>THIS MEANS WAR: Not Even For Free – This Means Crap No expense has been spared in making THIS MEANS WAR one of the worst pictures of recent years. A dreadful mash-up of the romantic-comedy and action-adventure genres, this thing has been in development for years, and although only 3 writers are credited (Timothy Dowling […]

  BABYGIRL (A24 – Dec. 25):  We’ve reached the point where Nicole Kidman’s work ethic has become something of a running gag.  In the past 5 years alone, she’s appeared in an incredible eight feature films and seven TV series, with three more series on tap for 2025 (so far).  Truth be told, it can feel […]

THE BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL:  Worth A Ticket – A Different Kind of Dream Team Bear with me here. On Friday, Fox Searchlight will throw THE BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL directly into the path of the mega-buster that is The Avengers.  (Well, in 27 big-city theatres, anyway.)  It’s tempting, of course, to see this as […]

  The year-end movies are almost all out now (2012’s final limited release, PROMISED LAND, opens on Friday), so here’s a handy capsule guide to what’s worth seeing at the multiplex-and what isn’t.  Just click on the titles for our full reviews. RESERVE YOUR SEATS NOW ZERO DARK THIRTY: Kathryn Bigelow’s (and screenwriter Mark Boal’s) […]

  FLORA AND SON (Apple):  John Carney’s Irish dramedy was (with Fair Play) the commercial bonanza of Sundance, reportedly with a $20M pricetag.  It isn’t hard to see why the studio and streamer checkbooks came out, since Flora and Son was one of the festival’s unabashed crowd pleasers.  Like most of Carney’s work (Once, Sing […]

  THE FORGIVEN (Focus/Universal – TBD):  In 1963, Pauline Kael famously wrote a piece entitled “The Sick-Soul-Of-Europe Parties,” and almost 60 years later, if you add the US to the guest list, John Michael McDonagh’s The Forgiven presents a bash in the same vein.  McDonagh’s script, based on a novel by Lawrence Osborne, underlines in […]

> Amid multiplying online reports, spearheaded by New York Magazine’s Vulture site, that Paramount’s SUPER 8 is tracking for a very soft opening this weekend at the box-office, the studio has decided to launch a “secret” (by which I mean “highly publicized“) pre-opening day:  the movie will now screen on Thursday in about 325 theaters […]

  SAVING MR. BANKS:  Buy A Ticket – Positively Supercalifragelisticexpialidocious SAVING MR. BANKS , which screened at the AFI Film Festival in Los Angeles last night before opening in theaters next month, is a moviegoer’s dream of Hollywood popular art, superbly melding history, personality, humor, sentiment and glitz with little fault or sign of strain.  […]