No extraneous pan down to an establishing exterior shot; we begin simply on action. After evicting an avaricious lawyer from his taxi, a near-mute cabbie (Parviz Parastui, Iran’s answer to Ben Gazzara) picks up a pregnant and battered fare (Soheila Golestani) en route to the hospital and once there convinces …
Cue trailer announcer: “They stole his insulin kit! They shot his son and violated his daughter! This time, the revenge comes subtitled!” Chile’s official submission in this year’s Oscar derby is a variation on a Death Wish theme, with enough passive camerawork and artlessly composed excess headroom to give it …
As a director, Chris Rock makes a fine stand-up comic. Like a good Gilbert Gottfried ectype, eyes wide open and minus the tics, Rock squawks dialog with the same intensity he brings to a Madagascar dubbing session, only his latest creation is being pitched as gutsy and ambitious. To date, …
Remastered edition of the cult documentary about Casa Verdi, a home for retired opera singers.
A successful bicycling team is threatened by the competing ambitions of its members.
Wanting to escape her bigoted, misogynistic small-town upbringing — and with little but four camels, a dog, and her wits to guide her — a young woman (Mia Wasikowska) embarks on a 2,000-mile trek across the Australian desert. It only sounds like Disneynature. Whatever you look for in a movie …
"People fear what they don't understand," drowsily intones Dr. Will Caster (Johnny Depp), a scientific genius who is uploaded to the Internet after his body gets taken out by a bunch of neo-Luddite radicals. True enough, Doc! You know what else they fear? Omniscient, omnipresent entities that can control all …
Michael Bay: evil genius. Example: subject a 17-year-old hottie to all manner of sexual shenanigans - camera shots between her thighs, guns thrust menacingly at her face, monster tongues wrapped around her leg, and then take the curse off it by giving us an overprotective daddy-hero (Mark Wahlberg) who tells …
Brit comics Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon scored a surprise hit with their documentary-style comedy about touring northern English restaurants, so naturally, there must be a sequel, and naturally, it must go bigger. Italy should do nicely: the food, the wine, the ancient architecture, and oh mercy, the coastal views. …
If money makes the world go 'round, the lack of it keeps things interesting and vital. Wonderbrothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne (The Kid With a Bike) return with a tale of heroic struggle against an ordinary disaster. A thoroughly deglammed Marion Cotillard plays Sandra, a woman who returns from a …