campiness.
The Memphis Flyer |
Addison Engelking |
10-20-2008 |
Reviews
'W.' is Not a Political Screed, but Rather an Empathetic Character Studynew
Bush fans, assuming there are any left, are unlikely to be much offended by W. It's the Bush haters -- the only potential audience for this, really -- who are likely to be upset.
