Drama Movies

What makes a son like his father? Is a son doomed to make his father’s mistakes? These questions are explored in the sweeping yet personal epic from director Derek Cianfrance The Place Beyond the Pines, which reunites him with his Blue Valentine star Ryan Gosling. At times captivating, at other times longwinded, The Place Beyond the Pines is the first good drama of the year. Unfortunately, it’s also far from perfect.

Read FilmJabber’s full The Place Beyond the Pines movie review.

When is an exorcism not an exorcism? And when is an exorcism movie not at all an exorcism movie? In Beyond the Hills, writer/director Cristian Mungis (4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days) takes a raw and sparing look at the true story of a failed Romanian exorcism that occurred in 2005. You’ll find no green vomit or flying objects here, as Beyond the Hills is less about exorcism and more about how dangerous blind faith can be.

Read FilmJabber’s full Beyond the Hills movie review.

With Snow White And The Huntsmen and the abysmal Mirror Mirror, the past year has seen its fair share of Snow White projects.  By a mile the most unique offering to the category is Blancanieves, Spain’s official entry into this year’s Academy Awards.

Read FilmJabber’s full Blancanieves movie review.

I had the opportunity to sit down with writer/director Derek Cianfrance, who has a new film coming out this Friday called The Place Beyond the Pines, which stars his Blue Valentine star Ryan Gosling as well as Bradley Cooper, Eva Mendes and Ray Liotta. While I only had a few minutes with him, I asked him about his motivations to make the film, what it’s like to work with Ryan Gosling and how both men are criminal masterminds at heart.

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Denzel Washington got the glory, Mary Elizabeth Winstead deserved it. Flight won the box office ($161 million worldwide), while Smashed didn’t even register ($376 thousand… total). And yet Smashed, another 2012 movie about alcoholism, is a much more earnest and engaging drama than Flight ever was.

Read FilmJabber’s full Smashed movie review.

Note to guys: if you are literally insane, your hot and neglected wife will cheat on you with a doctor. Such is the case in A Royal Affair, a romantic and engaging drama that deservedly earned an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language Picture.

Read the full A Royal Affair movie review.

Critics amour’d themselves some Amour. Oscar voters did, too, awarding the drama gold for Best Foreign Language Film and handing it a rare-for-subtitles nomination for Best Picture. As for me? Amour is a good movie with good performances, but didn’t we just see this movie a couple years ago? And given the director, isn’t the ending positively predictable?

Read FilmJabber’s full Amour movie review.

Portraying a little known but pivotal part of world history, Emperor tells the story of the audacious actions of General Douglas MacArthur as he sought to maintain peace in postwar Japan.  With many of Japan’s government figures already executed for war crimes, MacArthur had to decide what role Emperor Hirohito played in the war and if he too should be put to death.  The honorary and revered head of the proud nation, the Emperor was a figure shrouded in mystery; even after the war ended he remained closed away behind his palace walls.  No Americans were allowed to meet or even question the man.  Faced with deciding the future of Japan, MacArthur (played by Tommy Lee Jones) enlists General Bonner Fellers (Matthew Fox) to covertly investigate the emperor and determine his fate.

Read FilmJabber’s full Emperor movie review.

You lose her mom, you better take care of her daughter. Abbie Cornish stars in The Girl, where she plays a disgruntled mother who resorts to smuggling Mexicans across the border to make ends meet. Too bad for her, she sucks at just about everything, especially smuggling Mexicans across the border to make ends meet. On her first job, she manages to lose a woman in a river crossing – forcing her to take care of the woman’s daughter for a time. At least she speaks español, so that’s one positive.

Read FilmJabber’s full The Girl movie review.

Michael Mann’s The Insider withstands the test of time, and yet few have experienced this great movie. Nominated for seven Academy Awards including Best Picture back in 1999, the Al Pacino/Russell Crowe-starring movie earned only $29 million against a budget of $90 million. But money isn’t everything, right?

Wait, it is? Damn.

Read the rest of of The Insider movie review.

The Sessions was one of the best movies of 2012, but is the Blu-ray any good?

Helen Hunt earned an Oscar nomination for her performance as a sex surrogate in the movie, which is about the true story of paralyzed writer Mark O’Brien (John Hawkes) attempting to pop his cherry.

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How high would the divorce rate go if they all were as amicable as the one between the title characters in Celeste & Jesse Forever? Rashida Jones and Andy Samberg star as the two former lovebirds whose continued friendship amidst their divorce causes confusion for their friends and, when other potential love interests become involved, the two of them as well.

Read FilmJabber’s full Celeste & Jesse Forever movie review.