Tom Cruise as Major William Cage There’s no question that Doug Liman’s Edge of Tomorrow is a solid one hour and 40 minute movie. Too bad it runs one hour and 53 minutes. Smart, funny, exciting and thought provoking, like all good science fiction should, the film delivers everything you could want and more from […]
Movies
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Blended a familiar concoction
Drew Barrymore as Lauren Reynolds and Adam Sandler as Jim Friedman in Blended PHOTO COURTESY WARNER BROS. PICTURES As funny as it sounds, I held out a modicum of hope for Blended. After all, two of Adam Sandler’s more successful films, The Wedding Singer and 50 First Dates, also co-starred Drew Barrymore and there’s no […]
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Manic Spider-Man 2 nothing but a blur
One gets the impression that director Marc Webb knew he was going to have a hard time squeezing in everything that was in the script for The Amazing Spider-Man 2. After all, there must be some reason why the film starts with an action sequence, progresses directly to another and proceeds to pile one breathless […]
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Pace and plotting nearly undo The Other Woman
Kate Upton, Cameron Diaz and Leslie Mann in The Other Woman. Photo courtesy 20th Century Fox I understand the appeal of films like The Other Woman. They are to women what action flicks are to men – overwrought fantasies meant to provide a cathartic release for the audience. Then again they might exist as a […]
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Transcendence wastes its vast potential
Some films go out of their way to have their plots act as a metaphor for the action on screen. Case in point, the recent horror film Oculus, about an evil spirit that lives in a mirror, sports a story that puts together scenes from the past and present in such a way that they […]
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Pace undercuts Heaven
Greg Kinnear and Connor Corum in Heaven is for Real. “Pillar of the community” and “salt of the earth” are the kinds of things you’d use to describe Todd Burpo. He belongs to his town’s volunteer fire department, is a loving father and faithful husband and has no problem practicing what he preaches, which is […]
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Oculus a clever exercise in low-budget horror
Following the maxim, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” Blumhouse Productions continues to adhere to the formula that’s made it one of the fastest growing, small production arms in Hollywood. Sticking to budgets of $5 million or less, offering profit participation to lure the occasional name actor and aggressively promoting their modest horror films, […]
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Conflicted Noah visually spectacular, narratively muddled
Hardly worrying about catering to the critical eye of theologians or the concerns of the bean counters at Paramount Pictures, director Darren Aronofsky has succeeded in creating a singular vision with Noah to the tune of $125 million. A film that created a stir from the moment it was announced, this is a project that […]
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Cap 2: Sober reflection
Chris Evans as Steve Rogers in Captain America. While it could be argued that Captain America is the least “super” of the superheroes in the Marvel Comics universe, there’s no question he carries the most symbolic weight. The character, having been created at the dawn of World War II, was an obvious propaganda symbol used […]
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Anderson in fine form
Tom Wilkinson, Tony Revolori and Owen Wilson. PHOTO COURTESY FOX SEARCHLIGHT PICTURES It’s tempting to say that if you’ve seen one Wes Anderson film, you’ve seen them all, an ironic comment that I can’t help but think the director would appreciate. Each and every one of his movies from Rushmore on (The Royal Tenenbaums, Fantastic […]
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Not your father’s RoboCop
Joel Kinnaman as Alex Murphy in RoboCop. When Paul Verhoeven’s Robocop burst onto screens in 1987 it caused a sensation, primarily because of its excessive violence but also because of its cutting edge special effects. It also played out as a right-wing fantasy in which law and order was dispensed with impunity, with the title […]
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Monuments Men missing momentum
George Clooney as Frank Stokes George Clooney’s The Monuments Men has the sort of pedigree that Oscar winners are made of. What with an all-star cast, including former Academy Awards recipients Cate Blanchett, Matt Damon, Jean Dujardin (as well as Clooney) and Bill Murray, John Goodman and Bob Balaban, as well as a subject matter […]
