If the quirky little indie comedy “Little Miss Sunshine” would have been made inside the Hollywood studio system, some studio executive somewhere would have suggested that the directors insert the Rolling Stones song “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” during the film’s cathartic finale. The title would have been changed to something more easily […]
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“Little Miss Sunshine” is absolutely spectacular. The road-trip genre and dysfunctional family genre are frequently used foundations upon which to build a script, but this movie breaks out of the cliché. The first feature from husband and wife directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris is armed with inspired characters and killer performances that have the […]
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Hollywood’s resident wild-card director and sometimes conspiracy guru Oliver Stone couldn’t have made a better movie to follow his previous feature. The epic misadventure “Alexander” could have sent a lesser director back to the minor leagues, feeling lucky to direct an episode of “Laguna Beach,” but classics like “Platoon,” “Wall Street” and “JFK” give studios […]
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After a screening of Oliver Stone’s new 9/11 drama “World Trade Center” starring Nicolas Cage and Michael Pena, Eric and J.D. sit down outside the theater and hug it out. As always, the review also features clips from the movie! Click on the photo for the Windows Media version of this on-camera review.
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Oliver Stone is the last person one would think of to direct a straightforward survival movie about the World Trade Center attack that is free of post-9/11 politics and full of religious empathy. Yet that’s exactly what the rabble-rousing director of “JFK,” the biggest government conspiracy film ever, has done. Whomever you think is responsible […]
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On rare occasions, films can be entertaining and at the same time have sociological implications that add weight. For instance, I viewed Michael Moore’s controversial film “Bowling for Columbine” – a movie about Americans and their guns – in a theater full of Canadians in Toronto. I also had an opportunity to see Stephen Spielberg’s […]
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Three cheers for the most unsung hero in comedy—the film editor! In the case of the newest improv-heavy Will Ferrell comedy “Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby,” the MVP of the movie is most definitely editor Brent White. Just as he did with 2004’s “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgandy,” White had to choose […]
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I can remember distinctly the feeling I had…slipping on my white mesh shoes and straightening the white blazer over my pink polo, thinking to myself that if there was a way to make my exceptionally dorky ass cool…this has got to be it. It was the time of “Top Gun,” Pac-Man and “Footloose” and I […]
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Anyone going this weekend to see Michael Mann’s movie version of “Miami Vice,” the hugely popular television series that he executive-produced in the 1980s, may be shocked to find that about the only thing that ties the two together are the names of the two main characters. Sonny Crockett (Colin Farrell) and Ricardo Tubbs (Jaimie […]
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I honestly can’t remember the last time I went to a movie that made me jump out of my seat, laugh out loud, and get all emotional in the same two hours. M. Night Shyamalan’s “Lady in the Water” is an incredibly well balanced film that has immense style and substance. A bit of a […]
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Eric and J.D. debate the merits of Kevin Smith and re-visiting the “Clerks” for another go-around in this uncensored, no-holds-barred on camera review of “Clerks II.” Click on the photo for the Windows Media version of this on-camera review.
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“They are treading water in a sea of retarded sexuality and bad poetry.” – Marty Di Bergi, reading a review of a Spinal Tap album in “This is Spinal Tap” “That’s nit-picking, isn’t it?” – Nigel Tufnel, Spinal Tap lead guitarist It was twelve years ago that New Jersey convenience store twentysomethings Dante Hicks (Brian […]
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There are lots of sci-fi movie and novel fans out there who could explain to me fervently what they like about the book or film version of “A Scanner Darkly.” I admit, I haven’t read the novel, but I have read “Naked Lunch” and that should count for something. It’s possible I don’t own the […]
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“Blade Runner” and “Minority Report” are both terrific movies, but neither of those Philip K. Dick movie adaptations so accurately approximate the unique head trip that it is to actually read one of the revered science-fiction author’s books as much as Richard Linklater’s new animated film “A Scanner Darkly.” Based on a partly autobiographical 1977 […]
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No one expected the first film in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchise to be any good or to become such a huge success. Spectacular advertising and an outrageous performance from Johnny Depp made “The Curse of the Black Pearl” a smash-hit and left audiences chomping at the bit for another romp with Captain Jack […]
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