It’s no secret that photography is the art form most practiced by the masses. And because any Joe Blow with a pulse can push a shutter-release button on a camera, we’ve been subjected, ad nauseam, to the dreaded snapshot. I automatically think “bad amateur” when I see a clumsily composed…
For all the huzzahs deservedly heaped upon 2004’s Shaun of the Dead, in which it took a good long while to discern the living from the walking deceased, the zombie-flick spoof was little more than an extended sketch taken, oh, 19 minutes beyond its breaking point. But the movie, created…
This week’s generically titled studio suspense thriller, Fracture, has the good sense to begin where last week’s generically titled studio suspense thriller, Perfect Stranger, ended — with the solution to that tedious riddle: Whodunit? The answer is Anthony Hopkins as Ted Crawford, an aeronautical engineer whose pockets of money and…
To fully appreciate the merits of Vacancy, you need to have the proper technology. Digitally projected lurid images and THX-amplified creaks and moans are all well and good, but what director Nimród Antal’s creepy cockroach of a thriller really cries out for are the shabby delights that can be found…
A reformist disciple of Dogme, that earth- and camcorder-shaking movement wherein waves are broken and celebration is cause for alarm, Danish director Susanne Bier makes what you’d call emotional disaster movies. Her Open Hearts and Brothers, melodramas at once feverishly pitched and finely tuned, deploy paralysis and war, respectively, to…
Holland’s gift to world cinema, Paul Verhoeven, can be a very bad boy and a very good filmmaker. Any of his movies could have been titled Basic Instinct — not least his epic World War II thriller Black Book, in which a Jewish chanteuse who watched her family be massacred…
Grijs Verleden (Gray Past) is the title the Dutch historian Chris van der Heijden gave to his 2001 account of Holland’s morally murky landscape under Nazi occupation, and it’s the phrase director Paul Verhoeven (RoboCop, Total Recall, Starship Troopers) uses to explain why he returned to his home country after…
We’ve all seen Super Mario eat copious amounts of mushrooms, but have you ever considered the care that goes into preparing such delicacies? In Cooking Mama: Cook Off for the Wii, Wolfgang Puck wanna-bes are thrust into the kitchen — alongside “Mama,” the game’s titular chef — where they’ll chop,…
Not Just the Best of the Larry Sanders Show (Sony) The greatest boxed set ever — not so much for the made-up irritainment as for the real thing, which this collection serves up by the ton. There are 23 brilliant episodes of the HBO show here, but they pale in…
“Rembrandt and the Golden Age of Dutch Art” at the Phoenix Art Museum: Sometimes, its the fame and hype surrounding a piece of art that excites us more than does the piece itself. So even if youve never been nuts about 17th-century dusky interiors or girl doing meaningless task paintings,…
Brute Force: The Criterion Collection (Criterion) Cutie Honey: The Movie (Bandai) Double Happiness (Image) Forgiving Dr. Mengele (First Run) Freedom Writers (Paramount) George Lopez: The Complete 1st and 2nd Seasons (Warner Bros.) Happy Days: The Second Season (Paramount) The History Boys (Fox) The Image (Warner Bros.) La Haine: The Criterion…
Somewhere in TV Land, Madge the Manicurist is soaking some poor sap’s digits in Palmolive and claiming the stuff softens your hands while you do the dishes. Vile propaganda! The odious chemical compound is slowly eating away your paws, though rotting extremities are the least of your worries. Your kids…
She´s come a long way since playing a fawn in a grade-school pageant, and actor/director Amanda Monrad has learned plenty along the way. Like the joys of getting loaded online. And that auditions suck, but the Louvre doesn´t. And that dirt-flavored jellybeans can sometimes rock. I knew I wanted to…
Writers Christopher Landon and Carl Ellsworth receive sole credit for the movie Disturbia, which is surprising, as the film clearly is based on both a previously published work (a 1942 short story by Cornell Woolrich titled “It Had to Be Murder”) and the John Michael Hayes-penned, Alfred Hitchcock-directed, Academy Award-nominated…
I greeted the announcement of Stray Cat Theatre’s Fatal Attraction: A Greek Tragedy with great glee, thinking, “At last! Someone has noticed the similarities between gory Hollywood revenge films and the texts of ancient Greek tragedies!” And I headed for opening night of this particular production with a similarly giddy…
The residents of Mount Olympus haven’t gotten a good night’s sleep since Kratos moved in. Not only is the new god of war a grumpy, self-professed god-hater, he got the throne by killing Ares, something that naturally makes the other gods a little . . . jumpy. It’s not long…
Sleeping Dogs Lie (First Look) Writer-director Bobcat Goldthwait takes a subversive concept (honesty is overrated) and marries it to an outrageous scenario (a woman’s family learns that she once, uh, performed for a dog) to create . . . a romantic comedy? Well, sort of. Like Goldthwait’s underrated Shakes the…
Frylock, Meatwad, and Master Shake — the three stooges inhabiting Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters — will survive should you choose to avoid their movie. Truth be told, you’ve probably never heard of them anyway, unless you’re a regular viewer of Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim programming…
Well: Lisa Krons autobiographical play, set in the Lansing, Michigan, neighborhood where she grew up, delves into her familys medical history and addresses issues of health and sickness via her chronically ill mother and the community that this woman once saved from decline after its racial integration. Krons main conceit…
The Aura (Genius) Avatar: The Last Airbender — Book 2: Earth, Volume 2 (Paramount) The Batman: The Complete Third Season (Warner Bros.) Beneath Still Waters (Lions Gate) Bobby (Weinstein) Coming Soon (Lions Gate) Dead and Deader (Anchor Bay) A Guide for the Married Woman (Fox) Life of the Party (THINKFilm)…
After famous artists die, their work inherits and perpetuates their celebrity status. The Mona Lisa may not be your favorite, but if you happen to be cruising through the Louvre, there’s no way you can’t make a pit stop. She’s just too famous to pass up. Sometimes, it’s the fame…
Whether it’s hiking, camping, or going to the movies, most people remember the activities they shared as a family. I landed a family that played board games and went to Star Trek conventions. I try to block out those memories. If only I could have been a Moquay. Rotraut, the…
