If you’ve already decided to see Ocean’s Twelve, it’s probably best not to read much about it. Unlike its predecessor, a remake that clung to a hoary heist formula, the sequel contains ample pleasures, most of which amuse as the result of surprises both great and small. There’s no one…

At the bottom of the ocean, inside a giant pineapple, lives a yellow, oblong sponge who likes to blow bubbles, eat more ice cream than is good for him, and work as a fry cook. The “Krabby Patty” sandwiches he makes are so popular that a one-eyed plankton, who runs…

A parody of Gerry Anderson marionette shows (like Thunderbirds and Joe 90), Jerry Bruckheimer action movies, and the `80s cartoon/toy line M.A.S.K. , Team America: World Police boils all those ingredients down to their essences, starting with the theme song “Americaaa… Fuck yeah!” (imagine it scored like Kenny Loggins’ “Danger…

Although most people in the moviegoing universe by now know the differences between an “Alien” and a “Predator,” putting the two critters together in one movie really ought to necessitate more specific species names for each, since both are technically aliens and predators (they’re from outer space, and they hunt…

It’s a real credit to Intimate Strangers director Patrice Leconte that even though his film features a couple of ridiculous contrivances to get the plot going, the overall film still feels true. Leconte has a gift for depicting the quirks of odd relationships; his last film, Man on the Train,…

You may have already heard the stories about A Home at the End of the World. In what many viewers have deemed a big loss, Colin Farrell’s penis no longer appears in the film. The official line is that test audiences found it too distracting, though that seems unlikely, given…

As a reviewer, one can be tempted to want in on the ground floor of a phenomenon, to say you were there first when some low-budget feature with a nifty premise made its festival debut, only to be picked up by a big studio and become a national phenomenon. Whether…

If you’re wondering how Hollywood could possibly adapt Isaac Asimov’s I, Robot, a collection of similarly themed short stories bound together by the slenderest of common threads, the answer is that it didn’t. The credits for I, Robot read “suggested by Isaac Asimov’s book,” but the canny sci-fi fan will…

It’s one of the oldest stories in cinema and possibly in the history of storytelling: A man is kidnapped by a baddie wielding a deadly weapon. His family waits at home while law enforcement types try to figure out what’s going on. A plan is developed to deal with the…

Everyone loves tigers, save perhaps for those actually being mauled to death by them. Men like ’em because they’re wild beasts; women like ’em cuz they’re big kitty-cats. So whatever your point of interest, Two Brothers, starring a pair of tigers named Kumal and Sangha, is the perfect date movie…

So let’s get this straight: You’re a much-loved comedian who just did a low-budget, multiaward-winning film with an acclaimed up-and-coming director. In recent years, thanks in part to your work with the younger, edgier filmmaking set, you’re starting to be taken seriously as an actor. You even managed to score…

Directed by Alfonso Cuaron. Screenplay by Alfonso Cuaron, based on a novel by J.K. Rowling. Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, David Thewlis, and Michael Gambon. Rated PG.

Those people who live in small towns, they’re not like you and me. So naive, so innocent. And adorably quirky. Why, they’ve got so many lovable quirks, you just want to run up and hug ’em. Or if you’re a filmmaker, perhaps you can make a movie about these simple…

If the summer movie season is our annual time for escapism, last summer’s audiences escaped most often with the likes of Hulk, Terminator 3, and The Matrix Reloaded. Those titles, respectively, ended in a homeless and penniless hero, the end of life on Earth as we know it, and our…

It’s a measure of continual cultural desensitization that The Girl Next Door plays like a remake of 1983’s Risky Business, yet very little of it feels risky in the slightest. Twenty years on, the notion of a high school student getting involved in the sex-for-pay business seems almost cute rather…

Before Star Wars and Indiana Jones, audiences thrilled to an epic big-screen trilogy of a different sort: the tale of one righteous lawman and his big piece of wood. Based on the real-life exploits of Tennessee sheriff Buford Pusser, the first Walking Tall movie (1973) made lead actor Joe Don…

Michael Caine is a revelation!” declares the Jeffrey Lyons quote appearing on ads for The Statement. Lyons is right, but not in the way you might expect. Indeed, Caine’s performance here is revelatory — who knew he could be this boring? Insufferable, yes — Oscar aside, his mangled “American” accent…

With 50 First Dates it seems as though Adam Sandler is trying to compile a greatest-hits film, cobbling together the stuff that worked in his previous films in the hopes that it’ll play even better all in one go. There’s the falsetto comedy song bit from every episode of Saturday…

So, have you ever wondered what exactly goes into the painting of a portrait? You might have suspected there might be more to it than a painter saying something along the lines of, “Hey, baby, can I, uh, paint you?” and then someone else saying, “Yeah, sure, that’d be cool.”…

Back in January of 2003, New Line Cinema released Final Destination 2, a horror movie in which the antagonist was the unseen hand of death itself. All the main characters knew their time was up, but they didn’t know how or when, so they existed in a constant state of…

Remember the Farrelly brothers? Makers of Dumb and Dumber and There’s Something About Mary? Known for crossing the line of good taste and making fun of the differently abled, but with a sufficiently sweet streak that they could be forgiven for such? Kinda popular until Trey Parker and Matt Stone…

Given the way the United Nations has been taking a beating in the American media over the past year or so, it may not be a bad thing that the new movie Beyond Borders is at heart a two-hour infomercial for Kofi Annan’s organization. As a call to action, the…