The impact of global warming is the subject of yet another series of talking-head testimonials and finger-wagging rebukes aimed at those deep in “climate denial.” As if Al Gore’s conveniently filmed Learning Annex lecture wasn’t enough, documentarian Craig Scott Rosebraugh dredges up one more bucket of cold water to throw …
To pick up some side money, a raffish Copacabana bouncer agrees to chauffeur and an African-American jazz musician on a concert tour through the deep South. Viggo Mortensen and Mahershala Ali’s deeply engaging performances are the best Christmas present moviegoers will open this year. It’s when the two finally find …
Every cast member in Jocelyn DeBoer and Dawn Luebbe’s too-too manicured satire of cookie-cutter correctness in suburbia sports braces. In case this benumbing nuance went unnoticed, the opening credits roll over a tight shot of a tin-grin ringed by quivering red lips. It’s this belt-and-suspenders approach to comedy that gives …
It’s the smart pusher who doesn’t use. At least not knowingly as in the case of Dov (Shlomo Bar-Aba), a 75-year-old widower who after less than a week in a posh retirement center is already scraping a tin cup against the bars of his gated community. Dov blames the eviction …
With the world poised to suffer the fate of immolation by the red-hot remnants of an errant comet, the government earmarks a select group of civilians, based on their occupations, to evacuate their families to Greenland and begin rebuilding the wreckage. Among the chosen: John Garrity (Gerard Butler), a structural …
His father was a respected servant of Islam and Hamas was the family business, yet Mosab Hassan Yousef’s exposure to the marked inhumanity of the suicide-bombing terrorist organization led him to go undercover as a spy for the Israelis. The Green Prince is a compelling true-life adventure tale, reduced to …
A pinched punk band — so poor they can barely afford a presence on social media — siphons their way from gig to gig before contracting an engagement at an all-day skinhead sock hop. The white supremacist paraphernalia lining the walls of the titular cubbyhole should have been an instant …
Canonized singer-songwriter Jeff Buckley (Penn Badgely) agrees to perform at a tribute to a man he despises: his equally cultish folk singer father, Tim. (Dad OD’d when he was 28, and his son’s drowning at age 30 was ruled an accident.) We follow Jeff as he spends the week before …
Toward the outset of World War II, a devoutly religious but in-over-his-head Navy captain (Tom Hanks) leads a military escort of Allied ships though the North Atlantic — with a wolfpack of six Nazi U-boats hot on their tail. At a time when starring roles for middle-aged heroes are at …
I am almost entirely unfamiliar with Tupac Shakur’s discography, but I can personally vouch for the quality of his performances in the half-dozen films in which he starred. This black comedy romp places near the top. Spend New Year’s Day with a trio of junkies — Spoon (Tupac Shakur), Stretch …
Another action/drug comedy that does as much to promote Mexican tourism as our President. Director (and star Joel’s brother) Nash Edgerton (The Square) seems more interested in clogging his dithered narrative with sudden developments (many lifted from other movies) than he is in allowing his thoroughbred cast a little breathing …
A match between Rocky Balboa and the Raging Bull would have set box offices ablaze were it 1983, but back then, Robert “The Greatest Actor of His Generation” De Niro was too big to spar with a cauliflower-eared Rambonehead like Sylvester Stallone. With three decades and countless flops under their …
Before going to work, Carlos Spector feeds the gathering of birds that every morning congregates outside his door. If he’s in the mood for a brawl, rather than spreading the feed around, Spector stacks the grain in a neat pile for the birds to fight over. The fat fowl symbolize …
After an incident involving a water balloon, a third-story window, and a mother pushing a baby carriage, a single mom decides it’s time to send her youngest, Tomás (Sebastián Aguirre), to live with his older brother Frede (Tenoch Huerta). Handsomely shot by Damian Garcia in full-frame black-and-white, Güeros is at …