Dark Blue, it says in the credits, is based on a story by Los Angeles-born author James Ellroy, who pens grisly and guilt-ridden pulp-noir haiku that spread across hundreds of pages. Its screenplay was written by copper caper fetishist David Ayer, a native Angelino with an affinity for Hollywood-dark stories…
Right-wing pundits will be coming out of the woodwork to holler about this one. Bad enough, they’ll say, that The Life of David Gale attacks the death penalty; it also features a caricature governor of Texas with big ears and a familiar, scripture-quoting smirk. There’s a character who notes that…
Someone’s got to say it, so let’s start here: We’ve underestimated Will Ferrell. Honestly, it wasn’t that hard to do. His Saturday Night Live stint was never impressive, as he’d often fall back on the same shtick of yelling his lines with detailed enunciation in a passive-aggressive tone that made…
People engaged in warfare always believe that God endorses their cause and not their opponent’s. The Civil War drama Gods and Generals is filled with so much religious righteousness–endless Bible-readings, urgent recitation of prayer and ardent supplications to the Lord, to say nothing of the heavenly choir that intermittently bursts…
Thanks to the fickleness of pop culture, the French writer Aurore Dupin (1804-1876), a.k.a. George Sand, may well be better known for her relationship to Frederic Chopin than for her novels or her other romances or her generally bold life. Back in 1991, James Lapine’s Impromptu focused on the Sand-Chopin…
It begins in an almost playful mood. In a gallery of ancient art, a handsome, well-dressed man (Andrea Renzi) begins to make a pass at an equally attractive woman (Margherita Buy), who slyly rebuffs him. As we quickly learn, they’re actually husband and wife. Then, just as quickly, the direction…
His is an estimable and enviable filmography–not a bad movie to be found, if you’re willing to overlook Patch Adams, Twister and a few smaller offerings no one saw anyway. But even in the worst of films, and even in drag opposite Robert De Niro, Philip Seymour Hoffman keeps intact…
The fanboy suckled at the teat of comic-book writer-artist Frank Miller, circa 1980-81, will be satisfied, for the most part, with this cinematic Daredevil; if nothing else, the thing’s got enough Marvel Comics in-jokes to amuse ’em down at the comics shop for ages, or at least till Hulk smashes…
While virtually no one in this country foresaw the American disaster in Vietnam, the late British writer Graham Greene glimpsed it with astonishing clarity a decade before the first U.S. “adviser” set foot on Vietnamese soil. Greene’s 1955 novel The Quiet American, which has now been made into a disturbing…
If nothing else, because there’s nothing else to this movie, Shanghai Knights allows Jackie Chan, he of halting dialogue and poetic movement, to pay direct homage to his idols. He hangs from the arms of Big Ben, dangling off the stories-tall clock like Harold Lloyd in 1923’s Safety First; he…
Astaire & Rogers. Hepburn & Tracy. Heck, Ball & Arnaz, Houston & Washington or Vardalos & Corbett. Over the decades, Hollywood has proven that its romantic comedies needn’t suck. But alas, they often do, as is the case with How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. Clearly, bigwig co-producers…
Director Gary Hardwick’s first film, The Brothers, was a refreshing take on the single black man romantic comedy, offering a surprisingly mature perspective full of depth and well-rounded characters without resorting to the time-honored stereotypes of black man as player and black woman as ball-busting bitch. Hardwick wrote the script…
Director Roger Donaldson was part of a wave of Australian talent who went Hollywood in the ’80s, but he hasn’t fared as well here as colleagues like Peter Weir, Phillip Noyce and George Miller. His biggest hit was probably Cocktail, and his best American film was either Species or No…
First off, make no mistake: Biker Boyz is not, and has no intentions of being, The Fast and the Furious on two wheels, which will be considered a serious shame by the 12- to 12-year-old demographic who were hoping to chug a little more Diesel fuel till the official sequel’s…
There are enough good scenes within the 94 minutes of The Guru to make an entertaining coming-attractions trailer. Wait, that’s unfair. Such previews are only one minute long. It’s simplistic and snarky to say there are only 60 seconds of fun to be found in this “Bollywood-meets-Hollywood” romantic comedy. I’m…
Hitler as artist…Hitler as artist…Damn. So much for the ol’ “summarize plot, tease overpaid actors, pontificate wildly” formula. Reviewing Max–about the wonder years of Der Führer (Noah Taylor) and his eponymous, fictional Jewish benefactor Max Rothman (John Cusack)–looks to be something of a task. Set in 1918 Munich, this confident…
Once upon a time, in the town of Darkness Falls… “Wait,” you’re probably saying to yourself, “Darkness Falls is the name of the town?” Yes. Yes, it is. And it’s haunted by an evil tooth fairy. Are you sure you want to know more? OK, good. Because once you get…
Ever since Amores Perros burst onto the international scene two years ago, Latin American cinema has been experiencing one of the most fertile periods in its history. Encompassing such works as Alfonso Cuaron’s Y Tu Mamá También and Walter Salles’ Behind the Sun, these socially conscious, frequently brutal portraits of…
Compiled in the cold light of day, the sum of Chuck Barris’ contributions to American culture are the Top 40 ditty “Palisades Park,” which he wrote in 1962, and his discovery, a few years later, that many people are willing to make complete fools of themselves in front of a…
It all begins with the word. “I believe I may have a first sentence,” murmurs Virginia Woolf (Nicole Kidman, really) to her husband, Leonard (Stephen Dillane), commencing labor on the author’s fourth novel, Mrs. Dalloway. The year is 1921, but skillfully intercut segments illustrate that the book’s heady emotional content…
These are the dog days of January, the poor put-upon month used by studios as a dumping ground for product considered too lethally toxic for release during those real moviegoing months–December, say, when audiences are buzzed on two weeks of vacation and award-contenders do their Oscar striptease and reveal that…
Spike Lee’s adaptation of David Benioff’s 2001 novel The 25th Hour hews closely to the original tale, which the author has adapted in screenplay form: Montgomery Brogan, a working-class white boy who dreamed of being a New York City firefighter till he fell into the soft pile of easy money…
