Drama Rated R
"Coincidence can be a heavy burden for a movie…"
Action/Adventure Rated PG-13
Harrison Ford, as a cop who would rather be selling real estate, is loose, lively and often very funny in this action comedy, but the movie itself is lively only in spurts. Writer-director Ron Shelton (Bull Durham, Tin Cup) is after something admirable, but he ends up delivering a combination of Anonymous Police Movie 3,001
Horror Rated R
This remake of the seminal 1978 zombie flick – the one set in the mall – jettisons the consumerist satire of the original in favor of straight-ahead scares, which is fine by me. The first Dawn was so heavy-handed it had enough satire for four movies. This time, a larger cast of characters hides out
Comedy Rated PG-13
As a questionably talented bar-band guitarist who passes himself off as a substitute teacher, Jack Black has found the signature role for his singular talent. Black has made a career out of flailing his hair, limbs and devilishly gleaming eyes in all directions – in short, acting the way the rest of us wish we
An atmospheric account of an affair between a married woman (Julianne Moore) and a novelist (Ralph Fiennes) in World War II London, this adaptation of Graham Greene’s novel has been described as a love triangle involving those two and God, so heavily do religious themes come into play. Indeed, the story seems like little more
In this spinoff of Universal Pictures’ Mummy franchise, professional wrestler The Rock proves to be less of a new kind of action hero than a hybrid of the old kinds: he has Arnold Schwarzenegger’s body and Bruce Willis’ sense of irony. It’s a fitting approach for a sword-and-sorcery adventure that winkingly acknowledges it’s just having
Two snipers – a Russian (Jude Law) and a Nazi (Ed Harris) – square off during the World War II battle of Stalingrad, leading to expertly staged action sequences, as well as a mournful acknowledgment of what it means to lie in wait and take a life.
An extremely odd serial-killer exercise, all the more so for being the directorial debut of regular-guy actor Bill Paxton (Titanic, Twister). Paxton also stars as a father who teaches his two young boys to murder people he believes to be demons, a bizarre tale told in flashback by one of the grown boys (Matthew McConaughey).
Thriller Rated PG-13
More competent Hollywood craftsmanship from director Sidney Pollack, which may be why Nicole Kidman’s classy professionalism makes for a better fit than Sean Penn’s bleary realism. They play a United Nations translator who overhears an assassination plot and a Secret Service agent who investigates her claim, respectively. If their different styles often are at odds,
I’m not sure how anyone could dramatize Augusten Burroughs’ experience – his memoir tells how he was abandoned by his unstable mother in the barely functional home of her shrink – and manage to keep the farcical from outweighing the tragic (after all, his new family thought God spoke to them through bowel movements). As
