Movie Reviews

DreamWorks Animation’s latest, Monsters vs. Aliens, is an attempt to combine the world of Monsters, Inc. and The Incredibles to make an action-packed comedy where… monsters battle aliens. The movie is also in 3D, and thank God for that; its visuals are its saving grace.

In Monsters vs. Aliens, a planet explodes, sending a meteorite to Earth. No, Kal El is not on board, but the meteorite does cause one soon-to-be-married bride named Susan Murphy to grow into a gigantic woman and get shipped away by the government to a special holding area for monsters. Her roommates include a scientist-turned-cockroach, a half-man, half-reptile creature, a gigantic, furry insect and a gelatinous blob that sounds a lot like Seth Rogen. When aliens invade to reclaim the power that Susan has absorbed, however, these monsters become humanity’s last chance for survival.

Read the full Monsters vs. Aliens movie review.

2008′s remake of the science-fiction classic The Day the Earth Stood Still was not, when all things were said and done, a box office failure, but Fox had to be disappointed with its lackluster opening weekend, lukewarm critical reception and quick fade from theaters.

The overall so-so response sums up the movie pretty well. The Day the Earth Stood Still is good, but not great. It’s entertaining, but not thrilling. It’s intriguing, but not exciting. In other words, it’s sort of like the original, only… not original.

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For fans of Twilight who can’t wait until the fall to see werewolves and vampires interact, there’s Adventureland, which stars that guy from Cursed and that chick from Twilight in what can only be described as a throwback to the classic comedies of the 1980′s.

Jesse Eisenberg, who has also starred in The Squid and the Whale and Roger Dodger, stars as James, a college grad who finds himself strapped for cash in preparation for starting grad school in the fall. When all other avenues are exhausted, he takes a job at the local amusement park, effectively becoming a carnie for minimum wage. His eye immediately falls on coworker Em (Kristin Stewart), who is both open to the prospect of them becoming a thing while also deeply troubled by other issues in her life. There are no actual werewolves or vampires found in the movie.

Read the full Adventureland movie review.

A little known movie called No Country for Old Men came out a couple years back, raked in a few random awards and then settled into obscurity. With few critics or audiences avidly backing the film, the movie disappeared quickly, taking with it its shoddy acting and direction. Good riddance.

Alas, Miramax believes it can make a few more dollars on the unsuspecting moviegoer, as they are about to release on Tuesday a 3-Disc Collector’s Edition. You can read my full No Country for Old Men movie review, where I fault the picture for a variety of things including its lack of excitement, questionable acting – especially by the awful Javier Bardem – and horrific direction by the Coen brothers, or you can read on for my review of this new DVD collection…

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Doubt arrives on DVD this coming Tuesday, April 7, 2009. This chilling movie features the best collective performances of 2008 by far, and even if the movie were worse than The Love Guru, it would be worth it to see the actors involved.

Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams and Viola Davis were all nominated for their performances, and director John Patrick Shanley was nominated for his adaptation of his screenplay. The movie, about a nun who suspects that a popular young priest is in fact a pedophile, is one of 2008′s best, and better than Slumdog Millionaire. Yes, better than Slumdog Millionaire. And it’s not even close.

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When I first heard about Bedtime Stories, it sounded like a disaster. You take Adam Sandler, the bane of parents everywhere for delivering inappropriate and idiotic humor to their children, and put him in a PG-rated Disney flick, thus circumcising away what makes him so popular among his fan base: I smell mega-flop. But with a Christmas-time release date and some imagination, Bedtime Stories turned into a surprise hit, and deservedly so.

Adam Shankman has a knack for taking adult-oriented actors and making successful children’s comedies out of them. While I’m not a fan of Bringing Down the House, The Pacifier or Cheaper by the Dozen 2, the director has a talent for turning the likes of Steve Martin and Vin Diesel into children’s actors. Still, it was hard to imagine that Sandler’s fan base would accept him in a kid’s flick, or that parents would want to take their children to something featuring him. Nevertheless, Shankman has made the impossible possible; Bedtime Stories is funny, entertaining and utterly harmless, exactly what a Disney comedy should be.

Read the rest of the Bedtime Stories movie review.

There are entertaining documentaries, like Man on Wire. There are political documentaries, such as Nothing But the Truth. And then there are those utterly depressing documentaries that only come along once every couple of years. Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father is one of those films.

Filmmaker Kurt Kuenne made this deeply personal film after one of his good friends died way before he was meant to. Dear Zachary is a video letter to the son of Kuenne’s friend Andrew, who was violently murdered by his much older and psychotic ex-girlfriend. After breaking up with her and flying her 1,400 miles away, the crazy bitch drove back and shot him five times. Subsequently, she flees to Canada and falls into what turns out to be a very slow and ineffective legal process. While the murder is disturbing, what’s worse is that Andrew’s parents move up to the same Canadian town to be actively involved in the court proceedings and to spend time with their new grandson, Zachary, who is the product of Andrew and their son’s murderer. Since the Canadian government fails to keep the woman in jail, the grandparents are forced to spend time with the person responsible for taking their son away from them. It only gets worse from there.

Read the rest of the Dear Zachary movie review.

I have a new actress-crush. Her name: Amanda Crew. She plays the hot goth BFF in Sex Drive, the latest R-rated teen comedy to hit DVD. She’s the best part about the movie.

Sex Drive, from upstart Summit Entertainment, came and went from theaters with little promotion or buzz, though one wonders – and by “one,” I mean “me” – how much more of a marketing push it would have received had it been released after Twilight filled the distributor’s coffers. Though long past the days of American Pie and Road Trip, where audiences actually demanded comedies like these, Sex Drive still holds its own surprisingly well. Though Amanda Crew is still the best part.

Read the rest of the Sex Drive movie review.

From the director of the Oscar-nominated Michael Clayton comes Duplicity, a witty romantic-comedy-espionage-thriller starring Clive Owen and Julia Roberts. Smart and fun, Duplicity works in a breezy, harmless kind of way, though those expecting the crispness, fluidity and entertainment value of Ocean’s 11 may be disappointed.

Duplicity follows Ray Koval (Owen), an ex-MI6 agent who is now working counterintelligence for a private biotech company. This company has an unhealthy rivalry with its competitor and has infiltrated them with their own spy, former CIA agent Claire Stenwick (Roberts), who is trying to obtain the formula to a secret product that is about to be revealed. What neither company knows is that Ray and Claire actually know each other from several years earlier and are collaborating to steal the formula and sell it to a third party for a large sum of money.

Read the full Duplicity movie review.

Will Smith is one of the most consistent box office forces there is. Even his intentionally misspelled 2007 drama The Pursuit of Happyness went on to make well over $100 million in the United States.

So, the odds were good that his 2008 follow-up Seven Pounds, which is directed by the same man, Gabriele Muccino, would continue Smith’s streak of consecutive $100-million earners.

Unfortunately for Smith – though we can hardly feel sorry for his rare flop – audiences read right through the obscure previews and opted to not see the flick – or at least wait until DVD. It was a good choice.

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At some point in our lives, we all reach a split in the road. These are the decisions that shape us, that define our futures. I reached such a split tonight. On the one side of the gaping four-story mall promenade, a line for a free screening of Adventureland. On the other, The Haunting in Connecticut.

In life, we all make poor choices at times.

The Haunting in Connecticut stars Virginia Madsen as the mother of a dying teenager (Kyle Gallner), who is suffering from advanced cancer. Souped up on a variety of medicines, the long trips to the hospital are taking the toll on him. The decision is made to move to a house (guess in which state), which is closer to the hospital and still affordable. The only downside? It used to be a funeral parlor and is still inhabited by lots of angry ghosts. Since the son is closer to death, he becomes a channel for these spirits.

Read my full The Haunting of Connecticut movie review.

Owen Wilson + Jennifer Aniston + cute dog = blockbuster. Marley & Me comes to DVD on March 31, allowing people like me who passed on the film during its theatrical run to take a peek at the surprisingly heartwarming dog film.

Marley & Me is not at all what I expected. Based on the previews, I figured the movie would be a throw-away film with some funny dog antics and not much else; instead, the picture is a surprisingly mature and confident story that entertains and captivates for an hour and a half.

Read my full Marley & Me movie review.

The Best Picture of 2008, at least according to some unnamed Academy, arrives on DVD and Blu-Ray on March 31, 2009 – and is sure to be as big of a hit as it was in theaters. While I would argue that Fox’s decision to release Slumdog Millionaire on DVD while it is still going strong in theaters is rather stupid, it is here nonetheless, and I am going to review it.

Slumdog Millionaire is a true rags-to-riches story, not just due to its plot but its against-the-odds path to the golden statue of excellence. The film was once owned by another studio and was almost given a direct-to-DVD release before being passed on to Fox Searchlight. The fact that a movie like this almost went straight to DVD makes one wonder what other great films have been left to waste away on the shelves of Blockbuster (though history dictates that most movies that go straight to DVD deserved to do so).

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One of the greatest – or oddest – on-screen couples of all time returns to DVD in a Centennial Collection edition. Yes, it’s Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon, and they are The Odd Couple.

In The Odd Couple, Lemmon plays Felix Ungar, a man who just been kicked by his wife. Left to fend for himself, he ponders suicide until he is taken in by his friend Oscar Madison (Matthau), a divorcee who lives simply and like a slob. Felix seems to be the perfect complement to this, as he’s a clean freak verging on obsessive compulsive. Unfortunately, Felix’s mannerisms begin to gnaw at Oscar’s soul…

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The hit James Bond action flick Quantum of Solace speeds its way onto DVD and Blu-Ray this coming Tuesday, March 24, 2009 in a two-disc special edition. The follow-up to the immensely popular reboot Casino Royale finds us with a new director, an angrier Bond and of course a new set of Bond girls, and the combination is a bit of a disappointment.

While perfectly fine as a non-stop action movie, Quantum lacks the craftsmanship and character development of its predecessor, which was honed by the direction of Martin Campbell. Marc Forster, having never directed such an action film before, was an odd choice to helm the follow-up, and his style is largely a poor knock-off of Campbell’s direction. Funnily enough, in one of the special features on the DVD, Forster explains that his approach is to just “throw everything on the screen,” which explains the lack of deleted scenes – and the senseless barrage of action in the movie.

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