Q’orianka Kilcher’s first role since her stunning breakout as Pocahontas in Terrence Malick’s The New World finds her playing to type as the last princess of Hawaii, struggling against the American takeover of a then-sovereign republic. It’s her second indigenous-versus-white people role in a row, which suggests troubling things about…
Like its predecessor, 2010’s The Karate Kid begins with an uprooting. Young Dre Parker (Jaden Smith) and his mother are introduced in their Detroit apartment, now packed into boxes. Ralph Macchio shipped off to the Valley; Dre is going to China. A skate kid behind on his growth spurt, Dre…
Joe Carnahan’s big-screen adaptation of NBC’s 1983 midseason-replacement-turned-three-seasons-running-hit is convoluted, overstuffed, turned up to 11, and yet, somehow, deadly dull—in other words, white noise. Rather than a reinterpretation, it’s a soulless, sloppy, smirky rerun that makes those Charlie’s Angels movies seem positively nouvelle vague; at least Drew Barrymore and crew…
In his work as writer/director, Rodrigo García has admirably distinguished himself through his commitment to creating intelligent, complex roles for his heavily distaff casts. Like his debut, Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her (2000), and Nine Lives (2005), Mother and Child is a compassionate, multi-threaded tale about…
There are myriad moments during Get Him to the Greek — the roller-coaster spinoff of Forgetting Sarah Marshall — when it feels as if the thing will jump the rails and smash to the ground in a thousand pieces of what-in-the-fuck. It’s a complete and utter mess from the big-loud-dumb…
A pleasant, minor-key romance, Darko Lungulov’s Here and There has the unadorned integrity of a classic joke. There’s pleasure in watching the conceit unfold, which is sweetened by an unexpectedly poignant payoff. Veteran bit player David Thornton headlines as Robert, a surly boho graybeard who’s given up jazz saxophone for…
Brad Anderson’s long-running saga of the melty-looking Winslow family and the gangling, interfering Great Dane that should’ve been put to sleep ages ago gets a film treatment, and once-mute Marmaduke gets expressive CGI-arched eyebrows and a voice provided by Owen Wilson. Relocated from Kansas to Orange County by master Phil…
The story in Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time hinges on a dagger that can rewind time, a narrative conceit that taunts those who endure this cacophonous, frivolous adaptation of a video game series. This latest summer spectacle is filled to the hilt with producer Jerry Bruckheimer and Disney,…
Say what you will, director Michael Patrick King knows how to stage a fabulous gay nuptial. Sex and the City 2 begins with flair and good humor at the wedding of Stanford (Willie Garson) and Anthony (Mario Cantone), complete with a gay men’s chorus in white top-and-tails crooning a tastefully…
The latest from popular Korean director Kim Ji-woon lands with a splat in the camp of decadent American blockbusters. Dubbed an “oriental Western” but really a travesty of Sergio Leone’s control of space, pacing, and storytelling, The Good, the Bad, the Weird is a sloppy 130-minute scramble for treasure in…
In this fourth and final installation in the Shrek franchise, our green hero feels emasculated by the grind of domesticity (marriage, fatherhood) and worn down by the demands of celebrity. His failure to realize that his is, indeed, a wonderful life leads him to utter a wish for just one…
First off, forgive us for not having the budget to upgrade this summer movie preview to 3-D. Rest assured, there are plenty of eye-popping (brain-numbing?) epics in the preview list that follows, but to our pleasure and surprise, there is a surplus of attention-worthy 2-D flicks too. Happy summer, movie…
The postscript for Entre Nos explains that it’s based on codirector Paola Mendoza’s own story of eking out a living on the streets of New York. Unfortunately, that postscript is more affecting than anything that made it to the screen. In the film, Mendoza plays her Colombian mother, and her…
The great boundary-crosser of Iranian cinema, Bahman Ghobadi purposefully steps over the line with No One Knows About Persian Cats — a quasidocumentary, highly unofficial panorama of Tehran’s tenacious underground music scene and a movie that has accrued additional urgency since its first public screening at Cannes last May. Ghobadi’s…
Is it an accident that Ridley Scott’s Robin Hood plays like a rousing love letter to the tea party movement? It’s certainly something of a surprise. When the movie was announced in 2007 with the title Nottingham, reports suggested that it would sympathize with the normally vilified Sheriff of Nottingham…
Another movie, not as awful or deluded as this one, might one day find better use for the easygoing vibe between Queen Latifah and Common, the stars of Just Wright, a romantic comedy (for the ladies) with basketball and cameoing NBA players in it (for the fellas). That absolutely no…
Blond and spineless, Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) has a secure fact-checking job and is engaged to Victor (Gael García Bernal), a hunky restaurateur of indeterminate exotic origin who dangles hot, fresh fettuccine into her mouth in a totally nonthreatening, not-at-all-9½ Weeksish way. But Sophie’s not satisfied: She really wants to write,…
Purely for the reliable pleasure of Michael Caine’s company, I came ready to praise what threatened to be another miserable drama of life and death in Broken Britain. For a while, Caine holds his own as the titular pensioner, defeat registered in the quiescent slump of his shoulders, as he…
As Iron Man 2 begins, Tony Stark — mechanical genius, Forbes 400 perennial, the pop-star CEO of Stark Industries — has dropped any pretense of a secret identity. Stark is garishly “out” as Iron Man, performing a one-man air show before touching down to host his Stark Expo, which transforms…
Did I say “Awww” during Babies? I did. Did I giggle at the adorable things babies do in Babies? Oh my, yes. Did I ovulate like a dozen times during Babies? You better believe it. Is Babies a good movie? Of course not. But that’s missing the point—like asking if…
If there was an Oscar race worth following this year, it was the one for Best Animated Feature. Out of nowhere, The Secret of Kells, an enchantingly old-fashioned Irish upstart about a medieval boy monk who dreams of illuminating sacred books, tucked itself into an already juicy lineup that featured…
If audiences are willing to pretend that they’ve never seen Freddy Krueger—and the crowd I was with was primed—at least give them the privilege of a tease. Unfortunately, this remake of Wes Craven’s 1984 horror staple pops its cookies early, with barely a glimmer of suburban sunshine to contrast the…
