HURT LOCKER Sweeps Oscars

On March 7, Kathryn Bigelow became the first woman to win Best Director at the 82nd Annual Academy Awards®, at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, CA, for her film The Hurt Locker. In addition to Best Picture, the movie picked up a total of six awards for Best Supporting Actor in a Leading Role [...]

Alice in Wonderland

My thought exiting this movie was: Did Tim Burton actually read Lewis Carroll’s works? It doesn’t seem so. Mr. Burton’s critical failure may be that he only went as far as Disney’s animated adaptation in his research. Not surprising; they’re the ones bankrolling this version.
Alice in Wonderland, very loosely based on Mr. [...]

District 13: Ultimatum

Heavily computer-generated tracking shots race us through the slums of Paris—dregs of society. Leïto (David Belle), a recovering thug, reunites with Capt. Damien Tomasso (Cyril Raffaelli), the protagonist from this film’s 2004 predecessor, written and produced by Luc Besson. Instead of defusing a neutron bomb, an entirely plausible scenario for an officer and [...]

HURT LOCKER Producer’s Oscars Invitation Revoked

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) issued a statement late Tuesday announcing that, should Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt Locker win Best Picture, producer Nicolas Chartier would not be invited to receive the award with his colleagues.
According to the press release, Mr. Chartier engaged in campaigning activities the Academy deemed a violation [...]

The Ghost Writer

There’s an air of familiarity to the story, in more ways than one. Former British Prime Minister Adam Lang (Pierce Brosnan) is accused of war crimes and finds himself exiled in a bunker-like estate—a cross between Bauhaus and Usonian architecture. Just prior to these allegations by MP Robert Rycart (Robert Pugh), the original [...]

Saint John of Las Vegas

Seeing this movie reminded me of how plastic surgeries have anonuymized otherwise notable actors and actresses, obscuring their once unique features beyond recognition. It pleases me to know that even after being stabbed in the throat in a bar fight, Steve Buscemi has maintained his rat-like appearance and snaggle-teeth. I say that with [...]

Cop Out

Jimmy Monroe (Bruce Willis) and Paul Hodges (Tracy Morgan) begin with the mandatory, Glover-Gibson opening about age. They’ve been working together for nine years and, just like the infamous duo in Richard Donner’s template for the buddy-cop action/comedy, they beat that point to death. As is customary, they report to the Constantly Disappointed [...]

Shutter Island

Set in Boston, 1954, Shutter Island tells the story of U.S. Marshal Teddy Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio). He arrives, we’re told, at the island’s psychiatric hospital to investigate the disappearance of a woman who drowned her three children. We’ve seen so many films which play with perception versus reality in a psychiatric setting. [...]

THE LAST AIRBENDER – Trailer

It appears that Paramount has dropped “Avatar” from the title of M. Night Shyamalan’s upcoming adventure film, based on the 2005 animated television series, to distance their project from the monolithic presence of James Cameron’s 3D epic—now a cultural phenomenon.
Watch the new trailer (below) for The Last Airbender, written, directed and produced by Mr. Shyamalan. [...]

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