Check Out the Trailer

If this film is supposed to represent Generation X then we’re a pretty shallow lot. The central characters pretend to be about something more than the establishment, but in reality they’re slacker rich kids who feel they have some kind of entitlement. The film pretends to be rebellious, but in the end the Man wins because the righteous cool kids are really a bunch of posers.

Lelaina Pierce (Winona Ryder, EDWARD SCISSORHANDS) is supposed to be the valedictorian, but can’t even remember her graduation speech when she misplaces a page. She is filming a documentary about her friends who are all kids of divorced parents. It’s supposed to be a deep look at her generation’s identity. Troy Dyer (Ethan Hawke, DEAD POETS SOCIETY) is a pretentious fledgling rocker who dropped out of school just shy of a Philosophy degree. He’s such a rebel. Vickie Miner (Janeane Garofalo, MYSTERY MEN) is promiscuous and fears getting AIDS. She currently works at the GAP until who knows, because we never find out much more about her. Sammy Gray (Steve Zahn, HAPPY, TEXAS) is their obligatory gay friend. One day Lelaina throws her cigarette into the convertible of Michael Grates (Ben Stiller, ZOOLANDER), who happens to be a producer at the MTV-on-steroids TV network, In Your Face. When he starts dating Lelaina, Troy becomes jealous and a jerk.

Read the rest of this entry »

Check Out the Trailer

I’m going to avoid all the typical statements that accompany a new Woody Allen film, and simply say VICKY CRISTINA BARCELONA is a good Woody Allen film. Unlike MATCH POINT, Allen goes for laughs and deals with his favorite topic, sexual politics. He has chosen another lovely European country, Spain, to set his story, instead of his beloved New York. He also brings back his latest muse Scarlett Johansson. The story isn’t profound, but it is very funny and contains the smart Allen-esque dialogue that makes even this lesser films a joy to watch.

Vicky (Rebecca Hall, THE PRESTIGE) and Cristina (Scarlett Johansson, LOST IN TRANSLATION) are good friends who travel to Barcelona. Vicky is doing work for her Catalan Identity masters degree, while Cristina is just trying to find herself. They stay with Vicky’s relative Judy (Patricia Clarkson, THE STATION AGENT). After an art auction, the two women are propositioned by artist Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem, NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN) to travel with him to Oviedo for the weekend. Vicky, who is engaged to the conservative and unromantic Doug (Chris Messina, TV’s SIX FEET UNDER), wants nothing to do with the playboy painter, but Cristina is intrigued. Subsequently, sexual shenanigans transpire between the trio, but things get really volatile when Juan’s passionate and unstable ex-wife Maria Elena (Penelope Cruz, VOLVER) comes back into the picture.

Read the rest of this entry »

Check Out the Trailer

Ridley Scott’s sci-fi classic brings a film noir feel to a futuristic Earth where human-like renegade androids called replicants are hunted by blade runner assassins. However killing a replicant isn’t murder; it’s retirement. Perfectly paced for its haunting material, BLADE RUNNER is a moody detective story, but also ponders bigger issues about the meaning of life. If you knew that the day of your death was predetermined, but didn’t know the day, how would that affect the way you live your life?

Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford, INDIANA JONES) is the best blade runner around. Detective Bryant (M. Emmet Walsh, BLOOD SIMPLE) calls on his services after four top model replicants escaped an off-world site and since coming to Earth killed a police officer. Deckard is losing the taste for killing replicants, so Bryant keeps creepy detective Gaff (Edward James Olmos, STAND & DELIVER) on his tail. Meanwhile the renegade replicants, led by the military model Roy Batty (Rutger Hauer, TURKISH DELIGHT), begin searching for Eldon Tyrell (Joe Turkel, THE SHINING), the creator of the replicants. In his mission to retire Batty, Deckard visits Tyrell and meets the seductive woman Rachael (Sean Young, NO WAY OUT), who turns out to be the most advanced replicants he has ever seen. Sadly she doesn’t know she isn’t human.

Read the rest of this entry »

Check Out the Trailer

Guillermo del Toro, director of PAN’S LABYRINTH, brings his boundless visual imagination to another screen edition of the HELLBOY saga. Filled with fanciful creatures and whimsical silliness, del Toro nicely balances between humor and action in this fun superhero adventure. While not as fresh as the original, HELLBOY II holds its own in a summer filled with wonderful superheroic antics.

Ages ago the magical creatures of the world made a truce with humans, setting aside their indestructible golden army. They would stay in the woods while humans ruled the cities. However, as the cities spread and humans became consumed with greed, the magical creatures were pushed into the shadows. Now Prince Nuada (Luke Goss, BLADE II) wants the magical world to rule again, so he seeks the three pieces of the crown that controls the mechanical golden army made up of 70 times 70 warriors. With his robbery of the second piece of the crown and the murder of dozens of humans, the U.S. government calls in their paranormal task force of Hellboy (Ron Perlman, THE CITY OF LOST CHILDREN), Liz Sherman (Selma Blair, CRUEL INTENTIONS) and Abe Sapien (Doug Jones, PAN’S LABYRINTH).

Read the rest of this entry »

Check Out the Trailer

The epic Oscar-winning blockbuster that captured the hearts of teenage girls for months upon its initial release, making Leonardo DiCaprio a modern-day matinee idol. James Cameron’s passion project paid off to the tune of $1.2 billion at the worldwide box office. No film since has come close to its success. Mixing a love story with a disaster tale attracted both women and men. It’s beautiful young stars brought in the young viewers, while the historic true-life disaster tale brought in older movie watchers. It was a spectacle that truly had something for everyone.

Against an epic backdrop, the story is simple. Rose Bukater (Kate Winslet, LITTLE CHILDREN) is a 17-year-old girl engaged to the wealthy heir Cal Hockley (Billy Zane, SILVER CITY). She doesn’t love him, feeling trapped in a life that was not of her choosing. Her mother Ruth (Frances Fisher, L.A. STORY) needs her to marry rich so that their future is secure, since her husband left them with nothing but debt upon his death. In total desperation, she decides to jump off the back of the ship. But third-class passenger Jack Dawson (DiCaprio, THE DEPARTED) convinces her to rethink her decision. This begins a whirlwind romance much like Romeo and Juliet, however the sinking ship will put their happily ever after in jeopardy.

Read the rest of this entry »

Check Out the Trailer

Wong Kar Wai is a romantic plain and simple. He bathes his films in simmering neon and classic soul music. This film features beautifully sensual shots of ice cream melting between the crevices of a piece of blueberry pie where you can nearly taste the sweetness. Sometimes his shots take on the color tones of the characters feelings; this film is particularly washed over with blues and purples. Hues of the sad characters that inhabit Wong’s world of heartbreak and renewal searching.

Elizabeth (Norah Jones, jazz-pop singer) discovers that her boyfriend is cheating on her from Jeremy (Jude Law, BREAKING AND ENTERING), the owner of a small New York café. He seems to have a great deal of heartbreak come through his restaurant, for he has begun collecting the keys of the brokenhearted in a jar just in case they want to retry a failed romance. Over a few nights, Elizabeth grows closer to Jeremy over his lonely blueberry pie. Needing some kind of release from her life, Elizabeth orders up a new locale in Memphis as a bartender where she serves Arnie (David Strathairn, GOOD NIGHT, AND GOOD LUCK), a police officer determined to drink his blues away. Turns out his wife Sue Lynne (Rachel Weisz, THE CONSTANT GARDENER) has moved from late night snacks with a younger man into a full out binge. Soon Elizabeth moves on to a casino in nowhere Nevada where she gambles her savings on the cravings of poker player Leslie (Natalie Portman, CLOSER), who has some daddy issues.

Read the rest of this entry »

Watch the Film!

Filmed as a short prequel to the feature, THE DARJEELING LIMITED, Wes Anderson’s HOTEL CHEVALIER peeks into the troubled romance of two characters. Jack Whitman (Jason Schwartzman, RUSHMORE) has exiled himself in a Paris hotel for weeks. He seems depressed. Then he gets a phone call from the one who put him in this state. His former girlfriend (Natalie Portman, PARIS, JE'’TAIME) has found him and wants to drop by. How will Will react to her? How will she treat him?

As a piece on its own, the film is curious at best. It hints at a relationship and its characters, but never gives us concrete answers. Jason desperately wants to make a certain impression and sets the mood to his liking. His ex is rude and flippant about Jason’s feelings. He then counters with some stinging words of his own. Some hints are made to why she has returned.But all of this is done in a low key without theatrics. These two people know each other and know what they want too well to let the other get in their way. In context with DARJEELING, the ending curiously swifts. This short film certainly works better with the feature than alone, adding funny winks to that story. But that doesn’t diminish its quality as a piece on its own.

Support the Site

Buy “The Darjeeling Limited” and “Hotel Chevalier” Now!

Check Out the Trailer

Director Andrew Stanton previously made us believe in the love between a father fish and his son in FINDING NEMO. Now he makes us fall in love yet again with a love story between two utterly charming robots. This daring Pixar production breaks the company’s mold in many ways — it features live-action, the first third is English-dialogue free, and there is a big message.

It’s 2800 and humans have abandoned Earth, which has been consumed by garbage. Left behind to clean up the mess are tiny tractor-like WALL•E robots. They compress the trash into neat squares and stack them as high as skyscrapers. Since it has been centuries since humans left, it seems only one curious WALL•E remains at his task. As he compacts the garbage, he collects items he finds interesting. One of those items is a VHS tape of HELLO, DOLLY!, which he knows by heart. His only friend on Earth is a resilient cockroach. Then one day a giant spaceship arrives and drops off a new robot. The slick iPod-design-style Eve is on a mission, looking for proof of organic life on Earth. As she looks for life, WALL•E follows her every move, smitten with love. So when the spaceship returns to take Eve back to the floating ark in space, WALL•E hitches a ride.

Read the rest of this entry »

Check Out the Trailer

Having liked the Ang Lee version of the HULK, I had trepidations going into this reboot of the franchise for one major reason. Would Marvel sink to the level of pandering to a juvenile section of the audience who just want to see Hulk smash stuff real good? Nothing in the trailer made me think otherwise. What I got in the end, however, was another character-based superhero saga that honors the original source without indulging in the desires of the lowest common denominator. And Hulk smashed stuff real good too.

Over the opening credits we get a quick recap of the origin of the Hulk, which skillfully walks the line for those who liked Lee’s HULK and those who hated it. The other HULK’s existence is up to the viewer now. As we catch up with Bruce Banner (Edward Norton, FIGHT CLUB) he’s on the run in Brazil. Working with a secret partner in the States, he is looking for a cure for his rage problem, which transforms him into the big green guy. Gen. “Thunderbolt” Ross is determined to find him, believing that Banner’s body is the property of the U.S. military. He enlists ruthless soldier Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth, PULP FICTION) in the effort. His pursuit of Banner has estranged him from his scientist daughter Dr. Betty Ross (Liv Tyler, LORD OF THE RINGS), who is in love with Banner. When he is found in Brazil, the Hulk emerges and Blonsky becomes drunk with the idea of gaining that same power.

Read the rest of this entry »

Check Out the Trailer

This anthology film is a love letter to Paris and to love itself. Twenty short films were commissioned for the feature-length project set in the 20 arrondissements of Paris. Only two of those films did not make the final cut. Directors such as Gus Van Sant (GOOD WILL HUNTING), Joel and Ethan Coen (NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN), Walter Salles (CENTRAL STATION), Sylvain Chomet (THE TRIPLETS OF BELLEVILLE, Alfonso Cuaron (CHILDREN OF MEN), Wes Craven (A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET), Tom Tykwer (GO) and Alexander Payne (ABOUT SCHMIDT) all helmed sections. Stars such as Steve Buscemi, Juliette Binoche, Willem Dafoe, Nick Nolte, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Bob Hoskins, Elijah Wood, Natalie Portman, Gena Rowlands and Gerard Depardieu (who also directs) provide the film with their acting talents. Altogether it works as a joyous experience.

Director and star Bruno Podalydes begins the film with a hate story to Paris parking, which ends in a lonely man having a pretty passerby (Florence Muller) fall for him. Gurinder Chadha (BEND IT LIKE BECKHAM) brings us a tale of a young white man (Cyril Descours) who meets a young Muslim woman (Leila Bekhti) at the park, but what will her grandfather think when he follows her to their mosque? From Gus Van Sant, there is a tale of a print shop customer (Gaspard Ulliel, HANNIBAL RISING) who is smitten instantly with the young worker (Elias McConnell, ELEPHANT), but there is a hidden obstacle to the customer’s bold declaration of his affections. In a typical Coen Brother unsentimental fashion, their “love story” finds an American tourist (Buscemi, FARGO) trapped in the middle of a lovers’ spat between a pretty young girl and her hotheaded boyfriend.

Read the rest of this entry »