Everything is a little smoother in 2002’s HARRY POTTER AND THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS.  The young actors give more assured performances; Steve Kloves’ script, having gotten so much exposition out of its way in Sorcerer’s Stone, is faster and more character-based; the camerawork (by Roger Pratt instead of John Seale) is more fluid; […]

    RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES – Worth A Ticket:  Simian Power   Although it’s positioned as the last big adventure epic of the summer, for most of its length Rupert Wyatt’s RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES isn’t really an action movie.  Somewhat surprisingly, while it establishes an alternative mythology […]

  CHRONICLE – Worth A Ticket –  “Found Footage” That Deserves to Be Found   Over the past decade, audience hunger for “reality”–the word very much in quotation marks–has engulfed much of popular cultture, from YouTube videos to self-produced songs, from tweets to television series and even cable networks built around people playing manipulated versions […]

> As has been reported, there really was an ambulance outside the Ryerson Theatre in Toronto after the midnight premiere of Alexandre Courtes’ THE INCIDENT, there to rescue at least one person who had fainted during the movie.  Of course, this may just mean that Toronto Film Festival patrons have delicate sensibilities–an idea supported by […]

> Worth a Ticket:  A funny, moving story about navigating the twists of life.   Mike Mills’ BEGINNERS is about the fumble for love, the wrong turns and mistakes that can delay–although luckily not always prevent–true happiness.  Mills has said that this story is semiautobiographical:  like his protagonist Oliver (Ewan McGregor), Mills learned after the […]

> Chris Columbus’ Sorcerer’s Stone and Chamber of Secrets were well-crafted, entertaining movies, but Alfonso Cuaron’s 2004 HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN was the first real Potter film. It’s also the least successful financially (if you think $795M worldwide is something to complain about).  This may be because it’s burdened by the most […]

> Not Even For Free; The 3D Must Stand For “Dull Deadly Dud” If you squint at the post-apocalyptic desert wasteland settings of PRIEST, I swear you can see the camera crews from The Book of Eli, Jonah Hex, Resident Evil and Ultraviolet trying to duck out of frame.  At this point, I don’t think […]

  PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 3:  Worth A Ticket – More Minimalist Bumps In the Dark   The PARANORMAL ACTIVITY franchise is a movie studio’s dream come true.  The concept itself demands a no-star cast, a very limited number of settings and a bare minimum of special effects (the third and latest entry in the series cost […]