Day: August 21, 2008

Blade Runner film review

A rare masterpiece in both the sci-fi and film noir genres. Blade Runner makes you think, makes you question reality, and makes you return to watch it again and again. I own both the VHS and the DVD and have seen the movie a dozen times. It gets better with age. The best work of ….

Blood and Oil: The Middle East in World War One

Year: 2006 Blood and Oil, a new documentary from Inecom Entertainment, was utterly impressive. Director Marty Callaghan, whose previous work includes writing and producing a TV mini-series called The 20th Century: A Moving Visual History, clearly has a strong personal interest in his subject, and conveys a sense of immersive passion as he pursues the ….

The Bourne Identity film review

Last year, Christopher Nolan took memory loss to a new level with his masterful thriller Memento, in which the hero tattoos notes on his body to help him cope with his condition. This year, the amnesiac champion of The Bourne Identity uses brains and brawn as a means of sorting out his memory loss. Doug ….

The Bourne Supremacy film review

Attention all adventure-starved, action-crazed moviegoers: kennel the cat, wreck the robot, and step on that spider. This summer’s best action hero is not Catwoman, Spider-Man, or a CGI robot – it’s just a dude named Jason Bourne! Matt Damon is back to reprise his role from the widely popular The Bourne Identity as Bourne – ….

Bride and Prejudice film review

Bride and Prejudice, a new film by the director of the hit Bend It Like Beckham, tries to speak to a global audience by refracting an iconic English novel through the realities of the Indian diaspora. The movie by director Gurinder Chadha takes novelist Jane Austen’s 1813 classic Pride and Prejudice and sets it in ….

The Candidate film review

"Politics is bullshit." Such sentiment, spoken early in the film, sums up The Candidate’s position on politics, not to mention my own. Robert Redford plays the title role, a fresh-faced kid and son of a former governer goaded by a group of campaign strategists (namely Peter Boyle) into running against an "unbeatable" Republican nominee for ….

Casino Royale film review

Though great he may be, there is a limit to the amount of uninterrupted Burt Bacharach music one can endure. And sadly, that limit — of music punctuated by kazoos, harpischords, and accordions — is far less than 137 minutes. There’s also a limit on the length of a spy spoof one can sit through ….

Chasing Liberty film review

If you really want to know what Mandy Moore did last summer, then check out her European travelogue called Chasing Liberty. But be warned, watching her travels in this film makes sitting through the reels of your grandparent’s vacation seem like an easy walk in the park. Moore’s third film about finding true love is ….

Cocaine Cowboys film review

Year: 2006 Billy Corben’s exuberant documentary Cocaine Cowboys not only refrains from the type of overly preachy commentary that we usually see in drug-related documentaries, but it almost comically recounts the bloodbath that was Miami’s cocaine heyday, while delivering more solid reporting and facts than most of its predecessors. Part of the nirvana of the ….

Constellation film review

Year: 2005 Constellation deals with an African-American family dealing with racial and familial issues in Huntsville, Alabama. It stars Billy Dee Williams as a bitter man still harboring the ill-effects of the old South and its prejudiced practices that he holds responsible for his sister’s (Gabrielle Union) life-wasting pursuit of a white man that could ….

The Corpse Bride film review

Year: 2005 Directed by Tim Burton and Mike Johnson Musical Score by Danny Elfman Screenplay by John August and Pamela Johnson With his second attempt in the feature-length animation genre, “The Corpse Bride” is another visually stunning film from Tim Burton. The story revolves around Victor (voiced by Johnny Depp), a young man who is about to ….

Daddy’s Little Girls film review

Year: 2007 “Daddy’s Little Girls” takes baby-mama-drama to a whole ‘notha level. The story revolves around a struggling mechanic (Idris Elba) who’s fighting for custody of his three girls from his ultra-ghettofied, hoochi-ass ex-girlfriend (Tasha Smith), whose ruthless boyfriend is the local “street pharmacist.” As he fights for custody, he falls for the attorney (Gabrielle ….