[6] Charlie Hunnam (Sons of Anarchy, Pacific Rim) stars as Frankie, a hapless fellow who is constantly humiliated on camera by his older brother, Bruce (Chris O’Dowd). After one of Bruce’s videos became an internet sensation, Frankie went into isolation. But now that Bruce is getting out of rehab, their mother (Nora Dunn) convinces Frankie to give his brother a second chance. Unfortunately, Bruce is …
[8] Logan Lerman (from the Percy Jackson movies) stars as Charlie in this coming-of-age drama/romance about a socially awkward high school boy who finds solace among the ‘freaks’ while overcoming a past trauma that left him hospitalized. Emma Watson (Hermione from Harry Potter) and Ezra Miller co-star as Sam and Patrick, Charlie’s newfound friends. Together, the trio bond over music and star in a production …
[4] Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars as a New York City bicycle delivery man engaged in a never-ending cat-and-mouse chase with a nasty copy (Michael Shannon) for possession of a very valuable package. Premium Rush reminds me of movies like Rad and Thrashin’ — it’s not much more than a fetishistic showcase of fancy bicycling. And without any attachment to the thinly-drawn characters, the chase gets tiresome …
[6] Katharine Isabelle (Ginger Snaps) puts in a solid performance as a student surgeon whose life takes a serendipitous turn into the underground world of extreme body modification in Jen and Sylvia Soska’s American Mary. After one odd surgery procures her some much-needed cash, her name is quickly bandied about the message boards of people who are into things like… horns, tails, split tongues, appendage …
[4] Oscar-winning director Barry Levinson (Rain Man, Good Morning Vietnam) slums it with this found footage horror flick about a small Maryland community that gets infected by mutant parasites. The core concept is a solid one, building off the real-life parasite Cymothoa, which eats away and replaces the tongues of fishes (Google some pictures if you dare!) Unfortunately, found footage movies are officially cliche and it’s …
[6] Brad Pitt reunites with writer/director Andrew Dominik (The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford), playing a hit man called in by the local crime lords after two young kids take down a big card game that collapses the underground economy. The parallels to the US economy are blatant, complete with recurring clips of Barack Obama and George W. Bush talking about …
[6] Leslie Mann and Paul Rudd star as two 40-year-olds struggling to balance the demands of their marriage, children, parents, and jobs. This Is 40 is billed as a ‘sort of’ sequel to Knocked Up, where Mann and Rudd originated the roles. Both films were directed by Judd Apatow, and both take a more pastiche approach to their narratives. On one hand, I like the …
[6] Director Marc Webb (500 Days of Summer) takes on the web-slinging superhero in this hasty reboot of the franchise (just five years after Sam Raimi finished his trilogy). Andrew Garfield (The Social Network, Never Let Me Go) stars as Peter Parker, a high schooler who gets bitten by a radioactive spider and… you know the rest. The approach here is more realistic than Raimi’s, …
[6] Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings films are among my very favorites of all time, so The Hobbit is doomed to suffer in comparison. If you’re not a devoted fan of Middle Earth, the first half of An Unexpected Journey will probably feel a bit cumbersome. Jackson should have trimmed 20 or 30 minutes (starting with the oddly wooden cameo performances from Ian Holm …
[9] William Friedkin (The Exorcist, The French Connection) directs this darkly comic trailer trash ensemble piece about a family that conspires to hire a killer to whack their matriarch and collect her life insurance. Matthew McConaughey delivers a tense, frightening, carefully measured performance as the title character. He deserves an Oscar nomination if the Academy has the balls to recognize such sinister fare. Gina Gershon, …
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