Arriving just in time to win a place among the year’s worst films, Robin Hood — bursting with an entitled sense of its own non-existent coolness — falls flat on its fat one. It’s the umpteenth version of the heroic outlaw story, once more taking on the merry man that …
Read More »'Instant Family' Review: Adoption Comedy Can't Balance Sentiment, Satire, Sobs
This year has blessed us with a beautiful film about a longtime childless couple who suddenly find themselves grappling with the prospect of parenthood. That movie, of course, is Private Life, a comedy-drama featuring deft, touching performances from Paul Giamatti and Kathryn Hahn, which came out on Netflix last month. …
Read More »'A Private War' Review: A Reporter's Life in Hot Spots and Combat Zones
Marie Colvin lived and died in war zones. One of the most renowned combat correspondents of the past 50 years, distinguished by her empathetic prose and her omnipresent eyepatch, this Queens-born, Oyster Bay-bred journalist for the Sunday Times felt at home in hot spots around the world. Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, …
Read More »'White Boy Rick' Review: True Story of 1980s Informant Talks Loud, Says Little
By 14, Rick Wershe Jr. (Richie Merritt) could tell a real Russian Kalashnikov assault rifle from an AK-47 knock-off, courtesy of his firearms-hustling dad, Richie Sr. (Matthew McConaughey). At that age, he also hung with the African-American gangs who ran the drug trade in Detroit in 1984, earning a reputation …
Read More »'Who Is America?' Review: Sacha Baron Cohen Swings at Broken U.S.A. and Misses
In the most famous, comically potent moment of Da Ali G Show, Sacha Baron Cohen‘s Kazakhstan alter ego Borat takes the stage at a country and western bar in Tucson, Arizona to perform a song called, “In My Country There Is Problem,” whose lyrics include this refrain: Throw the Jew …
Read More »'Three Identical Strangers': Reunited-Triplets Doc Takes Dark WTF Turn
In 1980, Robert Shafran drove from Westchester County to the Catskills. It was his first day of college – a community college, he modestly notes, but still, he was going. As he walked through the campus, the 19-year-old noticed how friendly everyone was … excessively so, in some cases. Then …
Read More »Travers on 'Chappaquiddick': It's a Biopic of an American Tragedy
Kudos to the electrifying Australian actor Jason Clarke (Mudbound, Zero Dark Thirty) for playing Senator Edward “Ted” Kennedy with a forceful urgency that avoids the trap of saint-or-sinner labels – an easy go-to when you’re portraying a member of America’s foremost political dynasty. Both he and Chappaquidick hit on something …
Read More »'Loveless': Devastating Russian Drama Is Feel-Bad Movie of the Year
When is a bad marriage something more than a bad marriage? The answer: When Andrey Zvyagintsev (The Return, Elena) writes and directs a movie about it and turns the result into a mesmerizing meditation on the state of Russia today. Loveless is not an overtly political film, but it resonates …
Read More »'Proud Mary': Taraji P. Henson Is Gunned Down By Her Own Action Flick
Taraji P. Henson is such a firecracker she almost makes you believe Proud Mary might have been a decent crime flick – if she fired the asses of the clueless dudes who wrote and directed it and took on those jobs herself. Surely, the Oscar-nominated actress (The Curious Case of …
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