Film
The Bucket List: Die, Nicholson, Die!
Rob Reiner’s latest film is, among other things, a reflection of our persistent cultural belief that you…
Film
Sunflower: Again With the Cultural Revolution
In 1976, when Gengnian (Sun Haiying) returns from six years of brutal re-education, he finds that his…
Film
Eastern Promises and the Best Discs of 2007
Eastern Promises Universal, $29.98 Though it’s showing up on several 10-best lists for 2007, there’s still a bit…
Film
There Will Be Blood: Daniel Day-Lewis Devours the American West
A great brooding thundercloud of a movie, Paul Thomas Anderson’s There Will Be Blood arrives as if from…
Film
All My Love: Local Director Trips Through Mongolia
Probably the most ambitious film at October’s Local Sightings Film Festival (where it won top prize), Brian…
Film
The Orphanage: Old-School Frights From Spain
Having a child destroys your immune system to horror, real or imagined. As surely as Pan’s Labyrinth—whose…
Film
Whos BadderDeckard or Bourne?
Blade Runner: The Final Cut Warner Bros., $34.99 It’s a sign of this film’s enduring power after 25…
Film
The 10 Best (Overlooked) Films of 2007
How tough is it for a movie to find its audience, above the din of blockbuster marketing and…
Film
Murderers’ Melody
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street: Sondheim Plus Blood Equals Excellence
Film
P.S. I Love You: Hilary Swank Sees Dead Person
This isn’t the first time that Richard LaGravenese, the gifted writer of A Little Princess and The…
Film
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly: Julian Schnabels Arty Overload
At this year’s Cannes Film Festival, the American painter turned filmmaker Julian Schnabel (Basquiat, Before Night Falls) won…
Film
Charlie Wilsons War: Tom Hanks and Strippers Liberate Afghanistan
Hell of a thing, getting Mike Nichols to adapt the yer-kiddin’-me story of Charlie Wilson, the congressman from…
Film
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story: Spinal Tap Its Not
As an actor, John C. Reilly is the opposite of Mr. Cellophane. He doesn’t disappear into a role;…
Film
Youth Without Youth: Coppola Should Stick With the Winery
Francis Ford Coppola’s self-financed return to the fray is a curious project—well-crafted, personal, and movie-movie old-fashioned even…
Film
The Savages: Laura Linney Comes Unglued
Simmering below the squeamish elder-care euphemism “uncharted territory” is a fearful awareness that when it comes to dealing…
Film
The Kite Runner: Beloved Book Becomes Flaccid Potboiler
Kites fly high over San Francisco and Kabul, but not much else soars in Marc Forster’s flaccid…
Film
The Amateurs: Meet the Lebowski of Porn
Welcome to Butterface Fields, a SoCal “small-town U.S.A” peopled by cheery barfly numbskulls with names like Mo…
Film
I Am Legend: Will Smith Versus the Mutants
There are two momentous performances in the Darwinian horror fable I Am Legend. One is by the movie’s…
Film
The Walker: Woody Harrelson Versus the Neocons
Paul Schrader’s cinema is largely defined by the pathology of his male protagonists, and with The Walker,…