ReelViews for PG-13 movies

It has been a number of years since I have read the story of Noah in "Genesis" but I'm reasonably certain there are some discrepancies between the canonical account and the one related by director Darren Aronofsky in his new movie, Noah. For exampl...

Non-Stop plays like what might happen if Michael Bay directed a screenplay developed for Alfred Hitchcock. The movie, while so utterly preposterous as to provoke guffaws, is presented in such a way that there's a building sense of tension. As a res...

Now begins a period of prayer for Eddie Murphy - he must pray that no one who can cast a Best Supporting Actor vote in the 2007 Oscar race will see Norbit, because no one in their right mind could think of providing an honor to anyone involved in t...

I have not read Nicholas Sparks' The Notebook, but I have heard good word-of-mouth about the novel. Sadly, the elements that made the book special did not survive the transition to the screen. The Notebook, as adapted by Nick Cassavetes from a sc...

There are generally two kinds of Christmas movies: those designed for family audiences and those that should probably have aired on the Hallmark Channel instead of opening in a movie theater. Nothing Like the Holidays belongs in the latter categor...

In Western culture, we are obsessed by the concept of celebrity. How else can one explain the plague of paparazzi that descends on public figures when they make appearances, or the popularity of gossip magazines and TV shows? Celebrities are l...

With Now You See Me, director Louis Leterrier has taken a page out of the book of his characters: use sleight-of-hand so viewers are distracted from some rather obvious screenplay deficiencies. By employing a fast-moving, high-energy approach that...

2013’s Now You See Me wasn’t just about showmanship and misdirection, it was showmanship and misdirection. Brought to the screen by the sure hand of director Louis Leterrier, this was a triumph of style over substance - a flashy, fast-pac...

Three years after the modest 2013 hit Now You See Me, the filmmakers decided to make an ill-advised sequel, even though the original had all the earmarks of a stand-alone film. Sure enough, the second installment underwhelmed, shedding nearly ever...

Eddie Murphy's 1996 remake of The Nutty Professor is one of those movies that, at least from a creative perspective, neither deserves nor warrants a sequel. What's the point? More of the same, it seems. Any time a movie makes $130 million in the...