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The Horror!
I’m an advocate of remaking movies that stunk, since they – rather than films that were successful the first time around – are the ones most in need of reworking. Thus, I had high hopes for an updated version of 1979’s The Amityville Horror, which I found disappointingly mediocre. Oh well. I should have known…
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Time of the Wolf (2003): B+
In Time of the Wolf, an unspecified apocalyptic catastrophe has plunged rural France (and, presumably, the rest of the world) into chaos and darkness, though Michael Haneke’s film begins not with exposition about this disaster but, rather, with squatters murdering a family man in his vacation cottage. This shocking crime propels his widow Anna (Isabelle…
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East of Eden (1955): B+
Elia Kazan’s East of Eden introduced the world to James Dean, and the young heartthrob’s magnetic brooding – his body, and emotions, veering to and fro like an off-kilter see-saw – is the most arresting facet of this Bible-infused drama (based on John Steinbeck’s novel) about two sons’ strained relationship with their religious lettuce farmer…
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Code 46 (2003): C+
A sci-fi mood piece about memory, passion, and pseudo-Oedipal longing, Michael Winterbottom’s Code 46 – akin to THX 1138-via-Gattaca – is long on atmosphere but short on substance. In the near-future, national and racial differences have melted away in a sea of multicultural sterility, civilization has been divided into desirable urban areas and the barren…
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Vera Drake (2004): B+
Mike Leigh’s films habitually focus on the misery of downtrodden Brits struggling to cope with unfavorable socio-economic situations, and the director’s latest dreary drama, Vera Drake, may be his finest work in years. Vera (Imelda Staunton) is a cheery “domestic” who cleans wealthy homes for a living and, on the side and for no pay,…
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Slacker (1991): C-
Richard Linklater may have made a splash with his 1991 debut Slacker, but fourteen years later, it remains an exercise in meandering self-importance. A series of barely-connected vignettes in which Austin, Texas 20-somethings discuss alternate realities, then-prez George Bush, JFK’s assassination, and the symbolic nature of the Smurfs, Linklater’s film captures the nonchalant lack of…
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1-4
Of the four films I saw last week – including a pre-summer wannabe blockbuster, a French dramedy, and a ghost story from Japanese auteur Takeshi Miike – only one gets a passing grade. For those unwilling to guess which one I liked, here’s a hint: it’s the LAST film listed below. Sahara (Slant magazine) Happily…
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Fever Pitch
(Originally published in Rocky Mountain Bullhorn) Even considering the insufferable self-absorption of Boston baseball fans, Bobby and Peter Farrelly’s Red Sox-obsessed Fever Pitch proves an amusing and affecting ode to professional sports fandom. Ben Wrightman (Jimmy Fallon) is a math teacher who falls for high-powered corporate exec Lindsey Meeks (Drew Barrymore), and their courtship proceeds…
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To Be and to Have (2002): A-
The most unvarnished cinematic portrait of childhood I’ve ever seen, Nicolas Philibert’s To Be and to Have (Être et avoir) documents with intimacy, grace and candor the daily goings-on at a one-room school in rural France. The school’s student body consists of a handful of older and younger children who are taught, in alternating shifts,…
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Running the Gamut
Today’s post features a kung fu comedy, an earnest family drama, an anthology of shorts about love from three acclaimed directors, and a DVD review of a collection of haunted house films. Kung Fu Hustle (filmcritic.com) Winter Solstice (Slant magazine) Eros (Slant magazine) The Amityville Horror Collection – DVD (Slant magazine)
