recent product reviews
Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (2011)
Probably the best of the series. Bird handles live-action just fine, pulling off a polished movie with good action and effects. Unfortunately, the characters and performances in this one aren’t too memorable. An aging Cruise, funny-looking body and all, still pulls it off. Patton is very nice. I imagine that…
Full ReviewCrazy, Stupid, Love. (2011)
Early on, the story is all over the place. It should be engaging throughout, not just a set-up for the silly romantic stand-off at the end. Most of the comedy is shallow and weak. Carell, like a lot of great comedians, makes the easy transition to pseudo-drama. I could see…
Full ReviewRepo Men (2010)
Newbie director Sapochnik delivers a polished and interesting film. Is this where we’re headed? Why is Jude Law so good at playing characters in the future?
Full ReviewMobsters (1991)
Just feels so 90’s, with all the proper camera angles, even lighting, and cheesy melodramatic dialogue. Slater is decent, Dempsey is unpolished.
Full ReviewCowboys & Aliens (2011)
The story is slightly messy, scenes are slightly predictable, but it’s a pretty good attempt at fusing western and sci-fi. Not an easy thing to do. Craig is cool and engaging, Ford is OK.
Full ReviewBeing There (1979)
Perhaps one of the earliest explorations, or even commentaries, on the effects of television and mass media on people. Aside from that angle, the movie is rather boring. An idiot fools everyone and stumbles his way to national fame, a device used again but in a more fanciful way in…
Full ReviewThe Hurt Locker (2008)
Bigelow makes a boy movie. Wonderful tension in all of the action sequences, though the shaky camera is a bit much at times. Like Three Kings and Green Zone and a lot of Iraq war movies, creative lighting and filters are used to render Iraq the color of parchment. Renner…
Full ReviewA Complete History of My Sexual Failures (2008)
A lot of guys have wanted to do something like this. Waitt is deadpan funny and endearing, although sometimes he plays a bit too dumb and some of his scenes are staged. The end, in particular, is scripted and unsatisfyingly fake. Did we need to see his cock so much?…
Full ReviewKing Solomon’s Mines (1985)
Horribly made. Chamberlain’s such a goofball. Stone was lucky to have a career after this. Oh wait, she’s pretty.
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