Movies in the Fantasy/Adventure genre

If I was a teacher and The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus was a student's paper, I would give it an "incomplete." After all, how can one assess a project whose nature was irrevocably altered when the lead actor died? Whatever vision director Ter...

Immortals plays like the illegitimate offspring of 300 and Clash of the Titans, but while it represents a substantial improvement over the latter, it falls short of the former. As is typical of films directed by Tarsem Singh (The Cell), a weak narr...

In the Name of the King is a second-rate regurgitation of The Lord of the Rings. Everything about it, down to the set and costume design, apes Peter Jackson's epic trilogy. However, while The Lord of the Rings was a grand story of scope and power,...

Jack the Giant Slayer is an enjoyable fantasy/adventure whose magic is partially undermined by marginal 3-D. Once again, the ugliest aspects of this format rear their heads: dim and fuzzy images, lackluster colors, and poor definition. Everything i...

Regardless of the genre, there’s an art to making a successful family feature. It involves crafting a storyline that’s straightforward enough to engage younger viewers yet sufficiently sophisticated that it keeps the attention of the paren...

The most important name associated with this new telling of the tale of King Arthur is “Guy Ritchie.” More than most working directors, Ritchie comes to projects with his own specific take on them – one that inevitably rubs some viewers ...

Calling a movie a “fairy tale” and having Julie Andrews provide “Once Upon a Time…” bookend narration are not sufficient reasons to abandon things like intelligent plotting and compelling character development. For years, various Disney ...

If Vin Diesel is looking for a third franchise to add to his resume, The Last Witch Hunter might be considered a “safe” option. His character, Kaulder, an 800+ year old warrior for the forces of good, doesn’t require Diesel to step ...

There's a little Roald Dahl in Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, and that leads one to wonder what a twisted director like Danny DeVito (Dahl's Matilda) or Tim Burton (Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) could have made out of ...

With the arrival of Rob Marshall’s live-action The Little Mermaid, Disney has now successfully converted all four of their major late ‘80s/early ‘90s animated musicals into updated iterations. Of the quartet (which also includes Beauty and t...