Air Force Dumb. Russians hijack the American President’s plane, AIR FORCE ONE! Oh my! Whatever is going to happen now? Can I have a serving of foregone conclusion with my helping of blockbuster actioner? Two great actors. One dumbass movie. Harrison Ford is American President James Marshall (because the name President Privileged Whiteman was taken), and Gary Oldman is Russian … Read More
WAG THE DOG
Conflation Nation. “Of course there’s a war – I saw it on TV.” –Robert De Niro, WAG THE DOG. War is only real if you let them get away with it. As George Carlin used to say, “Why do the troops keep turning up?” But even if the troops didn’t turn up for active duty, WAG THE DOG is an … Read More
A CIVIL ACTION
Justice IS blind – so can’t see Truth. In movies, the good guys always seem to win court cases. Over an ingratiating orchestra swell, no less. But in reality, good or bad has nothing to do with the outcome of court cases. It’s how you play the game. If you can afford to be in the game in the first … Read More
MR. HOLLAND’S OPUS
Mopus Opus. A well-intentioned redemption movie that follows all its formulas sweetly, MR HOLLAND’S OPUS then tries one last tear-jerk that just makes us feel dirty, paying off with a piece of elevator muzak that is so memorable, it will have you humming something else within five minutes of hearing it. Richard Dreyfuss is Mr. Holland, a composer who begrudgingly … Read More
JURASSIC PARK III
Excitement replaced by Excrement. After Charles Darwin, Richard Owen, Louis Leakey, E.O. Wilson, Stephen Jay Gould, Richard Dawkins, Robert Bakker, Jack Horner and thousands of other anthropologists and paleontologists whose names we shall sadly never know, broke their backs formulating the knowledge that allowed us to comprehend evolution and the Dinosauria… JURASSIC PARK III takes those decades of learning – … Read More
THE MAIDEN HEIST
The Passion of The Heist. A quaint little heist comedy, with a nifty romantic resolution, THE MAIDEN HEIST stars Morgan Freeman, Christopher Walken and William H. Macy as security guards at a Boston art museum, so enamored with certain art pieces that when those pieces are sold to a European museum, they decide to steal the pieces for themselves and … Read More
WILD HOGS
On The Road To Nowhere. There is only one good thing in WILD HOGS: Peter Fonda. And he’s a cameo ten minutes before the end. Naif director Walt Becker helms this listless, laughless tale of four suburban friends pushing middle-age crisis who hit the open road as wannabe bikers to taste “freedom” and come smack up against real bikers and … Read More
THANK YOU FOR SMOKING
Black Lung Satire. Aaron Eckhart has always deserved to play a role as ferociously incisive as this. THANK YOU FOR SMOKING fleshes his latent silver-tongued devil in the form of Nick Naylor, a spokesman for Big Tobacco; the type of guy who could sell ice to Eskimos in winter. Movie opens with Nick on one of those daytime talk shows … Read More