Film
Taking Woodstock: A 60s Trip We Dont Need to Take
“If you remember Woodstock, you probably weren’t there,” the expression goes. And if you were, can you please…
Film
Inglourious Basterds: World War II According to Tarantino
Energetic, inventive, swaggering fun, Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds is a consummate Hollywood entertainment—rich in fantasy and blithely amoral.…
Film
Art & Copy: How to Sell Soap and Sex and VWs
Since his 1996 grunge-rock documentary Hype!, Doug Pray has become an ever-more-adept assembler of polished images. And where…
Film
Cold Souls: Paul Giamatti Has a Little Problem
Let’s get this out of the way first: Yes, it’s just like a Charlie Kaufman premise, but it’s…
Film
Pick Afghan Star: Compelling Reality TV, Without Simon Cowell in Sight
Slumdog Millionaire, the documentary. Deservedly a Sundance prizewinner, Havana Marking’s film follows the American Idol knockoff produced in…
Film
PICK Tony Manero: Finding Evil in a Disco Classic
Chilean filmmaker Pablo Larrain’s alarming Tony Manero—set in the dark days of the Pinochet regime and named not…
Film
PICK District 9: E.T. Goes to Guantánamo
The aliens have been with us for 20 years already at the start of South African director Neill…
Film
PICK Not Quite Hollywood: Exploitation in Oz
At the same moment that directors like Peter Weir and Gillian Armstrong were earning festival kudos and critical…
Film
Spread: Ashton Kutcher Sells His Bod
Broke-ass hustler Nikki (Ashton Kutcher, who also produced) may not have a home or a car, but he…
Film
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,…
Film
Adam: An Unconvincing Rain Man Romance
Other than Rose Byrne’s on-screen radiance and a soothingly warm palette lit by cinematographer Seamus Tierney, there’s not…
Film
PICK Thirst: Real Vampires, Not Like Those Sissies in Twilight
Finally there’s a vampire movie worthy of the title The Hunger—even if it arrives under a more potable…
Film
Ex-Drummer: Battle of the Belgian Bar Bands
This gutter-punk cult movie about an unlikely bar band’s rise and fall might’ve been scripted during a drunken…
Film
Julie & Julia: Meryl Streep Can Cook No Wrong
It was the best of movies. It was the worst of movies. Which is to say: There’s half…
Film
[PICK] The Cove: Youll Never Eat Dolphin Again!
“I was buying a new Porsche every year,” says a rueful Ric O’Barry, who as a young man…
Film
Paper Heart: Michael Cera Is So Dreamy!
The young ladies love Michael Cera. And they giggled along adoringly at SIFF for Charlyne Yi’s half-documentary hybrid.…
Film
The Garden: L.A. Politics Trumps Urban Farmers
Another eco-bore. Municipal politics in Los Angeles have never been known for transparency, nor have politicians always been…
Film
PICK Herb & Dorothy: You Dont Have to Be Fancy to Collect Good Art
Chuck Close calls them the mascots of the art world. Christo and Jeanne-Claude once offered them a drawing…
Film
Shrink: Kevin Spacey Self-Medicates
We know Kevin Spacey is one depressed psychiatrist because he doesn’t shave and he chain-smokes pot. (What Elliott…
Film
Funny People: Apatow and Sandler Confront Middle Age
After canvassing the getting of manly wisdom in The 40-Year-Old Virgin and childbirth in Knocked Up, Judd Apatow…