Movie Reviews
Hip hop: Kangaroo Jack lost in the Outback
Published on Jan 16th, 2003
0 comments Charlie Carbone and Louis Booker meet at the beach at the age of ten, and moments later Louis saves Charlie from drowning. Twenty years later, they're still the best of friends, but since that first...
Shooting ironic: Bang, bang-- you're dead
Published on Jan 9th, 2003
0 comments The people who say irony is dead probably tried to kill it with a handgun, but the post-ironic age will never arrive while Michael Moore (Roger & Me) draws breath. With a lifetime membership in...
2002 in film: Success from old stars and old styles
Published on Dec 26th, 2002
0 comments It wasn't the best of years at the movies, but some of the best moments came from stars of long standing doing some of their best work, and younger directors emulating the old pros.   Top Ten...
"Two" much: Three hours of Gollum gets old
Published on Dec 18th, 2002
0 comments No way should you begin your journey to Middle Earth with The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. To follow the story, you need more than a passing familiarity with The Fellowship of the Ring, because...
J.Lo at your service: Tip Maid with some chuckles
Published on Dec 12th, 2002
0 comments Pretty Woman almost meets The American President in Maid in Manhattan; but these are the Bush years, so the latest cinematic Cinderella story is about a maid winning the affection of an assemblyman...
Planet of the pirates: Seeking buried treasure in space
Published on Nov 28th, 2002
0 comments In 1950 Walt Disney captured boys' hearts and minds with a live-action film of Treasure Island. In 2002, the Disney organization has decided to take another pass at the story, this time through...
Double-oh-no!
Published on Nov 21st, 2002
0 comments As Die Another Day went on and on, I was worried about two things: 1) It would never end; and 2) There would be a pop quiz about the plot. With 20 films in 40 years, each trying to outdo those that...
Poor imitation: Femme Fatale could be fatal
Published on Nov 14th, 2002
0 comments With thousands of people in the world suffering from constipation, "piece of shit" is not a phrase to be used loosely; but after wasting two hours of my life watching Brian De Palma's Femme Fatale, I...
Great mile: Eminem shouldn't get bad rap
Published on Nov 7th, 2002
0 comments Eminem/Marshall Mathers/Slim Shady brings his macho swagger to the big screen in the semi-autobiographical 8 Mile, a '90s version of Saturday Night Fever. Em may not have the emotional range of John...
Auto Focus: Laboring in the shadow
Published on Oct 31st, 2002
0 comments Not all lives fit neatly into the TV Biography format. The exceptions are the stuff movie biographies like Auto Focus are made of. Don't ask me to name three. The closest comparison I can think of is...
The whole truth: Charade remake delivers the goods
Published on Oct 24th, 2002
0 comments Remakes are tricky things. In many cases, the filmmaker has no concept other than to make pretty much the same movie with a different cast on the theory that the property has proven itself, and...
The Ring: It's the denouement, stupid
Published on Oct 17th, 2002
0 comments The denouement is the scene or the moment at the end of a mystery where everything is explained and with luck the loose ends are tied up. No one who saw The Sixth Sense or The Others is likely to...
Chick flick with grit: Oleander might even please guys
Published on Oct 10th, 2002
0 comments How come Monty Python never thought of it? A gritty prison drama with an all-blonde cast! Start with Michelle Pfeiffer, who showed in Dangerous Minds how tough she could be (not!). She's Ingrid...
Lecter series: Red Dragon has bite
Published on Oct 3rd, 2002
0 comments It's hard to imagine anyone in Hollywood having the imagination to look at the Rush Hour movies and choose director Brett Ratner to helm a first-class thriller, the prequel to The Silence of the...
Sweet Home Alabama
Published on Sep 26th, 2002
0 comments Hollywood thinks nothing of "reinventing" an old property by slapping a new title on it, changing the setting, shooting it with a different cast, then pretending it's something brand new. The message...
Plucked clean: Four Feathers mostly fluff
Published on Sep 19th, 2002
0 comments As a product of the U.S. educational system, I'm as ignorant about history as President Bush, but with less severe repercussions in my case. Reported historical inaccuracies in the 2002 version of...
Hoppin'
Published on Sep 19th, 2002
0 comments Looking for a change of pace, I headed to Starr Hill to catch the band Carbon Leaf, which have received considerable press in recent months since they won the Coca-Cola New Music Award at the...
One Hour Photo
Published on Sep 5th, 2002
0 comments We don't always notice how creepy Robin Williams is when he's amusing us, but it's always lurking just beneath the surface. Writer-director Mark Romanek maximizes Williams' creep potential in One...
Simply Good: Aniston breathes life into new role
Published on Aug 29th, 2002
0 comments Independent films show that movies needn't be lavish, effects-filled overproductions. The Good Girl does that, but it also shows the same thing about hell: it doesn't have to be full of fire and...
Digital diva: S1m0ne is an unnatural woman
Published on Aug 22nd, 2002
0 comments It's pretty obvious that the brilliant mind behind S1m0ne is the same one that was responsible for The Truman Show. Directing this time as well as producing and writing, Andrew Niccol has given us...
XXXtreme spying: Diesel's new film not quite so Furious
Published on Aug 8th, 2002
0 comments Where are the drive-ins when we need them? Between XXX this week and Blue Crush next week, it's like we're back in the '60s, but with bigger budgets and more extreme, sometimes computer-enhanced,...
Crop failure: Signs comes up short
Published on Aug 1st, 2002
0 comments We are all Pavlov's dogs. We hear M. Night Shyamalan's name, and we begin to get scared. By the time we get to the theater where his new film is playing, we're terrified. When we see the ticket...
Mousey movie: Stuart Little 2 packs laughs for little ones
Published on Jul 18th, 2002
0 comments As Sony summer sequels go, Stuart Little 2 is better than Men in Black II. At least it seems better because we had such big hopes for MIBII while expectations for SL2 were more... little. Or maybe it...
Perdition
Published on Jul 11th, 2002
0 comments  If Steven Spielberg had made The Godfather it might have turned out like Road to Perdition, which instantly becomes the front-runner for year-end honors as of July 12. As praiseworthy as that...
Men In Black II (Three Stars)
Published on Jul 4th, 2002
0 comments By Cole Smithey Will Smith (Ali) and Tommy Lee Jones (U.S. Marshals) team up with director Barry Sonnenfeld (Get Shorty) once again to invigorate the infectious camp sci-fi buddy comedy they...
Chick flick Juwanna Mann's not all that
Published on Jun 27th, 2002
0 comments By Cole Smithey Tootsie meets women's basketball in this feeble attempt at milking comedy from a story about a guy who cross dresses to salvage his sports career. Jamal Jeffries (Miguel A. Nunez, Jr...
Knocking Minority
Published on Jun 20th, 2002
0 comments If anyone - well, almost anyone - but Steven Spielberg had directed Minority Report there wouldn't be enough words to praise it; but Spielberg's track record– his films rarely fail to make my...
Doo it
Published on Jun 13th, 2002
0 comments Here's a no-brainer: Scooby-Doo, why are you?You've got your GenXers with happy memories of the 1969-72 TV series and its spinoffs, and some of them have children of their own they want to expose to...
Never Enough: J.Lo's got the goods
Published on May 30th, 2002
0 comments Versatile director Michael Apted (Coal Miner's Daughter, The World Is Not Enough, 7-42 Up) offers a standard woman-in-jeopardy thriller, Enough, trying again with a genre that eluded him in Blink....
Wake-up call
Published on May 23rd, 2002
0 comments Insomnia shows the result of when good scripts happen to great actors. Al Pacino has been coasting since winning his undeserved Oscar for Scent of a Woman a decade ago, and Robin Williams has made...