With its use of active duty U.S. Navy Seals instead of actors and its allegedly true to life trappings, it would be far too easy to call Act of Valor out on the carpet for wearing its political leanings on its sleeve. It's pretty bad, but it never fully becomes a self-serious version of Team America and it just barely eschews becoming Call of Duty: The Movie. It's earnest, poorly staged jingoism would be more easily overlooked had the film been made by people who actually have a clue how to direct a movie.
Sketch comedy veteran David Wain returns to the big screen with Walderlust , an uproariously funny and charmingly vulgar film that lets some really great characters do the majority of the work instead of an overly convoluted plot.
Despite being the mind behind the brilliant L.A. Confidential, writer James Ellroy's work rarely transitions well to the big screen. Much like graphic novelist Frank Miller, Ellroy needs a director who can temper his sometimes unnecessarily over the top and formulaic material into a watchable package. With Ellroy’s latest outing Rampart, director Oren Moverman show’s that he’s simply not up to the challenge leading to film that feels wholly indistinguishable from the author’s past big screen outings about dirty Los Angeles cops.
Calling Goon this generation's Slap Shot would be an understatement. Aside from the obvious surface comparisons to the George Roy Hill/Paul Newman classic about a minor league hockey team going nowhere, director Michael Dowse ( Fubar ) and co-writer/co-star Jay Baruchel have created a film that outdoes what many hail as the greatest hockey comedy ever made.
During a big week for DVD releases, we take a look at Brett Ratner's Tower Heist , the film festival favourite Martha Marcy May Marlene , the multiple Genie award nominee Café de Flore , and a trio of big name direct to DVD features starring the likes of Chris Evans, Colin Farrell, Keira Knightley, Ryan Reynolds, and Julia Roberts.
To celebrate TIFF’s ongoing Bangkok Dangerous: The Cinema Of Nicolas Cage series, Alan Jones has resurrected his retrospective of the actor’s work entitled The Nic Cage Project. In this edition, Jones boards Simon West's Con Air – playing tonight at the Lightbox.
While technically a step up in quality from the first film in terms of storytelling, the second entry in the somewhat unnecessary Ghost Rider franchise still manages to feel like a bit of a missed opportunity given the talent both in front of and behind the camera. A film starring Nicolas Cage and directed by the duo of Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor ( Crank , Gamer ) should be balls to the wall, action packed insanity. Instead, what we get is a film that feels curiously neutered in terms of content and budget.
Even dubbed into English, it’s hard to go wrong with almost any film bearing the Studio Ghibli name on it. Similarly, the much beloved children’s novel The Borrowers – written by the late Mary Norton with no fewer than four big and small screen adaptations – stands as an enduring brand in family entertainment. While only written by Ghibli head maestro Hayao Miyazaki and only somewhat faithful to Norton’s beloved source material, The Secret World of Arrietty still manages to be another solid, but slight effort from the Japanese powerhouse.
This Means War refers not only to the title of director McG’s latest romantic action-comedy, but also to the exact sentiment I felt about forty minutes into the film. Staggeringly unfunny with a masochistic mean streak, only one of the jokes in the film even manages a single actual laugh, making for an extremely long feeling 95 minute sit. Ugly, incoherent, and all around lazy as hell, this is exactly the kind of movie I feel I will be weeping about when it inevitably hits number one at the box office.
Much like similar attempts to reduce the complete works of Shakespeare into a single scant theatrical running time, the unauthorized J.K. Rowling reduction Potted Potter (now on stage until March 25th at the Panasonic Theatre in Toronto after successful runs in the UK) has the feeling of a madcap romp boiled down to a science. This cramming of all seven Harry Potter books into a 70 minute production definitely skews slightly towards a younger crowd, but the fan appeal is undeniable and the uninitiated will have a hard time erasing the ear to ear grin from their faces.
Not much of anything romantic on DVD this Valentine's Day (unless you count the family dynamic in the brilliant Take Shelter), but there are a pair of decent horror films, a drunken Johnny Depp, Samuel L. Jackson and Tommy Lee Jones arguing in a room for 90 minutes, and some pretty great philosophical discussions. Something for everyone! Except romantics.
To celebrate TIFF’s ongoing Bangkok Dangerous: The Cinema Of Nicolas Cage series, Alan Jones has resurrected his retrospective of the actor’s work entitled The Nic Cage Project. In this edition, Jones analyzes David Lynch's violent road trip Wild at Heart – playing tonight at the Lightbox.
Ever since Paul Greengrass’ Bourne Identity sequels, espionage movies have been about terrorism and government cover-ups, set in third world countries and filmed with shaky handheld cameras and blown out colour schemes. Safe House falls firmly into this camp, loaded with nods to dirty dealings and water boarding. It’s a fairly entertaining movie, just one that definitely feels like it’s coming out a few years too late.
When considering whether or not you want to watch Journey 2, the only question you have to ask yourself is: ”Do I desperately need to see The Rock play a ukulele and bounce berries off his pecs in 3D?”
It’s simultaneously mind-boggling and easy to see why director Lynne Ramsay’s We Need to Talk About Kevin was snubbed and shut out of so many potential accolades this awards season. Despite having a stellar lead performance from actress Tilda Swinton as a mother at the end of her wits, Ramsay’s film might be looked down upon as just another genre film with a high gloss. That’s sad, since it’s one of the best and most outright terrifying bits of familial horror from last year.
