El Mariachi (1992)

Action/Adventure Rated R

Legend holds that Robert Rodriguez made his debut for just $7,000, but more impressive than his thrift was his knack for offbeat humor, inventively staged action and an even control of pacing rarely found in low-budget flicks. This is really a comedy, as a traveling musician (Carlos Gallardo) is mistaken for a vicious criminal. It’s

Bringing Down the House (2003)

Comedy Rated PG-13

This disappointing disaster spins endless jokes out of the assumptions that Wasps are stiff and uptight and blacks are loud and loose. Steve Martin plays Peter Sanderson, a Beverly Hills lawyer who gets mixed up with an ex-con named Charlene (Queen Latifah). The movie intends to unite black and white audiences, and it probably does

Brothers Grimm, The (2005)

Action/Adventure Rated PG-13

The manic, messy and magical style of director Terry Gilliam (Brazil, 12 Monkeys) defines this clever riff on fairy tales, in which the title brothers (Matt Damon and Heath Ledger, both delightfully light on their feet) pretend to be ghostbusters in 19th-century Germany. Like Neil Jordan’s The Company of Wolves and Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s

Peter Pan (1953)

Family Rated G

Though adapted from J.M. Barrie’s play, this might as well be a parable about the eternal childhood of the cinema. Peter Pan refuses to grow up and so, for better and worse, do the movies. Peter is a delightfully unpolished figure: troublesome, impudent and with feral eyebrows that would never be found on the usual

Meet the Robinsons (2007)

Family Rated PG

“Even in its messiness, (it) at least suffers from wild ambition, not laziness. And I’d rather have a family movie go over kids’ heads than insult their intelligence.

Grindhouse (2007)

Horror Rated R

"…offers plenty of film-buff fun, yet Rodriguez and Tarantino are, in a sense, limiting themselves."

Reservoir Dogs (1992)

Drama Rated R

“An action movie comprised almost entirely of words.”

Pulp Fiction (1994)

Drama Rated R

“Tarantino’s definitive film, if not his best.”

Lookout, The (2007)

Drama Rated R

“…far more thrilling before it turns into a thriller.

Blades of Glory (2007)

Comedy Rated PG-13

You need a perfectly timed double take to work with Will Ferrell – most of your job is reacting to the bizarre non sequiturs that fly from his mouth – and Jon Heder (Napoleon Dynamite) thankfully possesses a formidable one. (His mouth seems permanently curled in an expression of repulsed confusion.) Here he and Ferrell