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What is it about fantasy novels that makes them so difficult to translate effectively to the silver screen? It’s not impossible – J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series and Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings adaptations are proof that i...

It's amazing how a lifeless, pointless remake can provoke pangs of nostalgia about a mediocre movie. Such is the case with Arthur. The kindest thoughts I have ever experienced about the 1981 original occurred while I was watching Russell Brand and...

For Ask the Dust, director Robert Towne, adapting the novel by John Fante, has returned to the time and place of his greatest cinematic endeavor: Los Angeles in the 1930s. The setting, however, is the only similarity between Ask the Dust and China...

One of the longest films of the fall (both in terms of title length and running length) is The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. It seems every bit as long or longer than its 160 minutes. Parts of the movie are brilliant in a ...

What is the world coming to when the film community is remaking John Carpenter movies? Admittedly, Assault on Precinct 13 isn't the best example of Carpenter's expert craftsmanship, but it was the picture that got him noticed, and that notice enab...

It takes about ten seconds to identify Asteroid City as a “Wes Anderson movie” and that’s arguably the movie’s Achilles Heel. Anderson’s style and approach have become so baked-into his projects that they threaten to overwhelm the materi...

For every dozen-or-so teen-based dramas about white kids, there are maybe one or two similarly themed films about children of other races. So when one of the latter comes along that offers keenly observed characters involved in interesting situatio...

Atomic Blonde combines the storytelling intrigue of a LeCarre/Deighton Cold War spy novel with the in-your-face kinetic style of John Wick. The result, while at times a little too visually chaotic, is bracing. Headlined by a committed Charliz...

Joe Wright's interpretation of Ian McEwan's Atonement proves that, when it comes to literary adaptations, he understands what he's doing. Wright’s previous feature was Pride and Prejudice, a significantly happier production than this one (althoug...

August: Osage County is all about the acting. That makes sense because the storyline doesn't offer much that could be considered new or remarkable. It's as big a downer as the pills popped by matriarch Violet Weston (Meryl Streep) but the quality ...