Category: Monday Morning Movie Reviewer

Do you think an old man getting into outrageous situations is funny? Do you think a little kid getting into outrageous situations is funny? Well, you’ll need to because that’s pretty much the only two jokes “Bad Grandpa” has got. What Works: The idea of giving a Jackass hidden-camera-style movie a thin plot—-a young boy’s grandpa has…

I know, I know, this movie came out a month ago and why am I posting Monday’s reviews on Tuesday? Oh well, I’ll crank out a few reviews today and just hope people show up… What Works: The script is generic, the villain (clearly based on the late Steve Jobs, who did nothing but innovate) is…

A very strong movie that excels in you-are-there dramatic verisimilitude more than creativity, but any film that I know the ending of ahead of time but still manages to create genuine third-act suspense is doing something very right. Director Paul Greengrass is best known for directing two of the Matt Damon as Jason Bourne films but his…

Better late than never for Joseph Gordon Levitt’s terrific directorial debut. This movie is really good, and I wish I were telling you that before it’s about to leave theaters, but…Oh well… What Works: Although “Don Jon” is billed as a comedy about porn addiction it’s really about the fantasies young men and women indulge in that…

I ranked “Machete Kills” (the sequel to Machete, itself inspired by a fake trailer in front of Robert Rodriguez’s half of Grindhouse, still the only Quentin Tarantino movie to not make its budget back at the box office) as one of my least anticipated movies of the Fall, and it looks like audiences agreed with…

The box office for this film was amazing, the audience grade was a strong A- and the rotten tomatoes score was an unreal 97 percent. So there’s not a lot of praise I can sing for this movie that hasn’t already been sung but I’ll try anyway. The short review: See this movie, and do…

I could write a very long review about the new documentary on income inequality, but the absolute best thing for anyone to do is see it. What Works: This film lays out the economic case for exactly how staggering income inequality in the U.S. has become, and exactly why that’s the most disastrous thing that…

A solid, well-made film about the ferocious rivalry between two great formula 1 drivers (between this film and Senna, I’m beginning to think the whole sport hinges on rivalries between play-it-safe rulesters and cocky daredevils) that didn’t quite connect for me. I can definitely appreciate the film, and it’s hard to say it’s not a…

I feel a slight sense of protectiveness over this movie because the reviews are awful (a lousy 8 percent on Rotten Tomatoes), the box office was even worse, and even the audience grade (which usually ranges from B+ to A) was a dismal C. So I have to ask myself “Is this movie about online…

I’ll have a much longer review on Monday (per usual) but craftsmanship like this can’t go unnoticed. Gravity is a film you should definitely see in theaters, and preferably as soon as possible.

See this film… What Works: It takes a standard vigilante thriller premise (Hugh Jackman is the slightly paranoid, survivalist dad whose worst fears come true when his daughter goes missing, and he fears Paul Dano’s mentally handicapped creep is a child molester who has her somewhere) and flips it on its head by having Jackman’s…

I have no idea if I liked this movie, didn’t like it, whether it worked or not, if I should leave thinking sex addiction is awful or just a mild bump in the light-comedy road. I really am not sure how I feel about this film and I think that speaks to the mixed-blessings it…

Calling this a disappointment would be misleading since I never suspected this film would be good. What Works: The film keeps morphing from a survival tale on an alien world (in the first 15 to 20 minutes) to a bounty-hunters-after-Riddick neo-Western to a monsters-attack-Aliens-knock-off. I’ll let you guess which two of those three works best….