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There's something almost refreshing about a movie that delivers exactly what's expected of it. With a script developed by Sylvester Stallone and a cast led by Jason Statham, it wouldn't be hard to put together a checklist of obligatory scenes/momen...

It’s probably fair to say that Liam Neeson could do this role in his sleep. Perhaps that would explain the curious lack of energy not only in his performance but in the production as a whole. Ever since Neeson became accepted as an action st...

Since stepping away from working with his brother Joel, Ethan Coen has found a new creative partner in his wife, Trisha Cooke. Honey Don't! marks their second collaboration and, like Drive-Away Dolls, it revels in B-movie excess. That shouldn't be...

John Sayles is one of the last true independent American filmmakers. Honeydripper is his 16th feature and he has made all of them on his own terms without studio interference. (He sells them to distributors once they are in the can.) To date, his...

Televangelism and those who practice the dubious form of money-driven religiosity represent low-hanging fruit when it comes to satire. A lot of the material – Jimmy Swaggert crying crocodile tears, the eyes of Tammy Faye, etc. – comes across a...

Not since Reese Witherspoon figuratively donned the red cloak in Freeway has there been a fresh take on the story of "Little Red Riding Hood." With Hoodwinked, the production team has made an attempt to change that, although the end result is more...

Hope Springs has the unusual distinction of providing a sample of what an Ingmar Bergman movie might be like if made for mass American consumption. The production leavens the painful psychological introspection that defined the Swedish director's b...

Hoppers is Middling Pixar. By that, I mean that it's a perfectly fine animated film, especially for kids, but not an exceptional one. It lacks the unquantifiable magic that has imbued the best of the studio's offerings, operating instead withi...

Kevin Costner knows Westerns. He also loves them. Thus far, the one-time matinee idol has directed four films; three of them have been Westerns. (The fourth, The Postman, was a Razzie-honored post-apocalyptic misfire.) After his directorial debut,...

Sometimes, it's all about the cast. That comment isn't meant to disparage the scriptwriting of Michael Markowitz, John Francis Daley, and Jonathan Goldstein, who offer their share of amusing situations and snappy one-liners, or the direction of Se...