Roman Polanski's beautifully controlled first feature is an experiment in chemical reaction -- three characters isolated in a placid, bland, watery setting and engaged in an edgy jostle of egos, chiefly that of a well-off sportswriter and that of a hitch-hiking student (the writer's wife is almost dispensable, except as …
Bibulous burlesque of the espionage thriller, wherein the video-game action, the hail of bullets, the blossoms of fire, the flurry of fists, pose no threat to the impervious superspy, protected by the patron saint of stuntmen, free to behave like a total sociopath, a textbook charming one for sure, but …
The accumulation of corpses and clues -- sexually unmolested young women with the blood neatly drained from their bodies, sloppily lipsticked and eyeshadowed faces, and a different cryptic word scrawled in blood at each crime scene -- might whet the appetite of the undiscriminating mystery addict. But the stridency of …
At one point in Terrence Malick’s heady huffing of the sour stink of success, his protagonist (a skull-faced Christian Bale) muses, “So much love inside us that never gets out.” So many words, too — like nearly every line of any importance here, the observation remains unspoken. It’s probably for …
The idea of a gang of modern-day motorcyclists living by the chivalric code, jousting with one another from the seats of their Harleys, conjures up visions of some sort of Monty Python lunacy: a band of born-again Hell's Angels, coat of arms tattoed on their biceps, taking up the lance …
Seiya (Mackenyu), a headstrong street teen, spends his time fighting for cash while he searches for his abducted sister. When one of his fights unwittingly taps into mystical powers he never knew he had, Seiya finds himself thrust into a world of warring saints, ancient magical training and a reincarnated …
The Dark Ages lightened up: a rock-and-roll songtrack (Queen, Bowie, BTO, others), a spontaneous eruption of disco dancing at court, a Nike insignia on a suit of armor, a Mademoiselle cover girl for a fair maiden, and a centuries-ahead-of-his-time democratic hero, a lowborn squire who skyrockets to superstardom in the …
Writer-director Rian Johnson sure is having fun these days. They let him into the Star Wars sandbox, and he built a monument to feminine genius that enraged a measurable portion of the fanbase and still managed to make over a billion dollars. (Sure, it was half of what J.J. abrams …
While vacationing at a remote cabin, a young girl and her parents are taken hostage by four armed strangers who demand that the family make an unthinkable choice to avert the apocalypse. With limited access to the outside world, the family must decide what they believe before all is lost. …
Battle of the sexes update. A bout of drunken casual sex, sans condom, results in a result; and after abortion is given no more thought than it would have been given in 1957, the pair of "completely different people" set about to make it work when it makes no sense: …
Cheesy action-comedy with Jean-Claude van Damme as a disreputable Hong Kong businessman, and (as it happens) indefatigable fighting machine, in a crossfire between the Russian Mafia and the CIA. The gimmicky direction of Tsui Hark keeps setting off firecrackers to disrupt your nap. With Rob Schneider, Lela Rochon, Paul Sorvino.
A schoolgirl’s sealed submission to a time capsule fifty years ago seems to have predicted every major calamity up to the present and beyond. A couple of authentically nightmarish disasters and a couple of creepy moments with a group of silent stalkers known as the Whisper People provide small compensation …
When a contract killer has a rapidly evolving form of dementia, he is offered an opportunity to redeem himself by saving the life of the adult son with whom he had been estranged. Starring Michael Keaton and Al Pacino.