Search for 8

It’s fair to ask what new things Eli Roth and Bruce Willis bring to Death Wish that the original, made in 1974 with Charles Bronson, didn’t have. The answer is: not many. Rather than using this as an opportunity to provide a deeper dive in...

For Krzysztof Kieslowski's North American followers, Decalogue has attained an almost-mythical status. Kept out of theaters because of a distribution faux pas (the North American distributor refuses to allow the films to be shown), Decalogue has r...

To succeed, Deception requires viewers to be both inattentive and stupid. There's not a twist in this flimsy and moth-eaten plot that isn't both contrived and transparent and not a character who hasn't been hopelessly manipulated by the needs of th...

Another summer, another double-dip of disaster dramas. This time around, instead of volcanoes, it's comets. The films in question, Mimi Leder's Deep Impact and Michael Bay's Armageddon, are separated by two months, so the first should have a ...

Here's something to chew on: what's the favorite food of big, cheesy-looking special effects monsters like the one lurking in the bowels of a luxury liner in Deep Rising? The obvious answer to this question is cardboard, because that's the depth ...

Of the four major Vietnam war films made in the dozen years following the fall of Saigon, The Deer Hunter was the first and, in the minds of some critics, the best. (The other three being Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket, and Platoon.) Howev...

For some reason, the Nazis are popular during the holiday season of 2008. They occupy central positions in Valkyrie and Good, flitter around the periphery of The Reader, and are rarely seen but very much present in Defiance. Edward Zwick's adapta...

In spite of an awkward title and an uninspired choice for the leading man, Definitely, Maybe nevertheless manages to charm with its bittersweet story of love and loss that ends on an upbeat and romantic note. The movie starts out as one thing but,...

There’s little doubt that director Christian Gudegast’s primary intention in making Den of Thieves is to emulate Michael Mann’s classic 1995 thriller, Heat. The similarities – from the overall plot to individual story beats – are too...

History has labeled Susan Seidelman’s Desperately Seeking Susan as “a Madonna film” but a more accurate descriptor might be “a Rosanna Arquette film.” Indeed, at the time Seidelman was casting the film, Madonna was a footnote in the musi...