The co-founders of the San Diego Surf Film Festival, Pierce & Petra Kavanaugh, once again join forces with writer/editor Geoffrey Smart on what ostensibly amounts to a surfumentary in the guise of an educational doc. Kavanaugh and company invite a dozen hydrophilics to freely riff on the title. The participants …
Between 1992 and 2004, the De La Salle Spartans' high school football team out of Concord, California did not lose a football game; their 151-game win streak is the longest around, by a long shot. What happens when a streak like that ends? You might just get an inspirational sports …
A drunken, faded sports jock (Kristoffer Polaha) who is having difficulties raising his rebellious teenage daughter (McKaley Miller) on his own finds faith-restoring “magical happiness” in “Produce,” a grocery clerk played by David DeSanctis (one of the few actors with Down syndrome to star in an American feature). Mixed messages …
If this cautionary tale keeps just one kid from selling his soul in the name of artistic greatness, then it will have done its job. What's that? It's not a cautionary tale? It's a searing exploration of the sacrifices demanded by art, as exemplified by a driven jazz student (Miles …
The thing about a white bird in a blizzard? It disappears. Just like pretty young Kat Connor’s (Shailene Woodley) mom Eve (Eva Green), who simply vanishes one school-day afternoon. But it turns out that Eve had been evanescing for years: a beauty queen rendered gradually invisible by marriage (to mustachioed …
Documentary follows workers with disabilities facing the prospect of becoming unemployed workers with disabilities.
Six short stories, some centered on urban terrorism and/or revenge, most morbidly amusing, and all topfull of irony. It’s rare to find an omnibus film in which all of the pieces coalesce to form a unified whole, and even more uncommon when each segment is strong enough to pass as …
It took almost four hours to get through this: 90 minutes for the feature and well over two hours spent reveling in Carter Family music. Like me, if you think country & western amounts to little more than a guy or gal in a cowboy hat warbling about a truck, …
File under: animation complication. You see what happens when you start admiring the work of someone from another culture? You see? Suddenly, you're forced to confront his admiration for the beautiful work of his countrymen, which work produced machines that brought great suffering to your countrymen. If you're having trouble …
File under: animation complication. You see what happens when you start admiring the work of someone from another culture? You see? Suddenly, you're forced to confront his admiration for the beautiful work of his countrymen, which work produced machines that brought great suffering to your countrymen. If you're having trouble …
Here's what you need to know: inside each of us is a miracle meant for just one person. The limber universe, which loves us all equally, bends over backwards for each and every one of us, and in so doing, reaches down to help us fulfill our destiny, which is …
In a vain attempt at keeping the spirit, if not artistry, of John Ritter alive, Zach Braff stars in and directs this wacky-turned-sappy sitcom about parental mortality. It’s hard to muster much sympathy for a cancer-ridden grandfather who basically calls his innocent teenage granddaughter a whore from his deathbed. Mandy …