Dark Ark. Obsession! It’s not just a perfume. It’s all over the King James Bible. And for the first time, captured in a major motion picture that doesn’t paint a biblical figure like a cardboard cutout whimsically pimping himself out to God’s unholy will. On the strength of a “vision,” a guy builds a boat 300 cubits long (whatever that … Read More
MAN OF STEEL
Kneel Before Steel. Darkness, moral ambiguity, self-doubt, wearing underpants inside the trousers: these are things not commonly associated with Superman. But in MAN OF STEEL, the newest Superman vehicle, this heretical new direction is what we get – like it or not. But Poffy likey. The bedrock of Superman canon has been preserved (Krypton exploding, Kal-El sent to Earth, super … Read More
ROBIN HOOD 2010
Everything’s Archy. GLADIATOR and BRAVEHEART had a baby and they called it Russell Crowe. This ain’t Errol Flynn, this ain’t Adam Ant, and it’s certainly not Dennis Moore, Dennis Moore, riding through the woods… This ain’t your daddy’s ROBIN HOOD; no swinging from vines in the forest, no star-crossed lovers, no archery competition, no “splitting his competitor’s arrow in twain,” … Read More
STATE OF PLAY
ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN meets Blackwater. Politics, conspiracy, murder – is the STATE OF PLAY. And Rachel McAdams looking tastier than Christmas dinner. A murdered congressional aide is linked to Republican Congressman, Stephen Collins (Ben Affleck, playing it straighter than Tom Cruise’s public persona) in a sex scandal that leads to questions regarding his links to a no-bid, war-profiteering contractor, … Read More
BODY OF LIES
Pants on Fire! Little Boy Leo is now Big Bad DiCaprio. In BODY OF LIES, Leo has finished growing the beard he started in BLOOD DIAMOND and is neck deep in Syriana. He is undercover CIA operative Ferris, stationed in the Middle East, embroiled in an undercover plot to plant a Taliban newbie as a rising demagogue, in order to … Read More
GLADIATOR
Unleashing Helle. Truly GLADIATOR is the stuff of great fiction; a story so well-orchestrated and superbly told, there might well have been in Roman history a general who became a slave, a slave who became a gladiator, a gladiator who won an Oscar. But – as they used to say in ancient Rome – “only in Hollywood…” Russell Crowe is … Read More
3:10 TO YUMA 2007
Black hat, White hat, Gray souls… Every way of man is right in his own eyes. – Wade quoting the Book of Proverbs, 3:10 TO YUMA. Every modern Western released after Eastwood’s mighty 1992 elegy has laid hollow claim to “The best western since UNFORGIVEN.” 3:10 TO YUMA is. That’s because – like UNFORGIVEN – YUMA is not a “Western,” … Read More
AMERICAN GANGSTER
Smooth Criminal. Whadaya know – Crime DOES pay! Or so it seems at the conclusion of AMERICAN GANGSTER, when a career gangster and a struggling cop are laffing it up in a montage, collaborating to bring down the gangster’s empire. Now why would they be doing that? I’ll get to that subtle mismanaged message in a moment. Hmm, a movie … Read More