When the Swedish horror film Let the Right One In debuted a couple of years ago, it was deservedly hailed as one of the most original vampire tales to come along in a while — no small feat, given the bloodsuckers’ ubiquity both on the big screen and television.
What if you met someone online and later found she wasn’t whom she appeared to be? And what if the person she didn’t appear to be turned out to be someone else entirely?
That situation — with its attendant moral questions, narrative challenges, and headache-inducing implications — is at the heart of “Catfish,” a social-media meditation and mystery from first-time filmmakers Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman.
I admired the crime drama The Town far more than I actually liked it. It provides clear evidence of Ben Affleck’s gifts as a director, both with visuals and with actors. But the script, which Affleck co-wrote, has an all-too familiar premise — and feels more and more tired as it goes along. As too often happens with uneven movies, the trailer is far more exciting than the movie from which it was cut.
By Connie Ogle McClatchy Newspapers WWE Studios, a subsidiary of World Wrestling Entertainment, is surely hoping that most, if not all, of its millions of viewers will head to the theater to check out its latest feature film. But Legendary, a by-the-numbers sports drama with a death grip on cliches and acting every bit as…
”Checkered” would be too kind of a way to characterize Rob Reiner’s recent filmography as a director. His last decade has included the romantic comedies Rumor Has It . . . and Alex & Emma, and his last film, 2007′s The Bucket List. It’s been a while since his incredible start in the 1980s: This Is Spinal Tap, The Sure Thing, Stand by Me, The Princess Bride and When Harry Met Sally. . . . .
By Walter Addiego San Francisco Chronicle Soul Kitchen is a pleasant surprise from German director Fatih Akin. His last two movies — Head On and The Edge of Heaven — were a thriller and a melodrama, two parts of a planned trilogy about ”love, death and the devil.” This new picture is mainly in the…
Romantic comedy is the fruit fly of movie genres, usually so caught up in the myths and mores of the moment that even a few years later the behavior seems phony. But a good one is the gift that keeps on giving. Success or failure comes down to whether the filmmakers have the perception to recognize the truth of their own era and the honesty to say it.
By Rene Rodriguez McClatchy Newspapers Kevin Kline doesn’t land a lot of leading roles these days, but judging by his performance in The Extra Man, his comic timing remains as sharp as it was in his A Fish Called Wanda days. He plays Henry Harrison, a self-proclaimed playwright who says a Swiss hunchback stole his…
George Clooney is a classic movie star. Handsome. Dapper. Blessed with both a sense of humor and a social conscience, each of which was on view at Sunday’s Emmy awards.
But none of that means that he is always going to make the right choice, especially when it comes to movie roles.
LOOK, I TOTALLY understand if you’ve sworn off all low-budget, virally marketed horror movies involving some cheap-to-film premise about documentary footage.
Mere words cannot describe how awesomely gnarly “Piranha 3D” is, how hugely entertaining, and how urgently you must get yourself to the theater to see it. Like, now.
Lottery Ticket isn’t the mega ball of outrageous comedy, but it’s still a winner because of the way director Erik White blends comic lunacy with sweet sentimentality.
Not a single moment rings true in The Switch, which is unfortunate, because it’s actually about a situation in which a lot of women find themselves.
The Nanny McPhee movies may be principally for kids, but make no mistake about it: They are, quite literally, a parent’s dream.
