AltWeeklies Wire
Ang Lee Goes Big: Ocean Survival Story Raises the Bar on Spectacle
Gracefully sidestepping its overreaching, religiously didactic premise — that the unfolding story offers up absolute proof of God — Ang Lee’s lush 3D adaptation of Yann Martel’s restrained novel of magical realism is a stunner.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
11-19-2012 |
Movies
Resizing Tolstoy: Tom Stoppard’s Visible Magic Shines
Resizing Tolstoy
Tom Stoppard’s Visible Magic Shines
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
11-12-2012 |
Reviews
Stripped Down Bond No Competition With Craig’s 007 Around
The 23rd installment in the longest-running franchise in cinema history is crafted to satisfy fans from every era of the series based on the Ian Fleming novels. Sam Mendes tastefully directs this outing of action-based espionage, gently shifting gears between a literary approach to wit, style, personality, and spectacle.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
11-05-2012 |
Reviews
Spielberg Doesn’t Trouble the Water: Daniel Day Lewis Flawless as Always
See the film for Daniel Day Lewis. As for the “history lesson” on display, take it with a grain of salt.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
11-04-2012 |
Reviews
Goth Penn: Sean Penn Goes Out On a Limb
“This Must Be the Place” is a canny model of life-affirming cinema.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
10-29-2012 |
Reviews
Down In Flames: Robert Zemeckis Burns the Popcorn
Enjoyable in that Hollywood-popcorn way for which Robert Zemeckis is famous— see “Who Framed Roger Rabbit,” skip “Forest Gump” — “Flight” is a drama that would have been better without the director's love of schmaltz.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
10-29-2012 |
Reviews
Connection Lost The Wachowski Siblings and Tom Tykwer Play the Wrong Loops
“Cloud Atlas” wants to be more than it is. For a movie pitched as a Meta-Meta exploration linking all of humanity through the ancient past to the recent past to the faraway future, it nosedives before getting out of the gate.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
10-22-2012 |
Reviews
Getting Busy: Mark O’Brien’s Introduction to Sex Opens Doors
The most unlikely film of 2012, “The Sessions” is a defiant romantic comedy of serious import that pushes the boundaries of R-rated intimacy.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
10-15-2012 |
Reviews
Back In Time: Sci-fi Thriller Can’t Solve its Own Loopholes
As time-travel suspense thrillers go “Looper” is only a pinch better than mediocre.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
09-24-2012 |
Reviews
Girl Power: Anna Kendrick and Rebel Wilson Save A Cappella Comedy
Essentially a glorified episode of the television show “Glee,” “Pitch Perfect” is a spotty coming-of-age comedy that only marginally pays off on its promise of delivering harmonized vocal virtuosity.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
09-24-2012 |
Reviews
Bad Cop to Good Cop: David Ayers Switches Teams
“End of Watch” is a gritty brief apologia from writer-director David Ayer for his less than complementary Los Angeles copsploitation films “Training Day” and “Harsh Times.”
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
09-18-2012 |
Reviews
Loving Up Wall Street Corruption: Nicholas Jarecki Caters to the One Percent
Some not-so-fancy narrative mechanics set Richard Gere up as a one-percenter antihero in a movie that deplorably attempts to mitigate the evil that wealthy corruption loves to wield at every level of social injustice.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
09-10-2012 |
Reviews
The Pitfalls of Academia: Josh Radnor Shows You Can’t Go Back
Writer-director-actor Josh Radnor follows up his debut feature (“Happythankyoumoreplease”) with a compact romantic comedy that almost works, but not quite.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
09-10-2012 |
Reviews
Moonshine Rebels: Public Enemy Era Splashes with Booze and Blood
Inflected with the same gritty appreciation for brutal violence that director John Hillcoat applied to his Australian-set period Western “The Proposition,” “Lawless” is a Depression era bootleg gangster fantasy baked in booze, blood, and grime.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
08-28-2012 |
Reviews
Almost Human: Frank Langella Accepts His Inner Machine
from an actor’s showcase perspective, the film allows the redoubtable Frank Langella to cast his glowing spell over his audience.
City Pulse |
Cole Smithey |
08-20-2012 |
Reviews
