Like the outstanding 2011 documentary Project Nim, Chasing Ice tells the story of a man's quest to do something extraordinary while at the same time telling the story of the man himself. Unlike Project Nim, the biography portion of the story is here served up not as a sly counterpoint, …
Namby-pamby apolitical comedy about America's First Daughter, who, on a diplomatic mission to Prague, pulls an Audrey Hepburn in Roman Holiday and gives the slip to the Secret Service on the back of the handiest motorcycle. Unbeknownst to her, the biker (Matthew Goode, like a young Rupert Everett) is an …
The inspirational true-life story of 15-year-old Jay Moriarty (newcomer Jonny Weston), whose dream it was to surf Mavericks, the biggest and most hazardous waves in Northern California. Gerald Butler plays Frosty Hesson, a seasoned pro whose initial reluctance to mentor the lad (“Untrained boys don’t step in the ring with …
An illegal immigrant from Mainland China sneaks into corrupt British-colonized Hong Kong in 1963, transforming himself into a ruthless and emerging drug lord. Donnie Yen stars and Jason Kwan and Jing Wong direct.
Title tells all. Written and directed by John Scheinfeld.
Charles Bronson as a half-breed (which accounts for both the stealthiness and the mustache) who lures a white man's posse into the wilderness. Out there, he makes every last man feel absolutely miserable. The audience feels likewise. Directed by Michael Winner.
Fearless exposé of the deplorable conditions in a state mental institution -- as of three decades earlier and no longer. It has the zeal of not so much a social reformer as an old I-told-you-so. The opening scene of the actual crackup (it's based on a true case) retains some …
Neil Simon's Bogart parody gets underway with a verbose prologue which reads more like Woody Allen and which brings a smile to one's lips only by misspelling the Philippines. Simon's unnatural marriage of medium-good, cutie-pie Bogart (The Maltese Falcon) and medium-bad, bleeding-heart Bogart (Casablanca) is necessitated not because Simon has …
Unrecognizable update of the 1950 film (and 1949 book) of the same name, set originally around the turn of the century, now a sort of Fox-TV sitcom quadrupled. The messiness of the family life (in a family of fourteen) is neither adequate camouflage nor alibi for the messiness of the …
A family feud, over Labor Day at Lake Winnetka, between the twelve-kid Bakers and the eight-kid Murtaughs, or anyway between their hotly competitive dads (Steve Martin, Eugene Levy). Humor and sentiment every bit as cheap as Cheaper One. The only notable change is in the suddenly sculpted Hilary Duff, who …
Animator Bill Plympton trades the surreal for the fantastical and the satirical for the sincere with this story of, yes, true love tested and triumphant. (What he doesn't leave behind is frank physicality; it's a rare film about sweetness and romance that features so much pneumatic action.) Jake and Ella …
Surely the title ought to have been seen to be applicable only during production, and immediately upon release should have been altered to Cheech and Chong's New Movie, thus creating the world's first evolutionary movie title, turning into Cheech and Chong's Latest Movie on the second-run circuit, then into their …
A documentary about the hippie stoner duo, Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong directed by David Bushell.