Barely Legal (2003)
[4] David Mickey Evans, the director of Radio Flyer and The Sandlot turns in a teen sex comedy that reeks of '90s made-for-cable or direct-to-video. Three high school dudes decide they can make a lot of money by filming a…
The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
[8] Hailee Steinfeld (Oscar nominee for the Coen Brothers'Â True Grit remake) stars as a high school girl on the edge of a nervous breakdown when she discovers her best and only friend has begun dating her brother. Writer/director Kelly Fremon…
My Bodyguard (1980)
[8] Writer Alan Ormsby and director Tony Bill create a compelling coming-of-age story that avoids two of the greatest pitfalls of the genre: it doesn't talk down to its subjects and it doesn't wallow in sentimentality. Chris Makepeace and Adam…
The Hotel New Hampshire (1984)
[6] Intentionally bizarre and overwrought, I'm not sure what to make of this adaptation of John Irving's novel about an extended, eccentric family that moves into a down-trodden hotel. I liked a previous Irving adaptation, The World According to Garp,…
Matinee (1992)
[7] John Goodman stars as a schlock filmmaker previewing his latest atomic horror flick during the height of the Cuban Missile Crisis. The script by Charlie Haas draws clunky parallels between the real life threat of nuclear destruction and the…
Everybody Wants Some!! (2016)
[4] Richard Linklater writes and directs Everybody Wants Some!! as sort of a follow-up to his own Dazed and Confused. It's the early '80s and a group of college baseball players live together in a couple of houses off-campus. The…
A Serious Man (2009)
[4] The Coen Brothers run hot and cold with me. Sometimes I get them, sometimes I don't. This is one of the times that I don't, and I can only figure it's because the comedy is too subdued and the…
The Raven (1963)
[7] After success with House of Usher, The Pit and the Pendulum, and Tales of Terror, Roger Corman further exploited Edgar Allan Poe's name with The Raven. But this time, the film bears little resemblance to Poe's story. Instead, legendary sci-fi…
The Banger Sisters (2002)
[6] My main takeaway from The Banger Sisters is this: Damn, Goldie Hawn is awesome. She shares the top billing with Susan Sarandon here, but it's really Goldie's movie, and she carries it superbly. The film is about old friends…
The Odd Couple (1968)
[7] Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau give career-highlight performances as mismatched roommates Felix and Oscar in this comedy based on the Neil Simon play. Everyone knows the gist of the story: two men, one neat and one sloppy, are forced…