‘J. Edgar’ is a frustrating watch for sure, and its pace flags several times due to some heavy-handed narration that struggles with these historical themes, but the fact that it’s always fighting itself is kind of fascinating too.
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Director Sean Durkin uses shallow depth of field in an attempt to accentuate the psychological claustrophobia that Martha feels. Instead he manages to distract from Elizabeth Olsen’s stellar performance and detach the viewer from the emotional content or a genuine understanding of a well developed character.
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At festivals now, ‘Everyday Sunshine: The Story of Fishbone’ is an effective rock documentary of a one-of-a-kind alternative band that should have been bigger.
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A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas kicks off the holiday season right after Halloween, which is appropriate, because this movie is kind of a freak show.
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Brett Ratner’s latest assault on cinema, ‘Tower Heist’, wears its blue-collar leanings on its sleeve like the world’s least subtle Livestrong bracelet.
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One of the best films of 2011, ‘Take Shelter’ features an impressive performance from Michael Shannon and is assured, exciting filmmaking.
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In an age where conspiracy theories are more popular than reality-TV shows, disaster king Roland Emmerich sullies the name of Shakespeare.
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Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of A Tribe Called Quest is a skillfully made documentary directed by Michael Rappaport about the influential hip hop group.
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It’s a good week for Blu-ray. Richard Linklater’s Criterion version ‘Dazed and Confused’ is out and ‘Attack the Block’ beams in from outer space to the inner city.
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The first film in this month’s Horror Remix is 1987’s The Video Dead. It’s poorly acted, and is about a cursed television set that brings forth zombies upon the world. It’s pretty much as fantastic as it sounds.
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‘The Rum Diary’ feels about as focused as an all-night bender, which I suppose is kind of the point, but is its natural, rugged charm enough?
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J.C. Chandor’s Margin Call pulls off the easily attached labels of investment bankers and attempts to humanize the first shots fired in the global financial crisis of 2008.
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Ian Nathan has captured ‘Alien”s vibe and created a virtual treasure trove of cool collectibles and images in the new book ‘Alien Vault: The Definitive Story of the Making of the Film.’
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Cameron Crowe’s new movie ‘Pearl Jam Twenty’ is precisely the kind of by-the-books rock doc that you might get if you were watching a two-part episode of VH1’s Behind the Music.
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Cameron Diaz in ‘Bad Teacher’ and ‘Page One: Inside the New York Times’ are out on Blu-ray. One asks hard questions and the other will leave you with questions.
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