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Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha: Melvin Van Peebles Overshares
In Melvin Van Peebles’ homely home-video-art love-story curio, incorporating fragments of his 1982 stage musical Waltz of the…
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Lornas Silence: The Dardenne Brothers Repeat Themselves
Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, secular worker-priests of the Belgian cinema, emerge once more from their lower depths. In…
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The Time Travelers Wife: Only Recommended for Those Who Read the Book
A dapper (mostly) contemporary costume drama, The Time Traveler’s Wife is abundantly interior-decorated in vintage rococo. Eric Bana,…
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My Sisters Keeper: Cameron Diaz, Meet Jodi Picoult
Eleven-year-old Anna Fitzgerald’s parents didn’t just plan for her—they customized her in utero, with the specific end of…
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Imagine That: Eddie Murphy Taps Into the Parent Market
Eddie Murphy is Evan, a Denver investment consultant with a workaholic schedule that leaves little space for 7-year-old…
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Big Man Japan: Life Aint So Super for This Superhero
Hitoshi Matsumoto, half of a legendary Japanese comic duo, debuts as a big-screen director/star with this goof on…
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PICKDrag Me to Hell: Sam Raimi Makes a Welcome Return to His Roots
Often a drifting virtuoso in the years before finding his Spider-Man gig, with Drag Me to Hell director…
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Terminator Salvation: We Wont Be Back
Technophobic predictions, the Terminator movies sell tickets by promising this decade’s model of killing machine: the classic V8…
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Fados: Gorgeous Songs From Portugal
The fado is a dolorous folksong tradition from Portugal, first sung in the early 19th century by barefoot…
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Inkheart: How to Mess Up a Perfectly Good Childrens Book
Brendan “Kids’ Choice” Fraser returns to the multiplex day-care as Mo Folchart, antiquarian-book-repairman-cum-adventurer and member of a race…
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Nothing Like the Holidays: Chicago Catholics Bicker and Bond
The Rodriguez kids, spread far from their native Chicago, reunite for Xmas under the roof of their voluminous…
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The Dukes: An Old Tune, Professionally Sung
Even if you don’t know the name, you’ll recognize Robert Davi’s slightly corroded handsomeness and shiny, bottomless eyes.…
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Frontrunners: Revenge of the Nerds
The great American student-government election: Teenagers exposing their fragile egos to public ballot-box rejection and spending a small…
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The Pool: Sorry, Wrong Caste
Leaving Milwaukee to tell an indigenous tale of life on India’s west coast, director/DP Chris Smith inevitably brings…
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RocknRolla: English Hoodlums Pose Like Mad
What do you have to do to get your career revoked in England, short of being Gary Glitter?…
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What We Do Is Secret: The Germs Are Resurrected
In my day, you had to visit a dozen Blockbusters to find a ratty copy of The Decline…
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XXY: Hold On to Your Genitals
On the remote Uruguayan seaside, Alex’s parents have sequestered their daughter, hoping to keep her secret hidden from…
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Towelhead: Adolescence Is Hell During the First Gulf War
American Beauty scribe Alan Ball makes his dreaded feature-directing debut with another tale of suburban purgatory, featuring yet…
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The Edge of Heaven: A pomo, post-colonial, polyglot soap opera
Fatih Akin’s The Edge of Heaven wears current events on its sleeve, feeling out the state of German-Turkish…
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America the Beautiful: Shocker! We’re all Deeply Superficial
This scattershot documentary recapitulates vintage Beauty Myth trumpery: Beauty standards make us average frumps miserable and are the…