Category: Movie Reviews (Page 48 of 81)

Movie Review: “Maps to the Stars”

February 26, 2015 / Billy Tatum Jr.

Julianne Moore, Mia Wasikowska, Robert Pattinson, John Cusack, Olivia Williams, Evan Bird, Sarah Gadon

David Cronenberg

Less than a week after Hollywood celebrated itself at the Oscars in a televised circus of fashions, overlong acceptance speeches and underrepresented diversity, Canadian director David Cronenberg reminds us why even Hollywood excesses should have a limit in the weirdly satirical hybrid “Maps to the Stars.” The director best known for such classics as “The Fly,” “Scanners” and “A History of Violence” breaks new ground by filming in the States. It’s just too bad that he wasted the trip on such a manic, dated project filled with cynicism, incest and runaway egos.

Just off the bus is the fresh-faced but hideously scarred Agatha (Mia Wasikowska), a burn victim who seems to take things way too much in stride. Introducing herself as being from Jupiter (the city, not the planet), Agatha instantly attaches herself to her limo driver, Jerome (Robert Pattison). Of course, what would a limo driver be in this town without acting and/or writing aspirations? Jerome is all too quick to write her off as just another weird client who happens to be a really good tipper, but Agatha grows on him as she does with many people in the film. Thanks to social media and Carrie Fisher, who stars as herself, Agatha manages to quickly find a job as a personal assistant, or “chore whore,” to aging C-lister Havana Segrand (Julianne Moore). When Havana isn’t grasping to any last chance at stardom, she’s having fierce arguments with her dead mother (Sarah Gadon), who has no problems telling her what a disappointment she is.

Dysfunctional family time and visits from the beyond aren’t exclusive to the Segrand household, as we bounce back and forth between there and the Weiss compound. Agatha’s kid brother Benjie (Evan Bird) is 13 going on 40. He’s facing his own need for a ghostbuster with all the uncut crassness of a thousand Bieber clones rolled into one. Benjie’s the star of the “Bad Babysitter” franchise, which was so lucrative that stage mom Cristina (Olivia Williams) takes pride in squeezing out a multimillion dollar payday as if she were the real star. His dad, Stafford (John Cusack), is a self-help guru who rarely smiles, talks as though he’s three steps ahead of everyone, and administers a near-sadistic type of scream therapy to Havana.

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David Cronenberg John Cusack Julianne Moore Maps to the Stars Maps to the Stars review Mia Wasikowska Robert Pattinson

Movie Review: “VANish”

February 25, 2015 / David Medsker

Maiara Walsh, Austin Abke, Bryan Bockbrader, Adam Guthrie, Danny Trejo

Bryan Bockbrader

Here’s a tip for those hoping to get reviews of their new indie film by cold-writing movie critics: make sure your movie has Danny Trejo or Tony Todd in it, preferably both. “VANish” has both, and here we are.

“VANish” hits video and on demand this week. Writer and director Bryan Bockbrader tells us that he shot the film in 13 days, which brings to mind the story of how Robert Rodriguez shot “El Mariachi” on a $7,000 budget. The comparison is an apt one, as “VANish” is a warped wet dream of chatty Tarantino wise asses with “From Dusk Till Dawn” levels of bloodshed, and the entire movie takes place inside of a van, hence the capitalization in the title (and possibly a reference to the first half of “From Dusk Till Dawn,” which mostly takes place inside an RV). The majority of the acting fails the plot – and in some ways, the plot fails the plot – but it is a fun distraction, even if it pains us to think of a Tarantino/Rodriguez bloodfest like this as the two-decade nostalgia trip that it is.

College student Emma (Maiara Walsh) is kidnapped by Jack (Austin Abke) and Max (Bockbrader, the writer and director himself). They go to pick up their driver Shane (Adam Guthrie) with the intent of arranging a drop with Emma’s estranged father, drug lord Carlos (Trejo). Emma is not afraid of these guys in the slightest, and tells her dad as much in her kidnapping video. War veteran Jack, however, thinks he has everything under control, but as the job gets botched (on a number of levels), the three accomplices learn things about the other that cause mistrust to settle in. Oh, and did we mention that the damsel in distress is the daughter of a drug lord? (We did.) She is surely a delicate flower, and wouldn’t think of exploiting the circumstances at the first opportunity. Or the second. Or the third.

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Danny Trejo Maiara Walsh Tony Todd VANish VANish review

Movie Review: “Kingsman: The Secret Service”

February 13, 2015 / Jason Zingale

Colin Firth, Taron Egerton, Samuel L. Jackson, Sofia Boutella, Mark Strong, Michael Caine, Sophie Cookson

Matthew Vaughn

After subverting the superhero genre with “Kick-Ass,” the creative team behind that film (director Matthew Vaughn, co-writer Jane Goldman and comic book writer Mark Millar) has returned with an equally over-the-top homage to spy movies. Developed separately from the Millar-penned comic on which it’s loosely based, Vaughn’s film improves on that version in just about every way, delivering a smarter (but no less absurd) take on Cold War-era spy movies that embraces as many genre conventions as it breaks. A mix of the old and new school, “Kingsman: The Secret Service” is a lot cooler than its clunky title might imply – a hyper-stylized, gratuitously explicit action film that would make James Bond blush. After all, this is a movie that cartoonishly blows up Barack Obama’s head without even blinking.

The movie opens 17 years earlier when, while on a mission in the Middle East, secret agent Harry Hart (Colin Firth) is unable to prevent the death of a fellow agent. Feeling personally responsible, he visits the man’s wife (Samantha Womack) and young son, Eggsy, giving them a medal with a special phone number on the back should they ever need a favor. Fast-forward to present day and Eggsy (Taron Egerton) has grown up to become a lower-class delinquent who’s wasted his incredible potential. When Eggsy gets in trouble with the law, Harry bails him out, eventually recruiting him as a candidate for the same secret agency his father worked for, the Kingsmen, an independent organization of highly-trained agents who put their lives on the line to protect the world. While Eggsy undergoes the ultra-competitive training program (with only one recruit earning a spot as a Kingsman), Harry investigates a potential threat involving a tech-genius billionaire named Valentine (Samuel L. Jackson) who wants to save the Earth from the dangerous effects of climate change by wiping out most of humanity.

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Colin Firth Kingsman: The Secret Service Kingsman: The Secret Service review Matthew Vaughn Samuel L. Jackson Taron Egerton

Movie Review: “Fifty Shades of Grey”

February 12, 2015 / David Medsker

Dakota Johnson, Jamie Dornan, Eloise Mumford, Jennifer Ehle, Luke Grimes, Victor Rasuk, Marcia Gay Harden

Sam Taylor-Johnson

It’s well established that “Fifty Shades of Grey” began life as fan fiction by a “Twilight” devotee who was frustrated with the lack of sex in the books, and that’s fair; there is but one sex scene in the entire series, after all. However, this married mother of two (!) didn’t just write about Bella and Edward (here named Ana and Christian) having sex: she wrote about them having rough sex, BDSM-type stuff that tries to present itself as a confident woman owning her sexuality, when in fact the sex is completely about him, and he is constantly looking for reasons to “punish” her. Christian Grey is basically the Patrick Bateman (“American Psycho”) of sex, to the point where “American Psycho” author Bret Easton Ellis saw so much of Patrick in Christian that he actually begged “Grey” author E. L. James for the right to write the film’s screenplay. She turned him down. That’s unfortunate; he might have made something watchable out of this.

Anastasia Steele (Dakota Johnson) is a college senior who does her journalism major roommate Kate (Eloise Mumford) a solid by doing an interview on her behalf when Kate gets the flu. The interviewee is Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan), a 27-year-old billionaire who is giving her school’s commencement speech. Ana is intimidated by Christian – yet conducts the most passive-aggressive interview in history – but something about Ana intrigues Christian. He visits her at the hardware store where she works, and later tracks her down at a bar after she drunk calls him to tell him off. She wakes up in his hotel room, and after a brief (and hilariously awkward) chat, it is clear that there is chemistry between them, and each wants to consummate the relationship.

However, Christian plays a different sport than Ana does. He doesn’t want a lover: he wants a submissive (honest to God quote from the movie: “I don’t make love. I fuck. Hard.”), and asks Ana to look over a lengthy contract that spells out the terms of their sexual relationship, unaware that Ana is a virgin. Once he discovers this, he softens his approach and gives her the loving first experience that girls wish for, but after that, it’s all business, and business is this: you will do what I want, when I want, or you will be punished. Ana refuses to sign the contract, though the two continue to see each other. They have lots of sex, he spanks and whips her, and despite his insistence that he is not a candy and flowers kind of guy, Ana thinks that this arrangement has the potential to blossom into something greater. Fool.

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Dakota Johnson Fifty Shades of Grey Fifty Shades of Grey review Jamie Dornan

Movie Review: “What We Do in the Shadows”

February 12, 2015 / Jason Zingale

Taika Waititi, Jemaine Clement, Jonathan Brugh, Cori Gonzalez-Macuer, Stuart Rutherford, Ben Fransham

Taika Waititi & Jemaine Clement

“What We Do in the Shadows” sounds like a bad comedy sketch – a “Real World”-esque reality show with vampires in place of horny millennials – but it’s actually a really funny satire of the vampire subgenre that’s done in the deadpan style of a Christopher Guest mockumentary. Because of the loose, improvisational nature of the film, not every joke lands, but the ones that do are laugh-out-loud hilarious. As a result, the movie feels a little uneven at times, especially when it begins to lose steam in the latter half, although that’s partially due to the fact that many of the best gags occur early on. While that inconsistency prevents it from being the comedy masterpiece that some have suggested, the funny bits (including the ones you’ll likely miss the first time around) are what make “What We Do in the Shadows” such an entertaining import worthy of repeat viewings.

Filmed in the months leading up to the annual Unholy Masquerade Ball, a documentary crew granted protection from its subjects follows a group of vampires – including Victorian dandy Viago (Taika Waititi), medieval torturer Vladislav (Jemaine Clement), resident bad boy Deacon (Jonathan Brugh) and 8,000-year-old Petyr (Ben Fransham) – living together in Wellington, New Zealand as they deal with the dull minutiae of everyday life as an ancient bloodsucker. But the vampire lifestyle isn’t as glamorous as it’s hyped up to be, which unwitting victim Nick (Cori Gonzalez-Macuer) soon learns when he’s invited to one of their dinner parties, only to be served as the main course. After being sucked dry and granted the mixed blessing of eternal life, Nick attempts to make the most of his newfound abilities while ushering his fellow housemates into the 21st century, much to the chagrin of the jealous Deacon.

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Jemaine Clement Taika Waititi What We Do in the Shadows What We Do in the Shadows review