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'Star Trek Into Darkness' Movie Review
A new global terrorist known as The Mandarin has oozed onto the scene, destroying Tony Stark's house, slaughtering innocent civilians, etc. Stark flees to rural Tennessee, where he befriends a bullied 8-year-old who becomes his tag-along and sometime savior
'Kon-Tiki' is a ripping yarn torn from yesterday's headlines. Though somewhat forgotten now, the 1947 story of six men, an oceangoing raft and a wild and crazy theory was a media sensation that gripped the world's imagination -- and launched a thousand tiki bars
Don (Robert De Niro) is living with a caterer (Susan Sarandon), and was previously married to Ellie (Diane Keaton). Their adopted son, Alejandro, has two siblings. A big wedding ensues that brings about all sorts of slapstick interactions, pretending and the like
Don (Robert De Niro) is living with a caterer (Susan Sarandon), and was previously married to Ellie (Diane Keaton). Their adopted son, Alejandro, has two siblings. A big wedding ensues that brings about all sorts of slapstick interactions, pretending and the like
It has taken the movie industry a long time to recognize the end of life as a potential market, possibly because the themes don't make a great movie pitch. But a number of recent films suggest that the industry has finally discovered the 'grey market'
Pain and Gain follows Danny Lugo (Mark Wahlberg), bodybuilder and gym manager. Lugo and his hapless colleagues (Dwayne Johnson, Anthony Mackie) target a Colombian gym client for kidnapping and extortion. He's tortured, then crushed by a vehicle and left for dead
'To the Wonder' depicts an Oklahoma man, played by Ben Affleck; a Ukrainian woman living in Paris, played by Olga Kurylenko; another woman back in Oklahoma, Rachel McAdams; and a fourth character, a Catholic priest stricken by a crisis of faith and purpose, played by Javier Bardem
In this latest Tom Cruise film, Jack Harper is a Mr. Fix-It in the year 2077, living and working high above what's left of Earth after a devastating war with invading aliens. Most of the population has been relocated to a Saturn moon, except for the 'scavs' led by Morgan Freeman
This carefully tended portrait of Jackie Robinson, the man who broke baseball's color barrier, settles for too little. Jackie Robinson (Chadwick Boseman) endures long odds and racism to join the Dodgers. Harrison Ford is fun as the general manager who brought him up, Branch Rickey
'The Company You Keep' is best enjoyed as an actors' showcase. Robert Redford is Jim Grant, a progressive public interest lawyer living in Albany, N.Y. He's a widower raising a preteen daughter on his own. Then a cub reporter (Shia LaBeouf) ferrets out the truth on this man
Mia (Jane Levy) has quit drugs, and her withdrawal confuses her senses. Her friends have brought her to the cabin in the woods to cure her. But is she seeing visions of demonic possession, or is this simply the cold turkey playing tricks on her mind?
This Spielberg classic is back, with its lunging raptors and roaring T. rexes now in 3-D. The result is great, since the film has always been so much more powerful on the big screen than on TV. It really is a fun movie, and the dinos were made for 3-D
Luke (Ryan Gosling) is a performer traveling with a two-bit carnival. He learns he has fathered a son with a local waitress. Luke turns to bank robbery while also trying to establish a relationship with his son. Then, the story switches to the police officer (Bradley Cooper)
In Adam Leon's 'Gimme the Loot,' a loose, beguiling bit of larceny, a pair of teenage graffiti artistes from the Bronx -- Malcolm, played by Ty Hickson, and Sofia, played by Tashiana Washington -- spend an eventful summer weekend in side-winding pursuit of their dream
'Spring Breakers' is about four teenage girls -- three nasty, one nice. Determined to have a memorable vacation, the girls get some spending cash by fake-pistol-waving in a restaurant. But things steadily move into a more dangerous space
Portia (Tina Fey) is a Princeton University admissions officer that visits a new age high school, run by John (Paul Rudd). John has reason to believe that a promising applicant just might be the same boy that Portia gave up for adoption
The plot concerns the murder of the Pakistani president, stolen nukes, a frame-up job by COBRA disgracing the Joes. The Joes fight back. There's Channing Tatum as Duke, Dwayne Johnson as Roadblock, and even ole Bruce Willis as the original Joe
It's 'Ice Age' with humans and less ice. The Croods are a brood of cavepeople; there's Ugg (Nicolas Cage), Ugga (Catherine Keener), Eep (Emma Stone) and some others. Earthquaked out of their dwelling, the Crood brood embarks on a search for a new home
Terrorists appear out of nowhere and take over the White House seizing the president (Aaron Eckhart). The only hope is former agent Mike Banning (Gerard Butler), the only man who knows how to get into the fortified presidential bunker where the hostages are
'The Host' is all about voices in your head. It imagines the planet we call home shortly after an invasion by creatures from another galaxy. They are called the Souls. The Souls have rid the joint of strife, hunger and wars
Can an adaptation of an iconic novel yield a failure and a success in one? I think so. Salles' answer to Kerouac's material is faithful, which is neither a virtue or a vice. It's long on atmosphere, alert to the shifting dynamics of the characters
'The Incredible Burt Wonderstone'
Las Vegas magicians Burt (Steve Carell) and Anton Marvelton (Steve Buscemi) have a stale act. They can't stand each other. And there's a dangerous new kid (Jim Carrey) in town, who gives the public what it wants
Jordan (Halle Berry) is a 911 operator. On a call in which she tries to coach a teenage girl away from a home invasion, Jordan slips up, fails, and the girl is murdered. Dedicated to redeem herself, Jordan gets another chance
Romanian writer-director Cristian Mungiu's remarkable 'Beyond the Hills' stands alone. It is a different sort of horror movie, focused on character and on the precarious emotional state of lovers whose affair has come to an abrupt close
'Like Someone in Love' is a straightforward affair. I liked the film the first time I saw it. But a second viewing made me appreciate what's there even more, and experience the film for what it is: a study in shifting personae
In March 1968 a Soviet submarine imploded, and for mysterious reasons a modern screenwriter would find intrigue in on which to speculate. Capt. Dmitri Zubov (Ed Harris) does his best to hold off the alternately motivated KGB agents on board
In yet another crude comedy, this is the story of Jeff Chang (Justin Chon), who goes out on the town for his 21st birthday. His gonzo friend Miller (Miles Teller) and the more responsible Casey (Skylar Austin) get him blind drunk
Loosely based on true events, this movie follows a father (Dwayne Johnson) who goes undercover for the DEA to nab drug kingpins in an effort to free his harshly sentenced son (Rafi Gavron). Gritty and noirish, this flick actually works
Argo, a film about a daring escape from Iran during the 1979 hostage crisis, took top honors at the Academy Awards, or Oscars. Argo was named best picture. An excited Ben Affleck thanked those involved in the film
Hollywood Prepares for Oscars Night
Preparations for this Sunday's 85th Academy Awards are under way in Hollywood, from setting up the red carpet to accrediting journalists from around the world
With Lincoln, Daniel Day-Lewis Ponders 3rd Oscar
British-born actor Daniel Day-Lewis is a front-runner to win the Best Actor in a Leading Role Academy Award for his portrayal of the 16th U.S. president in Steven Spielberg's movie 'Lincoln'
Nominated Movie Scores Feature Sophistication, Cultural Diversity
Film composers may lack the celebrity of A-list actors and directors, but their work is crucial to a film's success. It's a fact recognized by the Academy Awards in its Best Original Score category. Here's a look at this year's contenders
We received a letter from a reader telling us how how much she loved the scene in 'Desk Set' where Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy make fried chicken and floating island! And since it's Oscar season, it inspired us to ask some of our contributors what their favorite food scenes in movies are
Oscar 'Oz' Diggs (James Franco) is a carny magician who departs 1905 Kansas via tornado and lands in Oz. He runs into witches, including Theodora, Evanora and Glinda, and has the company of a winged monkey. Oz must lead the revolution to restore order to the land
Daniel Day-Lewis Wins 3rd Oscar for 'Lincoln'
As expected, Daniel Day-Lewis won the Best Actor Oscar for his portrayal of the nation's 16th president, in Steven Spielberg's Lincoln, at the Academy Awards. It's the third lead actor Oscar for the British actor
Jennifer Lawrence Makes Up for Forgotten Thank You's during Oscars
Jennifer Lawrence looked bewildered, afloat and at a loss for words when she came up on stage to gather her Oscar award for Best Actress that she has forgotten to thank some important people who have undoubtedly done a lot for her career
Oscars 2013: Stars Shine at 85th Academy Awards
Ben Affleck's 'Argo' wins best picture, Daniel Day Lewis, Jennifer Lawrence, Adele and Ang Lee among other 2013 Oscar winners
Find out who took home a coveted Oscar statuette at the 85th Academy Awards
'Amour' Favorite for Best Foreign Film Oscar
Stars and directors of Oscar-nominated foreign films discuss their work, predicting a win for Michael Haneke's 'Amour' ahead of the 85th Academy Awards
Afghan Coming-of-Age Film is Oscar Contender
One of the 2013 Oscar nominees for Live-action Short Film is 'Buzkashi Boys' -- a coming-of-age story set in Afghanistan -- shows a side of life in Afghanistan seldom seen outside the country
'Life of Pi's Ang Lee Conquers Anti-Asian Bias
Like many Asian-Americans in the film industry, Taiwanese-born film director Ang Lee struggled for acceptance early in his career. This year, the Oscar-winning Lee is again a nominee for an Academy Award for Best Director for his film Life of Pi
Palestinians Hope to Tell Their Story Through the Oscars
'5 Broken Cameras' is one of five candidates for the Oscar in the Best Documentary Feature category this year. Palestinians hope this Oscar-nominated documentary depicting a non-violent struggle against Israel will succeed in telling their story
In 1988, owing to international pressure, Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet authorized a vote on whether Pinochet deserved eight more years. The voters could vote 'yes' in favor of Pinochet or 'no' against him. Rene, in this version of events, becomes the spearhead of the 'no' campaign
Anne Hathaway Apologizes for Last-Minute Dress Switch at Oscars
Anne Hathaway, who most often wears Valentino couture, including her wedding to Adam Schulman last September, surprised the public when she emerged on the Oscars red carpet wearing a pale pink Prada gown
In 'The Gatekeepers,' filmmaker Dror Moreh has come up with a profoundly humane political documentary for a different, smarter, humane way forward in the Middle East. This may not be the movie Israel's right wing would've commissioned. For anyone else it's an eye-opener
Based on the young adult novel, this film follows high school senior Ethan (Alden Ehrenreich) who is plagued by a recurring Civil War-era nightmare. The girl in his dreams resembles the new girl in town, Lena (Alice Englert)
'Safe Haven' begins as a desperate young woman (Julianne Hough) flees the scene of a crime in Boston. Katie gets off the bus in Southport, NC, gets a job and a cabin, and starts sharing smoldering looks with town widower dad (Josh Duhamel)
The 2013 Academy Awards by the Numbers
As the 2013 Academy Awards approaches, nominees are narrowing down what to wear, which after-parties to attend, and who to thank in their acceptance speeches
Most Entertaining Documentary May Win The Oscar
Documentaries don't play in big theaters, nor do they compete at the box office. But through political and social exposes they can change hearts and minds the world over. Dick Kirby's Oscar-nominated documentary 'The Invisible War' is a prime example
Oscar-Nominated Film Traces Journey of Ailing African Youngsters
'Open Heart' is about eight children with rheumatic heart disease who travel from Rwanda to Sudan for life-saving surgery. The film is 2013 short documentary Academy Award nominee. Filmmaker Kief Davidson hopes it will spread awareness about a widespread health problem in Africa
Sci-Tech Oscars Honor Science of Movie-Making
Special effects and other cinema technology are becoming more important in helping movie-makers tell their stories. Hollywood's motion picture academy has already honored the engineers and scientists behind the industry's changing technology
John McClane (Bruce Willis) is back. Traveling to Moscow to retrieve his estranged son, McClane the elder discovers his son is really a CIA spook trying to keep a Russian dissident alive long enough to turn over a top-secret file
'A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III'
As the title character, Charles Swan III (Charlie Sheen) Sheen is a playboy in 1970s Los Angeles, a superstar designer of album covers who's in the throes of a midlife breakdown after his girlfriend (Katheryn Winnick) walks out
This sly film from director Steven Soderbergh is a deftly plotted look at pharmacological states of mind. Emily (Rooney Mara) is a tense Manhattanite who's husband (Channing Tatum) gets out of prison after a stint for insider trading. They struggle to connect
Denver businessman Sandy (Jason Bateman) discovers his identity has been stolen, his credit ruined. To fix things, he must track down the culpirt, who happens to be Diana (Melissa McCarthy), a Florida con woman. The two go on the road to make things right
This is a fantasy grab bag in which nearly anything can happen. At one point a freezer full of packaged meats disgorges its contents, which spring to life and assemble themselves into an encased-meat monster. A mustache transforms into a batlike creature
This goofy zombie comic-romance follows the undead fellow known as R (Nicholas Hoult), who's pretty nostalgic and 'just wants to connect.' One day while hunting zombies, human Julie (Teresa Palmer) gets saved from being eaten by R, and both of their heartstrings go zing
Nominees and Movie Fans Get Ready for Oscars
Hollywood is gearing up for the Academy Awards, or Oscars, the highlight of the year for the movie industry, and for movie fans around the world
Two Films, Directors Are Top Oscar Contenders
Iconic filmmakers Steven Spielberg and Ang Lee are competing for two of the most coveted Oscars this year: Best Director and Best Picture
In this pretty cliche, grungy, uber-violent action flick, hit man Jimmy Bobo (Sylvester Stallone) partners up with a crusading police detective played by Sung Kang, and the two get swept up in something to do with police corruption, skeezy development deals and an incriminating flash drive
After a 28-year prison sentence, small-time hood Val (Al Pacino), and his nutty hair, is greeted at the gates by old friend Doc (Christopher Walken) and his nutty hair. Doc's been hired, under threat of execution, to kill his pal Val. But first, some fun
To see '56 Up' is to be reunited with an old friend. Make that 13 old friends, together again for a documentary project the likes of which the world has never seen. It all started in 1964, when Britain's Granada TV gathered 7-year-old schoolchildren from divergent economic backgrounds
'Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters'
Hansel (Jeremy Renner) and Gretel (Gemma Arterton) have become witch hunters ever since their original goose cooking made them famous. Their hired to save the village of Augsburg from its witch blight and the Great Witch
'Quartet' comes from a minor play by Ronald Harwood, who adapted 'The Dresser' for the screen from his own stage work and won an Oscar for 'The Pianist.' It's set in an English country retirement home for aging musicians known as Beecham House
The prologue tells us of a father fleeing scandal, grabbing his children and speeding into the mountains. They crash, wind up at a remote cabin, and then something happens to him. Five years later, searchers find the girls, now feral, nonverbal, like rats almost. Naturally, all is not as it seems
In 'LUV' the rapper-turned-actor Common excels as Vincent, a former drug dealer recently out of prison, trying to go straight guided by his dream of opening a crab-shack restaurant on Baltimore's waterfront. The story follows this character as he hustles to acquire the money needed to secure a bank loan
Billy (Mark Wahlberg) is a disgraced former cop turned private eye who is hired by the mayor of New York (Russell Crowe) to tail his wife (Catherine Zeta-Jones), whom he suspects of having an affair. Billy finds some evidence all right, but that's when the script goes a little nuts
Arnold Schwarzenegger plays Ray Owens, the sheriff of a sleepy Arizona border town. Little does he know that Mexican gangster Gabriel Cortez has escaped federal custody and is speeding toward them to escape into Mexico. So it's up to Owens and his ragtag crew to block the border
O'Mara (Josh Brolin) and his team of rogue officers (Ryan Gosling, etc.) take on the notorious Mickey Cohen, played with relish by Sean Penn. A couple fine performances play off the iconic set design and help along the revenge killings
'Amour' opens with firefighters breaking into the spacious, eerily silent Paris apartment belonging to two retired musicians, Georges (Jean-Louis Trintignant) and Anne (Emmanuelle Riva). There's no fire, no smoke, but then we discover Anne's body
Jessica Chastain plays Maya, a CIA operative in Pakistan, who ultimately is appropriately sidelined for the climactic raid on bin Laden's compound. The film remains impressively complicated and nonpartisan
The sharp workplace comedy 'Price Check' follows a supermarket chain's pricing-department exec whose life gets upended by a whirlwind new boss. Pete Cozy (Eric Mabius) would rather 9-to-5 it than climb the corporate ladder
Argo Wins Top Prize at Golden Globe Awards
Ben Affleck's Iran hostage drama Argo and the musical Les Miserables were the big winners at the 70th annual Golden Globe Awards, while Steven Spielberg's Lincoln won only one major award
'Lincoln' Leads Oscar Nominations
Steven Spielberg's epic drama 'Lincoln' leads the nominees for the Academy Awards, Hollywood's top honors. Nominees were announced in Los Angeles and 'Lincoln' garnered 12 nominations, including for Best Picture
Pete (Paul Rudd) and Debbie (Leslie Mann) reprise their roles from 'Knocked Up.' They've reached age 40; there are money problems; Pete's label is on the verge of insolvency; their sex life has cooled; Debbie becomes pregnant again
We experience the unthinkable in 'The Impossible' firsthand. The moment of impact; the horrid rush of water; the sudden devastation and endless loss; the separation of parents and children, not knowing who's alive and who's dead
Barbra Streisand plays Joyce, the long-widowed mother of inventor Andy (Seth Rogen). Out of guilt, Andy asks Joyce to accompany him on a work trip. The secret mission is to hook up Joyce with a long-lost beau
This stimulating black comedy is a good one. Brad Pitt stars as hitman Jackie Cogan in 2008, much of the dialogue in the film concerning the financial difficulties experienced by contract killers
This romantic comedy follows onetime Scottish soccer star George (Gerard Butler), who finds himself down and nearly out. He's moved to suburban Virginia to be close to his preteen son. George's ex (Jessica Biel) is engaged to be remarried
David O. Russell's pungent romantic comedy 'Silver Linings Playbook' takes some risks en route to its own happy ending. And I say good for Russell for risking a protagonist who requires some patience and forgiveness
In the not-too-distant future, North Korea has invaded American soil. Our only hope is a gaggle of high school kids who form a guerilla army calling itself the Wolverines, after the local football mascot.
Jack Reacher (Tom Cruise) is off the grid as a cop, ex-military sniper and investigator. An accused killer, coming out of a coma, asks for Reacher to help clear his name. Rosamund Pike plays Helen, the defense attorney who's on the case
'Promised Land' starts with the notion that Matt Damon's character, Steve, has begun to doubt his corporate mission. Filmed in western Pennsylvania, director Gus Van Sant's film takes on the issue of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking
Joe Morgenstern's Top Films of 2012
From 'Argo' to 'Skyfall,' WSJ Movie Critic Joe Morgenstern discusses some of his top movie picks for 2012
This film version of the popular French Revolution musical (based on the classic novel) is destined for Oscar nods. That being said, Les Miserables doesn't exactly work. It's just all right
"The Central Park Five" -- an unusually good documentary about an outlandish miscarriage of justice -- comes from, among others, Ken Burns
Pi sets sail with his family on a freighter, accompanying a slew of zoo creatures. Terrible weather. The ship sinks. All die except for Pi, a zebra, a hyena, an orangutan and a Bengal Tiger named Richard Parker
Based on a children's book series, a team of Bunny, North (aka Santa), Tooth and the silent Sandman need the help of newcomer Jack Frost to defeat Pitch, who is threatening to rid the children of the belief in magical figures
The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2
Newly vampired Bella (Kristen Stewart) is adjusting to her new powers, new life, new child, and the uneasy truce with the werewolves led by Jacob (Taylor Lautner). There's some Edward (Robert Pattinson) of course
Jamie Foxx plays Django, a freed slave who teams up with his bounty hunter savior (Christoph Waltz) to rescue Django's wife (Kerry Washington) from a venal plantation owner (Leonardo DiCaprio)
'Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away' is a 3-D catalog of the wonders of the Cirque company's Las Vegas shows. It is a feast for the eyes and an appreciation of the accomplished art of the jugglers, tumblers, mimes, contortionists, acrobats and aerialists
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman), a homey hobbit ill-suited to dangerous adventures, gets mixed up in just such a quest. Bilbo and Gandalf (Ian McKellen) and 13 dwarves set out to reclaim the ravaged kingdom or Erebor
The demurely prurient 'Hyde Park on Hudson' is an anecdotal account of FDR's pre-war sexual escapades one weekend in 1939 starring Bill Murray as Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Laura Linney as his spinster fifth cousin, Daisy Suckley
We watch the drama unfold between Anna (Keira Knightley), her pill of a husband (Jude Law) and her cavalry officer lover (Aaron Johnson). Its well-written script leaps between high comedy and piercing drama, and the film has its moments
Spielberg returns with this impressive biopic about our 16th president. Based on Doris Kearns Goodwin's book, the film focuses tightly on the final four months of Lincoln's life and his political maneuvering in support of the 13th Amendment's abolition of slavery
James Bond is back for his 23rd installment, and this is more like it. Daniel Craig returns as 007, charged with rescuing the world from a computer savvy adversary, perhaps the most singular Bond villain in a decade, played by Javier Bardem
Whip Whitaker (Denzel Washington) is a pilot who, after a night of drinking and cocaine, crash lands a routine flight, rescuing most of his passengers and crew. An instant hero, Whitaker knows that other people know what was in his system
In 'The Details,' Dr. Jeff Lang (Tobey Maguire) is a not-that-happily married suburban Washington OB-GYN whose new lawn would be the great joy of his life, if only the raccoons would stop digging it up, looking for grubs
The first clue that Stephen Fung's 'Tai Chi Zero' is not your usual kung-fu kickfest is when our hero -- Yang Lu Chan (Yuan Xiaochao) -- is introduced on a 19th century Chinese battlefield to the strains of heavy metal
Scott Voss (Kevin James) is a biology teacher, a single man barely able to muster the gumption to ask out the school nurse (Salma Hayek). Their crumbling school needs $48,000 to save the longtime music teacher. Solution: Voss enters the mixed martial arts arena
Colin Farrell plays Marty, a blocked screenwriter, who's already blown past his deadline for his screenplay of 'Seven Psychopaths.' His friend Billy and his accomplice Hans, make a living kidnapping dogs and returning them for reward money
CIA operative Antonio Mendez (Ben Affleck) concocts a plan: fly into Iran, pose as a film crew scouting locations, fly out again with the six Americans playing the roles of crew members
Ellison Oswalt (Ethan Hawke) is a true-crime author in desperate need of a hit, and he doesn't tell his wife and family that he's moved them into a house that was the scene of a mass murder
Tim Burton is back with this black-and-white 3-D stop motion animation picture, a remake of a short live action movie he made in 1984 in which he remakes the Frankenstein myth with a dog
Clint Eastwood plays Gus, an aging Atlanta Braves baseball scout whose eyes are failing and whose contract is up. Amy Adams, who is getting better by the movie, plays Gus' workaholic lawyer daughter
Freddie is an alcoholic WWII vet suffering from a nervous condition. Eventually, he finds himself in the company of fellow misfit, Lancaster Dodd, the founder of a Scientology-like religion
Officers Taylor and Zavala are good friends and valiant protectors of the people. Episodically, the movie follows them as they crisscross paths with an encroaching drug cartel and its street soldiers
This film is about surfing the Mavericks, off the coast of northern California, and teenage Jay Moriarty who became famous there. Jay (Jonny Weston) gets the surfing bug from his nextdoor neighbor, Frosty (Gerard Butler)
This Halloween film concerns a Cleveland high school senior (Victoria Justice) who misplaces her preteen brother (Jackson Nicoll) on trick-or-treat night
A murderer, known as Picasso, is killing people and leaving Cubist-style drawings at the crime scene. He appears to have his sights set on a multi-national industrialist. But not if Alex Cross has anything to say about it
Extending a work trip to vacation with his ex-wife and daughter, Liam Neeson's ex-CIA op, Brian Mills, is kidnapped and held captive in a hellhole by murderous Albanians
In director Lee Daniels' jacked-up bayou melodrama 'The Paperboy,' a screen full of charismatic actors do their damnedest not to turn into a screen full of overactors in the service of a lurid Florida Gothic
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
The film quickly drops us into Charlie's fraught first days, which only solidify his fears. From there, the film digs into the major theme, which is the messy business of figuring out who you are
In the futuristic, vermin-infested Mega City, Peach Tree is run by a gangland ruler, who controls the flow of the latest drug. Judge Dredd and his psychic protege square off against the bad people
Charlie (Dax Shepard) is a reformed robbery getaway driver living in rural California with his girlfriend, Annie (Kristen Bell). They hit the road to get Annie to LA for a job, but they're pursued by Annie's ex and Charlie's former cohorts
This is not just another 3-D conversion; it's an encore of modern animation's gold standard. The conversion is all in the details, and this beautiful movie gets even better
'The Sessions' is straightforward in its script construction. It's somewhat cautious in emotional terms. John Hawkes is wonderful as O'Brien, as is Helen Hunt as the surrogate whose sessions with O'Brien form the crux of the film
Ralph (voiced by John C. Reilly) is weary of his prescribed lot in life: he's not a bad guy, so why does he have to play a bad guy in everybody's favorite arcade game 'Fix-It Felix Jr.'? Ralph breaks out and goes on the run
Cloud Atlas defies description. Six storylines spanning several centuries, from an 1849 Pacific Ocean voyage to the year 2321, provide the narrative webbing. Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Jim Broadbent, Hugo Weaving and others play many roles apiece
In filmmaker Rian Johnson's imaginative sci-fi thriller, futuristic criminals are sent back in time to Kansas, and there, standing at the ready with a nasty rifle, is the 'looper,' the gun for hire
Dracula (voiced by Adam Sandler) operates a swanky resort for his fellow outcasts and monsters. His daughter Mavis is turning 16. Despite his best efforts, Dracula cannot keep his daughter from the wider world forever
In this statement on the dismal state of public education, Maggie Gyllenhaal plays a single mother who takes more than a passing interest in her daughter's flailing education. Viola Davis plays a teacher at her school
It's an unseemly request by a movie, to ask us to root for the lying, scrambling but extremely well-coiffed hedge fund billionaire weasel played by Richard Gere in the new film 'Arbitrage'
Four friends have reunited because one of them is getting married. There's Regan (Kirsten Dunst). There's dizzy, loose Katie (Isla Fisher), booze-fueled Gena (Lizzy Caplan) and, of course, Becky (Rebel Wilson), the bride
The Bondurant brothers run a hooch operation during Prohibition. While the youngest, Jack (Shia LaBeouf), leads and narrates, the reason to see the picture is the gruff leader, Forrest (Tom Hardy)
'The Words' tells the story of a struggling novelist (Bradley Cooper) married to a woman (Zoe Saldana) with whom he honeymoons in Paris. She buys him a satchel that just happens to have an unpublished manuscript inside
In the raunchy but rather sweet new comedy 'For a Good Time, Call ...' frenemies-turned-roommates Lauren and Katie, residents of Manhattan, learn what they could've learned simply by watching Julianne Moore in 'Short Cuts'
Clyde (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) is newly divorced, trying to keep up with his daughters. Unfortunately, he hits the wrong garage sale, and Emily buys an odd wooden box that just so happens to have a demon inside
Wilee (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) gets a 'premium rush' order to deliver an envelope to Chinatown. Inside is a marker for a considerable amount of money. A dirty cop with gambling debts (Michael Shannon) needs to intercept. The chase ensues
Sleek and forbidding, David Cronenberg's adaptation of the Don DeLillo novel 'Cosmopolis' presents the most whopping paradox in the cinema year 2012.
'Celeste and Jesse Forever' opens with a montage of how Celeste (Rashida Jones) and Jesse (Andy Samberg) meet, date, marry and then split and ends with an unspoken question: Is this mismatched couple meant to stay together?
It's a congressional race in North Carolina. Will Ferrell plays Cam Brady, longtime incumbent, cross between John Edwards and Bill Clinton. Zach Galifianakis plays Marty Huggins the Republican son of a backroom dealmaker. Ridiculousness ensues
Ten years after becoming a best-selling author at 19, Calvin Weir-Fields (Paul Dano) has writer's block. He obsesses over past slights and a romantic breakup.
Ben Stiller plays a Costco manager in small-town Ohio who forms a neighborhood watch to track down the killer of a security guard. Vince Vaughn and Jonah Hill provide backup
This entertaining kids-gotta-dance musical taps into the dance 'flash mob' phenomenon. The story is an overfamiliar one, but the dance scenes are a brilliantly choreographed, well-shot and sharply edited treat
Director Steven Soderbergh's film, which is loosely based on producer/star Channing Tatum's own experience as a male stripper, is actually a nimble, enjoyable and well put-together workplace comedy
John (Mark Wahlberg) grows up in Boston where he wishes upon a star for a friend. His teddy bear becomes a talking teddy bear, and the pair remain best pals and bong-devoted couch potatoes well into John's arrested-development adulthood
In 'The Expendables 2,' Barney Ross (Stallone) and his team (which includes Statham, Couture, Lundgren, Li, etc.) take their soldier-for-hire thing to Nepal and environs to do battle with countless henchman
Jim and Cindy can't conceive or adopt. Then, a miracle. One night, they write down their ideal child, put the paper in a box and bury it in the backyard. Then, a freak rainstorm brings forth from the earth ... a boy
Jeremy Renner reboots the Matt Damon franchise as Aaron Cross, another one of the highly trained government killers. The film pits Cross against his would-be assailants and sends him running alongside fellow target Marta (Rachel Weisz)
Douglas Quaid (Colin Farrell) lives a decent life with his wife Lori (Kate Beckinsale). Restless, he visits a dream factory for a memory-implant vacation, which doesn't go well
Christopher Nolan's third installment in his Batman reboot trilogy is intense. Maybe too intense. The film will likely satisfy those who fell headlong into the first two
The woolly mammoth Manny gets separated from his family for a while. The saber-toothed tiger Diego finds a mate. Sid the sloth becomes caretaker of his abandoned grandmother
Woody Allen's latest movie, 'To Rome With Love,' lacks the clean lines and payoffs of 'Midnight in Paris.' On the other hand, it's not painful the way 'Whatever Works' was, or a dullard in the 'Cassandra's Dream' vein
Sam (Chris Pine) learns that the father he barely knew, an LA music producer, has died. Arriving at the wake, Sam learns that his father fathered another child, a girl, his half-sister, who is now grown and with her own son
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter
This portrays Honest Abe as a rail-splitting, life-long enemy of the vampires who killed his mother. The story also turns the Civil War into a battle between humans and bloodsucking fiends
Already known as Whitney Houston's swan song, Sparkle (Jordin Sparks) is one third of a singing sister act who writes her own material and has to hide it from her formidable God-fearing mother (Whitney Houston)
Their kids grown and gone, Kay (Meryl Streep) and Arnold Soames (Tommy Lee Jones) have been married 31 years. In an attempt to break them out of their rut, Kay takes them to a couples therapy workshop in a small coastal Maine town
Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days
Greg (Zachary Gordon) is on summer vacation, and his dad has plans to school Greg in the wonders of camping. Greg's pal Rowley sneaks Greg into his country club to be around Holly
There's a reason Matthew McConaughey's character wears a black Stetson in 'Killer Joe,' a self-knowingly sleazy crime drama that's simultaneously repellent and enjoyable
Five years into their marriage, the freelance Toronto writers played by Michelle Williams and Seth Rogen in 'Take This Waltz' have drifted, rudderless, into a harbor that is anything but safe
Director Marc Webb reboots the classic comic book superhero, and Andrew Garfield (Peter Parker) makes it work. Garfield captures the nerve-wracking duality of the character, and makes us believe as if we're seeing this for the first time
This chipper, no-warts-and-all tour chronicle was shot last year when the pop star crisscrossed the world on her 'California Dreams Tour.' Perry is likeable in her camera-friendliness, and she works hard
Chon (Taylor Kitsch), along with his bro-pal Ben (Aaron Johnson), starts a wildly successful marijuana endeavor. Business booms, and a Mexican cartel takes notice, which ultimately leads to kidnapping of the bros best girl
Pixar's latest is a gorgeous pre-medieval Scottish adventure. Young Merida is preparing for an arranged marriage to one of three suitors representing clans of the kingdom ruled by her father, King Fergus
Seeking A Friend For The End Of The World
In this dramedy, Dodge (Steve Carell) keeps going through his insurance salesman paces. But the world around him goes crazy. Dodge decides to set out to find the high school sweetheart who got away
The Hummer-driving schlub at the center of 'Dark Horse' has hit his mid-30s without realizing just how many unfortunate personality traits fight every second for dominance of his everyday life
Ridley Scott returns to the big screen in this long-awaited, sort-of 'Alien' prequel, and the result is a little bit of everything. The film works as elegant and stately sci-fi
Aligning closely with the Brothers Grimm version, this film follows Snow White (Kristen Stewart) as she escapes her evil stepmother queen, Ravenna (Charlize Theron)
Peace, Love and Misunderstanding
Casting Jane Fonda as a tie-dyed hippie, smoking her weed while listening to her vinyl up in Woodstock, N.Y., lends 'Peace, Love & Misunderstanding' an air of nostalgic authenticity
Wes Anderson's latest -- the sweetly yearning 'Moonrise Kingdom' -- is a fable about what it feels like to be 12 years old and afflicted by a romantic crush the size of a planet
Long-buried vampire Barnabas awakens from his 200-year hiatus to find himself in 1972. The vamp comically grapples with the new age, reading hardback editions of 'Love Story,' devouring hippies while wondering who these freaks are, exactly
As the skillfully told, small-scale drama 'Sound of My Voice' unfolds, a young couple join a mysterious, smock-wearing cult of budding survivalists operating secretly and seemingly benignly
From the folks behind 'Wallace & Gromit' comes this enjoyable pirate tale, an interesting and funny mix of stop-motion and digital animation
Someone in 1849 Baltimore is on a murder spree, riffing on methods of torture and execution depicted in the stories of melancholic, alcoholic Edgar Allan Poe (John Cusack)
Mei (Catherine Chan) has information, a string of memorized numbers, that the Chinese and Russian mafias have to have
Five college friends pile into a camper for a frolicsome vacation. Early on, we're shown that they're being watched very closely
In 2079, Snow (Guy Pearce), an ex-CIA operative, gets strong-armed into a trip to a space station prison that's been taken over by its psychotic inmates. Oh, and the president's daughter (Maggie Grace) needs rescuing
Perseus (Sam Worthington) is now a widower and single father, having given up soldiering until a multiheaded creature invades his village and he must reveal the powers he possesses as half man, half god
That a film as delicate, personal and small-scale as 'The Salt of Life,' directed and co-written by Italy's Gianni Di Gregorio, exists at all is a function of fate and chance
The film follows Civil War veteran John Carter (Taylor Kitsch), who gets transported somehow to the planet Barsoom. He's thrust in the middle of another civil war, naturally falling for a Heliumite princess (Lynn Collins)
This new animated feature does a few smaller things right but the bigger things not quite. With some cooked-up elements like a corporate villain and a pair of nominally sympathetic young humans, enough is different here to be offputting
Michael Phillips
This film, which started as a Navy recruiting video and stars several actual SEALs, depicts a team sent into Costa Rica to extract a captured comrade. There's a drug lord, Muslim terrorist, all kinds of modern weaponry, and true-to-life teamwork
CIA operatives played by Chris Pine and Tom Hardy fall for the same woman, a consumer products tester played by Reese Witherspoon. At first the boys agree to let the best agent win
Bill Wine
This Means War was directed by McG. What does that mean? It means that those of us watching this romantic-triangle romp featuring Reese Witherspoon at the vertex are at the mercy of a pretentious, uni-monickered director with a sledgehammer style and absolutely no sense of humor
Michael Phillips
Denzel Washington plays Tobin Frost, a spy in from the cold, who is brought to a CIA safe house in Capetown, South Africa, to be interrogated for the super-secret intel he has
Bill Wine
Denzel Washington stars as the CIA's most dangerous traitor. He's a renegade operative and suspected double agent who has been on the run for more than a decade
Bill Wine
Daniel Radcliffe stars as a young lawyer at the turn of the last century. He travels to an isolated coastal village to settle the legal affairs of a reclusive widow
Michael Phillips
Arthur Kipps (Daniel Radcliffe) is sent north to settle the affairs of its recently deceased owner. Years ealier, Alice Drablow lost her little boy in the nearby marsh. His cries can still be heard. Kipps comes to learn the truth of the creepy village
Michael Phillips
Liam Neeson stars as a heartbroken loner named John Ottway, on the verge of suicide as his plane crashes in the Alaskan wilderness. Ottway and his fellow workers must brave horrible conditions and a hungry pack of oversized wolves on their trail
Bill Wine
Throwing its characters to the wolves -- literally -- to see how they fare is a central component of The Grey's anatomy. Liam Neeson stars as loner John Ottway
The year is 1987; the place is LA's Bourbon Room, whose debaucheries have drawn the ire of the clean-it-up! mayor's wife (Catherine Zeta-Jones). All is riding on soul-spent rocker Stacie Jaxx (Tom Cruise)
The fetching new comedy 'Safety Not Guaranteed' is based on a classified ad that ran in Backwoods Home magazine in the 1990s and then, years later, thanks to the Internet, acquired a viral life for itself
Turns out, an alien serial killer Boris the Animal has traveled back in time to save an arm and avoid lunar prison. So Agent J (Will Smith) goes back in time to save the day
The new Sacha Baron Cohen offender 'The Dictator' wages war with itself, crude nonsense up against crude nonsense that's really funny. This one's plottier than 'Borat' or 'Bruno'
Here it is. The great conjunction. The culmination of it all. The players: Iron Man, Captain America, The Hulk, Thor, Hawkeye and Black Widow. Their nemesis: Thor's evil brother, the god Loki, hellbent on conquering Earth
The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
A comedy-drama saved by the casting bell, 'The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel' arranges for a tiptop collection of British character women and men to bring out the best in a pleasantly predictable story
Maybe it's a case of emotions getting the better of filmmaker Lawrence Kasdan. 'Darling Companion' is close to his heart, inspired by Mac, the dog he and wife Meg rescued from a shelter
"Think Like a Man" stays relaxed yet lively and is actually pretty funny. Though it leans pretty heavily on gender war generalizations, the movie and its charming characters draw us in and keep us laughing
Logan (Zac Efron) is a Marine vet who's rattled, isolated and ripe for the right woman to come along. In a night raid in Iraq, Logan finds a photo of a smiling woman in the rubble. Upon returning home, he sets out to find her (Taylor Schilling)
The original cast returns for yet another installment in the 'American Pie' series. A high-school reunion brings together Jim and his band-camp wife, Stifler, sportscaster Oz and that other guy
The ship so nice they sank it twice, only this time, with a 3-D up-charge. James Cameron's 1997 film returns for the 100th anniversary of the doomed vessel's voyage
This long-awaited adaptation of Suzanne Collins' cult-classic YA novel series doesn't disappoint. Jennifer Lawrence carries the film but is far from the only good part
The Dardennes' latest is one of their best. 'The Kid With a Bike' is a memorable cinematic portrait of troubled youth and soul-saving charity
Elizabeth Olsen (Sarah) plays the 'girl in jeopardy' in this thriller, set in a family's creaky old lake house that they're about to sell. A girl, suddenly alone in a boarded-up house in the middle of nowhere
When an idiosyncratic talent seeks a wider audience for her work, there's a danger in trading the offbeat for something more on-the-nose. This is what has happened in 'Friends With Kids,' a smooth but frustrating third feature with an extremely good ensemble cast
Michael Phillips
Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance
Nicolas Cage returns in this superhero-thriller followup to Ghost Rider that's based on the Marvel Comic of the same name
This latest film from Japan's Studio Ghibli brings the classic Mary Norton novel 'The Borrowers' into animation. Arrietty, 14 and ready to bloom, lives under the floorboards of a house with her equally miniature father and mother
Bill Wine
The Clock family are miniature people -- 4 inches tall -- who live surreptitiously beneath the floorboards in a regular-sized human family's residence. Arrietty is a headstrong 14-year-old who lives with her parents under a suburban home undetected by anyone in the mansion overhead
Michael Phillips
Paige (Rachel McAdams) is sent flying through a car windshield. She survives but a traumatic brain injury leaves her with no memory of meeting or marrying her husband Leo (Channing Tatum)
Bill Wine
This sweet-natured strumming of the heartstrings has an interesting premise: an amnesiac cannot remember her husband. It's a romantic melodrama that tries to make us fall in love
Michael Phillips
Three whales get trapped under the ice off the coast of Alaska. A slew of competing interests flock to the scene. Drew Barrymore plays a Greenpeace organizer, whose ex-boyfriend (John Krasinski) is a news reporter covering the story
Bill Wine
John Krasinski plays a TV news reporter from Anchorage when he discovers a trio of whales blocked from migrating south to Mexico: they're trapped under an immense slab of ice
Michael Phillips
Sam Worthington plays an ex-cop and a convicted thief on the lam, and he's threatening suicide. With Elizabeth Banks, Anthony Mackie and Ed Harris, the supporting cast does well here
Bill Wine
This suspense thriller about a guy who threatens to jump to his death from the top of a high-rise building stars Sam Worthington as an ex-cop and ex-con who was convicted of theft but who has just escaped from prison
Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted
This third installment is one of the fanciest, most carefully assembled cartoons ever put on screen. The gang is still stranded and yearning to get back where they belong
Donny (Adam Sandler) is a washed-up punk who, at age 13, fathered a child (Andy Samberg). Donny comes crashing back into his son Todd's life just as he's about to marry the wrong woman
What to Expect When You're Expecting
The ensemble cast of assorted couples cope with pregnancies planned and unplanned, adoption, and the epic change coming to their lives in "What to Expect When You're Expecting"
Taylor Kitsch and Alexander Skarsgard play Navy men trying to stop the alien invasion, and Rihanna, Brooklyn Decker and Liam Neeson are also along for the ride
Believe it or not, but this is actually a quality, enjoyable rom-com, starring Jason Segal and the fabulous Emily Blunt
Do sad movies always make you cry? That's great. Get ready to feel good afterward
Chimpanzee is a documentary that follows a baby chimp named Oscar as he struggles to learn the ways of his tribe and to survive in the dense rain forests of Africa's Ivory Coast
There are a hundred reasons 'Bully' is a good film instead of a great one, but Lee Hirsch's blood-boiling documentary will very likely end up doing more than its share of good in this world
The Farrelly brothers' long-time-coming 'Stooges' movie comes across as sincerely affectionate and a tad eerie
There are so many drooly food shows on TV these days, it takes an exceptional subject to arrest our senses and hold our attention. Now 86, Jiro Ono -- the world's premier sushi chef -- is that subject
This mashup retelling of the Snow White fairy tale, brought to us by inventive director Tarsem Singh, occupies the divide between Disney and Grimm, zinging along on the comic timing of its cast
Odd couple cops, Schmidt (Jonah Hill) and Jenko (Channing Tatum), go undercover as high school students to bring down a drug ring. But high school's changed since the duo's teenage days, and they struggle to relate to the modern cliques
'Jeff, Who Lives at Home' could be just another quirky, abrasive and unconventional relationship comedy from the Duplass Brothers. But it is much, much more
In this 'Hangover' for high schoolers, Thomas (Thomas Mann) and Costa (Oliver Cooper) plan a parents-out-of-town birthday party. Costa is hellbent on turning this fete into an epic party that will be the 'game changer' for their social status
'Undefeated' presents itself as a look at a single season in the life of a striving high school football team in impoverished North Memphis, Tenn., but really it's about so much more
George (Paul Rudd) and Linda (Jennifer Aniston) lose their shirts when George's company is shut down by the Feds. They head south to stay with George's brother Rick. Along the way, they stumble across a hippie commune
Kenneth Turan
'In Darkness' is a pitiless glimpse into the inferno, into hell not only on earth but below it. Based on a true story, it visits the sewers of the Polish city of Lvov during World War II, a place where a group of Jews lived for more than a year
Bill Wine
Journey 2: The Mysterious Island
Here's a sequel that's pretty much the equal of its predecessor. It's an escapist action-adventure thriller for kids, a followup to Journey to the Center of the Earth
Michael Phillips
Journey 2: The Mysterious Island
Josh Hutcherson returns as Sean, now 17, and yet to warm up to his stepfather (Dwayne Johnson). Along comes a cryptogram containing news that Jules Verne's mysterious island was no imaginative figment
Michael Phillips
Madonna's second feature as director, 'W.E.,' turns 'The King's Speech' on its side, focusing on the much-maligned Baltimore socialite Wallis Simpson. This was the woman who conquered the heart of King Edward VIII
Roger Moore
Teenagers acquire super powers on videotape in this new sci-fi romp. Nerdy Andrew (Dane DeHaan) will bully his bullies and try to save his dying mom. Cerebral Matt (Alex Russell) will test out 'free will.' And popular Steve (Michael B. Jordan) will enhance his popularity
Michael Phillips
Ralph Fiennes has conjured a very fine film of 'Coriolanus,' in which the actor makes his feature directorial debut. It's worth seeing simply for Vanessa Redgrave's Volumnia, the Roman soldier's fearsome mother
Sheri Linden
Albert Nobbs, he is actually a she. For reasons we learn gradually, burdens have led this woman (Glenn Close) to initiate a decadeslong masquerade and then to lose herself beneath her own facade
Bill Wine
Glenn Close plays Albert Nobbs, a woman passing as a man in 19th-century Ireland so that she can make a decent living. She stays out of trouble until Albert makes the acquaintance of Hubert Page (Janet McTeer)
Bill Wine
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
It's not extremely loud, but it is incredibly close. To our hearts and minds. This is a poignant, stimulating drama about the tragic effects and aftermath of the attacks on 9/11
Sheri Linden
Based on Geling Yan's novel, the story gathers an improbable collection of people in the nominal refuge of a Catholic cathedral as the Chinese capital falls to Japan's Imperial Army
Michael Phillips
In Steven Soderbergh's globe-trotting revenge thriller, martial arts star Gina Carano delivers some serious beatdowns. Special operative Mallory Kane (Carano) is being set up for a double cross and suspects as much
Bill Wine
Steven Soderbergh has gone Haywire. For his dip in the action-genre pool, he offers a series of life-threatening predicaments that his protagonist must fight her way out of
Michael Phillips
In 1944 Italy, African-American pilots finally get their shot to prove their worth in the air. The filmmaking comes across as more in love with its digital effects than the characters
Bill Wine
Bill Wine
It's a historical drama about the Tuskegee Airmen, the first group of African-American fighter pilots in the United States' armed forces
The Iron Lady
Bill Wine
Meryl Streep portrays former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher in the biographical drama about not only the only woman to hold the post, but the person who held it the longest
Michael Phillips
Some movies arrive pre-stamped with a consensus opinion. With 'The Iron Lady,' the consensus so far is this: Meryl Streep excels as Margaret Thatcher. And the movie itself does not work
Michael Phillips
With amazing cel animation, impressive vocal performances, and unforgettable characters, this movie reminds us of what animation was capable of before the rise of computers and Pixar
Bill Wine
Set in New Orleans, Contraband centers on the predicament of one Chris Farrady (Mark Wahlberg), a legendary smuggler, who is trying desperately to leave the dangerous, high-stakes world of international smuggling behind in the name of protecting his family
Michael Phillips
Mark Wahlberg plays Chris Farraday, an ex-smuggler who gets sucked back in. A nasty drug lord is owed money by Farraday's brother-in-law. Now Farraday has to get beaucoup counterfeit bills from Panama to New Orleans in a jiffy
Bill Wine
This dialogue-driven dark comedy of manners is based on Yasmina Reza's play, God of Carnage, about two sets of parents who meet to discuss the playground altercation that their tween sons have recently gotten into
Bill Wine
The Devil Inside is a spooky thriller about a woman who becomes involved with a series of exorcisms as part of her investigation into just what happened to her mother, who murdered three people while possessed
Joyful Noise
Michael Phillips
This serviceable musical contraption takes place in a hard-hit Georgia town, where the multiracial members of the Divinity Church Choir take their act to the competition stage
Bill Wine
In the Land of Blood and Honey
This grim, bittersweet love story in the midst of a tragic and savage war stars Goran Kostic as Christian Serb Danijel, a Yugoslav policeman who meets Ajla, a delicate Muslim artist played by Zana Marjanovic
Michael Phillips
In the Land of Blood and Honey
In '90s Sarajevo, a Bosnian Muslim painter dances at a nightclub with a Bosnian Serb police officer, played by Goran Kostic. Then a bomb explodes
Michael Phillips
Silent film star George Valentin (Jean Dujardin) struggles to stay relevant at the end of the silent era. He meets would-be starlet Peppy Miller (Berenice Bejo), who dreams of success, and as her stock rises at the studio, Valentin's plummets.
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Bill Wine
The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Pt 1
Michael Phillips
The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Pt 1
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
The period drama concerns the turbulent and shifting relationships among psychiatrists Carl Jung (Michael Fassbender) and his mentor, Sigmund Freud (Viggo Mortensen).
Michael Phillips
It's 1914, and Joey, a farm horse, is sold to the army and thrust into World War I. But will he ever find Albert (Jeremy Irvine), the farmer's son he's forced to leave behind?
Michael Phillips
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)
Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig) and his unlikely colleague, the heavily pierced Lisbeth (Rooney Mara), go about nailing a killer of women. All roads lead to a rich family led by Henrik Vanger
Bill Wine
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)
Michael Phillips
Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol
Bill Wine
Sherlock Holmes:
A Game Of Shadows
Michael Phillips
Sherlock Holmes:
A Game Of Shadows
Michael Phillips
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Michael Phillips
Michael Phillips
Remember the name Adepero Oduye. The luminous actress makes this new, coming-of-age drama exceptional. Oduye plays Alike, a young woman slowly coming out as a lesbian at various speeds
Bill Wine
It's the story of a horse. And his boy. And their war. This old-fashioned epic melodrama is set against the sweeping canvas of rural England and the nightmarish battlefields in France during the First World War
Michael Phillips
Benjamin Mee (Matt Damon) is a widower with two children who quits his job and, searching for a fresh start for his preteen daughter along with his grieving son, finds exactly what he wasn't looking for: a zoo on the skids.
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Roger Moore
Alvin and the Chipmunks:
Chipwrecked
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Here is -- with votes offered and tallied by the firm of Me, Myself, and I -- the list of one grateful moviegoer's choices for the Top Ten Moviegoing Experiences of 2011
With the 2011 calendar winding down and the Oscar races heating up, what are the end-of-the-year-and-in-some-cases-immediately-thereafter flicks that we'll be flocking to during the holiday season and beyond? Here's this year's lineup of end-of-the-year hopeful blockbusters, best-selling-book adaptations, built-in-audience sequels, and get-out-the-vote Oscar contenders that flaunt their pedigrees as we wait for them to open
The Descendants
Bill Wine
George Clooney stars as a real estate lawyer living in Hawaii with his wife and two daughters who is somewhat of a land baron these days, because he has been put in charge of managing his extended family's land trust on the island of Kauai that represents the last untouched inheritance of Hawaiian royalty
Bill Wine
Bill Wine
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Roger Moore
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Bill Wine
A Very Harold and Kumar 3D Christmas
Michael Phillips
A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas
Michael Phillips
Michael Phillips
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Betsy Sharkey
The Way
Bill Wine
'The Way' is an inspirational drama starring Martin Sheen as a bereaved father, who comes to France to collect the remains of his son, played in flashbacks and visions by Emilio Estevez who has been killed during a storm in the Pyrenees while walking on a Christian pilgrimage route in Spain
The Ides of March
Michael Phillips
In this political suspense film, Ryan Gosling stars as a spokesman for a governor (George Clooney) seeking the nomination for president. Philip Seymour Hoffman plays the campaign's manager; Paul Giamatti plays his counterpart.
The Ides of March
Bill Wine
"The Ides of March" is an absorbing drama as well as an ends-and-means morality tale about integrity and loyalty, soul-selling and seduction, compromise and corruption, and betrayal. And that's just before lunch. Ryan Gosling stars as the strategist for the charismatic governor of Pennsylvania (George Clooney), who is vying to win the crucial presidential primary in Ohio
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Robert Abele
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Roger Moore
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Michael Phillips
Roger Moore
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Michael Phillips
Bill Wine
Set in Iran but shot in Lebanon, for obvious reasons, the coming-of-age drama 'Circumstance' stars two photogenic and expressive marvels, Nikohl Boosheri and Sarah Kazemy, as teenage friends and lovers living under the thumb of an oppressive regime
Apollo 18 is a fake-found-footage horror thriller. That is, it's purportedly a documentary about the final moon landing, conducted surreptitiously by NASA in 1974, offered as an explanation of why we as a nation have stopped going to the moon
'The Debt' toggles between two time sequences. In 1997, three veterans of Mossad, Israel's secret service, are forced to revisit the truth behind their roughest assignment when the daughter of the agent played by Helen Mirren publishes a book about her mother and what happened in 1965-1966 in East Berlin
The Debt is a remake of an Israeli thriller about a legendary hunt for a notorious Nazi war criminal that examines that ever-elusive boundary between legend and truth. The espionage drama begins in 1997 as shocking news reaches retired Mossad agents Rachel (Helen Mirren) and Stefan (Tom Wilkinson) about former colleague David (Ciaran Hinds)
Vera Farmiga directs and stars in this independent film about a woman who confronts the limitations of her life and then redefines her life completely. Farmiga's film doesn't state things directly, but we sense what is happening to her character, Corinne, and how some turn to fundamentalism for complex and interconnected reasons
There's funny and then there's funny, and 'A Good Old-Fashioned Orgy' is neither. Jason Sudeikis of 'Saturday Night Live' starts as Eric, who leads plans for a raucous Labor Day weekend at his dad's place on Long Island
Plot? Who needs a plot? Not this R-rated comedy, which delivers just what its title promises and nothing more. Jason Sudeikis stars as Eric, the leader of a group of thirtysomethings who have long enjoyed gathering whenever possible for elaborate theme parties at his family's summer home in the Hamptons.
Set during the brief, brutal 2008 flare-up between Russia and Georgia, '5 Days of War' has some exhilarating moments, but they're dampened by concessions to overly theatrical dialogue and inadvertently comic slo-mo
A young golfer has a meltdown in the middle of a tournament, followed by seven days of perspective-patching among mild-mannered, God-fearing folk in rural Texas. Faith and 'fore' walk hand in hand in this soft-centered, faith-based drama starring Lucas Black.
This golf flick is not par for the course in that it's a faith-based golf drama. That's right: it's about playing golf, finding God, then playing golf better. Among other things. Lucas Black plays a talented young Texas golfer intent on making the pro tour
Ned (Paul Rudd) has a penchant for causing inadvertent chaos. His three sisters balance out Ned's antics: Miranda (Elizabeth Banks), a weaselly magazine writer; Natalie (Zooey Deschanel), a bisexual artist's model; and Liz (Emily Mortimer), a repressed wife married to a philandering filmmaker
Guy Pearce and Katie Holmes play a couple renovating a spooky mansion, one with nasty little neighbors in the sub-basement. Bailee Madison plays Pearce's daughter, an unhappy girl who hears the whispered invitations of the monsters when no one else can. She must endure the horrors, while convincing her elders that she's not losing her mind
Colombiana follows the sexy, vengeful contract killer Cataleya (Zoe Saldana) signing her victims with lipstick. After a well-handled prologue gives us Cataleya as a child (Amandla Stenberg) witnessing the assassination of her next of kin by crime boss Don Luis (Beto Benites), we catch up with the beautiful adult Cataleya, now a hit-woman working for her uncle
In mediocrity lies opportunity. The new film version of Graham Greene's 1938 novel 'Brighton Rock' isn't very good, but if you haven't yet seen the 1947 film version of Greene's book, do so! It's the right time.
We meet the whip-smart Emma (Anne Hathaway) when she's celebrating university graduation with Dexter (Jim Sturgess), an arrogant but sweet boy-man. Then we pop in and out of their lives across two decades as they go their separate ways, always wondering if they're meant to be
Our new Conan (Jason Momoa) is ripped out of his mother's womb on the battlefield. His father (Ron Perlman) trains him well. As a grown man, Conan must save the nations of Hyboria and protect the beautiful Tamara (Rachel Nichols) from the man who slew his father, the evil Khalar Zym.
This remake of the 1985 cult classic actually works. In suburban Las Vegas, Charley (Anton Yelchin) doesn't like the vampirish looks of his new neighbor, Jerry, played by Colin Farrell, who you can tell relishes every rascally, bloodthirsty come-on.
In 1960s Jackson, Miss., young Miss Skeeter (Emma Stone) undertakes a clandestine book project gathering stories from the African-American housekeepers and child-raisers. Skeeter elicits counsel and stories from Aibileen (Viola Davis) and Minny (Octavia Spencer) while standing off against the despicable queen bee of privilege and prejudice, Hilly (Bryce Dallas Howard)
Based on the book of the same name, 'The Help' is a racially charged but smartly understated portrait of the relationship between African-American maids and their white employers in Jackson, Mississippi in the early 1960s. Emma Stone, Viola Davis, and Octavia Spenser play the three central characters, and this triumvirate of actresses on the rise are uniformly fine
'30 Minutes or Less' pivots on Nick (Jesse Eisenberg), a pizza delivery guy who gets pulled into a tangled web of bank robbery and murder by Dwayne (Danny McBride). For most of the film, Nick runs around with explosives strapped to his chest, breaking the law with his buddy Chet (Aziz Ansari). The movie is sharp enough, but uneven
Bank heist flicks don't come much more convoluted and lowbrow than this one, a madcap action comedy set in Grand Rapids. Jesse Eisenberg stars as a pot-smoking slacker of a pizza delivery driver who is abducted by minor-league thugs Danny McBride and Nick Swardson. They need $100,000 so they abduct Nick and force him to rob a bank with a bomb vest strapped to him. The real-life incident that this plot parallels ended tragically, but here it's played for laughs
'The Whistleblower' tells the story of Kathy Bolkovac, a Nebraska police officer who signs on with a private contractor to act as a U.N. peacekeeper in Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1999. She goes for the money, really, needing it to aid in a custody battle for her kids, but she finds herself unable to remain a bystander when confronted by horrors she never expected
This darkly comic Irish thriller is set in rural Galway, on Ireland's west coast, where a small-town cop is rarely confronted with big-time crime. Brendan Gleeson stars as an unorthodox Irish policeman who is a maverick where rules are concerned. Don Cheadle is a by-the-book African-American FBI agent. They find themselves working together as monumentally mismatched partners who might need to turn themselves into a heroic odd couple of law enforcers
Rise of The Planet of The Apes
"Rise of The Planet of The Apes" follows a pharmaceutical researcher (James Franco) on a mission to develop a drug to cure Alzheimer's. He takes in an orphaned lab chimp, Caesar, who ends up responding extraordinarily well to the trial drug. The resulting 'rise' plays out
Rise of The Planet of The Apes
Say hello once again to the apes of wrath. Yep, they're on the rise: here are the creatures we came to know in 1968 in the original Planet of the Apes and subsequently in four sequels, then encountered again a decade ago in the remake. Now comes a reboot of the basic concept in a prequel
'The Change-Up' is a weak and uninteresting farce. Jason Bateman, playing a workaholic lawyer, and Ryan Reynolds, playing his bongaholic buddy, magically change places while peeing in a fountain one drunken evening
This is a persona-swapping fantasy comedy in which lifelong best buddies, living what seem diametrically opposed lifestyles, switch bodies and thus get to see how the other half lives. Jason Bateman is a married father and a sleep-deprived, buttoned-down lawyer. Ryan Reynolds plays his best friend, a bottom-swimming actor and hedonistic womanizer
In 'The Guard,' Gleeson's Gerry Boyle teams up with a visiting American FBI agent, played by Don Cheadle, to chase down (in an ambling sort of way) a rumored half-billion dollars' worth of cocaine smuggled into Ireland by a trio of bad 'uns, notably the icy-eyed killer played by Mark Strong
It is 1987 in betrayal- and corruption-choked Baghdad. Decorated army lieutenant Latif Yahia is summoned to Saddam Hussein's palace and ordered to become the body double for the decadent, sadistic, and megalomaniacal Uday Saddam Hussein
A desperado (Daniel Craig) wakes up one day in the desert in 1875 with a metallic weapon locked to his forearm and no memory of a recent alien encounter. Uniting with the local townsfolk of Absolution and a Civil War veteran ranch baron played by Harrison Ford, Craig's cowboy conspires to send the aliens back to their alien land
An LA wife and mother played by Julianne Moore announces that she wants a divorce from her husband (Steve Carell). Carell's character moves out, eventually coming under the tutelage of a ladykiller played by Ryan Gosling
Clumsy Smurf accidentally reveals the hidden Smurf Village to the evil wizard Gargamel, played to the hilt by Hank Azaria. As the mushroom-house villagers scatter into the forest, a half-dozen of them are sucked into a 'blue moon' vortex,' finding themselves in Central Park
This small movie with big ideas is a science fiction speculation, a star-crossed romance, a fantasy-drama about loss and guilt and redemption, and a meditation on second chances. And it takes on all those challenges with a minimum of fuss -- and financing
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
The film version of 'Snow Flower and the Secret Fan' proceeds as if willed into being by a particularly misguided 'question for discussion,' the kind you'd find at the tail end of a best-seller's paperback edition
Captain America: The First Avenger
Everything good about 'Captain America: The First Avenger,' which certainly is the most stylish comics-derived entertainment of the year. Director Joe Johnston's film is paced and designed for people who won't shrivel up and die if two or three characters take 45 seconds between combat sequences to have a conversation about world domination
'No relationship. No emotions. Just sex!' So says the hotshot website art director played by Justin Timberlake, recruited from his California gig for a New York City job as GQ magazine's design head. The woman he's pitching, an executive headhunter played by Mila Kunis, says she's up for it. The newbie and his savvy Manhattan sponsor fall into a fast friendship
To wit: a contemporary couple attempts to keep their relationship strictly physical, with no romantic involvement. Friends with Benefits features Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis. Friends with Benefits benefits from some friendly genre tweaking
In 1973, a wife brought a chimpanzee home to her husband and seven kids and proceeded to raise it in their Upper West Side brownstone in New York City along with, and as, one of her children. That's the springboard for this compelling documentary about a controversial scientific research experiment in the nature-versus-nurture vein
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2
In 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2', Harry (Daniel Radcliffe) is still hunting Horcruxes, which contain amounts of Voldemort's (played by Ralph Fiennes) soul. Smart yet not slavish direction, and the still-perfect casting from way back when, make this final chapter an entertaining and satisfying success
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2
Ten years and seven movies later, the imaginative, energetic, and climactic final installment in the admirably realized and fantastically successful series of movie adaptations of J. K. Rowling's epic, seven-novel fantasy about a boy wizard, finally -- or is it too quickly? -- arrives
Pooh has a very important thing to do. Sad old Eeyore (voiced by Bud Luckey) has lost his tail, and the gang makes various plans to round up a replacement. Voice actor Jim Cummings does a great impersonation of Sterling Holloway, the original Pooh, and the direction makes for a gentle and warm introduction to the cineplex for all the little tykes out there
Pitched directly at preschoolers, it would, it just so happens, do nicely as a youngster's first theatrical movie. It's a playful, modest reboot of a franchise that has enthralled young children for decades about a rotund 'bear of very little brain' and his woodland friends, the amiably bumbling residents of the Hundred Acre Wood
Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels Of A Tribe Called Quest
Musical groups come together and they come apart, and even the ones that come apart occasionally get back together for gigs and another fan-tantalizing prospect of a new album. So it is with A Tribe Called Quest, the subject of debut feature filmmaker Michael Rapaport's bracing documentary
What "How to Live Forever" does for its audience is get them to think about what ultimately gives life meaning. And this focus on the cognitive wrestling match that pits quantity of life versus quality of life is a fascinating and crucial consideration that, let's face it, proves to be of more interest and urgency the older you are
In this comedy, three friends played by Jason Bateman, Jason Sudeikis and Charlie Day dare themselves to murder their bosses. Advised by their 'murder consultant,' played by Jamie Foxx, the friends make awkward attempts to off people while hilarity ensues. Kevin Spacey turns in a great performance as Bateman's boss, and Jennifer Aniston does what she can
Call them what you will, bosses aren't always so boss. Thus the premise here, in which three friends commiserate with one another because each of them feels he works for the Boss from Hell. Bateman, Sudeikis and Day play three buddies who are tormented in various ways by their respective employers, played by Kevin Spacey, Colin Farrell and Jennifer Aniston. So they plot to kill them
In "Zookeeper", Griffin (Kevin James), a zookeeper, receives dating advice from the critters in his charge. While Griffin has eyes for the out-of-his-league beauty played by Leslie Bibb, he gets all the advice he can handle from Joe the Lion (voiced by Sly Stallone), Janet the Lioness (Cher), a monkey (Adam Sandler) and even Bernie the Bear (Nick Nolte)
Zookeeper is family film in which Kevin James talks to the animals. He's the protagonist of this talking-critter comedy, an indifferently made gimmickfest that wants to be childlike but is only childish. Some talking-animal movies charm while others soil the rug. Zookeeper fits squarely in the latter category
Page One: Inside the New York Times
This print-journalism-as-endangered-species documentary chronicles the workings and worries, the adjustments and accommodations, the merits and missteps, and the trials and tribulations of the nation's paper of record. The film tries to take the digital-age temperature during the ongoing metamorphosis of serious news reporting, investigative journalism, and the daily newspaper
The Names of Love (Le Nom des Gens)
Director Michel Leclerc and his co-writer Baya Kasmi illuminate the ethnic, racial and religious issues that have beset France from World War II to the present -- through, surprisingly, the unfolding of a classic romantic comedy plot. 'Le Nom des Gens' ('The Names of Love') is so inspired and insightful that it is frequently hilarious yet does not shy away from tragedy
With elements of Jurassic Park, Ghostbusters, and The Blair Witch Project, The Troll Hunter is a merry monster mockumentary that explores the fantastical and embraces the bizarre in matter-of-fact fashion. The title character, a bearded woodsman named Hans, agrees to allow a three-student film crew to accompany him as he investigates a series of mysterious bear killings in the countryside
Monte Carlo follows Grace (Selena Gomez), a small-town Texas girl who travels to Paris with waitress pal Emma (Katie Cassidy) and third wheel Meg (Leighton Meester). The threesome gets separated from the group after an Eiffel Tower visit, and Grace is mistaken for a British socialite (also played by Gomez), for whom she is a dead ringer. Then it's off to Monte Carlo
Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon
In this third installment, we learn that the NASA space program was a cover-up that allowed the crew of Apollo 11 to explore the alien ruins on the dark side of the moon. Sam (Shia LaBeouf) returns with a new girlfriend (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley). And once again, the Autobots (our friends) take on the Decepticons (not our friends), with humanity in the middle
Transformers: Dark of the Moon
Transformers: Dark of the Moon is once again. Once again, it's good robots versus bad robots. Once again, it's full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. And once again, unless you can think of nothing more entertaining than watchin' stuff blow up, it's a collective sleeping pill, with Shia LaBeouf saving the world yet again
This Tom Hanks directed (and co-produced and co-written) rom-com is the neediest movie of the year, and one of the phoniest. Julia Roberts plays a washed-up community college instructor. Tom Hanks plays a washed-up, laid-off divorcee who returns to school and winds up in guess who's class
Larry Crowne is a low-keyed recession-era comedy that examines the need for reinventing oneself during challenging times. Tom Hanks plays the upbeat and affable title character, who -- even though he has excelled at, and been acknowledged for, his fine work, but because he doesn't have a college degree -- loses his job at a big-box retailer
A public school teacher, Elizabeth (Cameron Diaz) blows most of her classroom time showing her students movies like 'Lean on Me' and 'Dangerous Minds' while she nurses a hangover or longs for her next bong hit. A darling substitute teacher (Justin Timberlake) gives Elizabeth a clear goal: raise 10 grand for a boob job to bag a new man
[Also, Check Out Bill Wine's Review of "Bad Teacher"]
Director John Lasseter's effort smooshes the old gang into a nefarious James Bond universe, heavy on the missiles and ray guns and electrocutions. It's peculiar. Lightning McQueen (voiced by Owen Wilson) competes in World Grand Prix races from Tokyo to Paris. Meanwhile, Tow Mater (Larry the Cable Guy) is mistaken for a secret agent
2010 was a season of remakes, sequels and superheroes. So what's in store for 2011? You got it: more remakes, sequels and superheroes. We run through the summer movie lineup and tell you which films look worthy of a trip to the theater
Neither Jim Carrey nor the six penguins with whom he co-stars are shown to any kind of advantage. He does it again here in a strained kids' comedy that's loosely based on the 1938 children's book of the same name by Richard and Florence Atwater
Ewan McGregor plays Oliver, a 38-year-old Los Angeles graphic designer who's coping with the fact that his 75-year-old widower father -- Hal (Christopher Plummer) -- is gay. It's also when Hal is diagnosed with terminal cancer. Melanie Laurent plays Anna, a free-spirited French actress whom OIiver would appear to be falling for
It's a good time, this J.J. Abrams-directed, Steven Spielberg-produced movie. Joe, the young teenage son of a local police officer, is making a zombie movie with his friends in their hilly Ohio steel town. One night while filming a scene on the train platform, an Air Force train derails before their very eyes, some strange boxcar cargo making its presence known
'X-Men: First Class' settles for moderately engrossing mutant superheroism. Directed with efficiency by Matthew Vaughn, the movie juggles full roster of mutants as it heads toward the finish line and the answer to the question: What really happened to provoke, and then narrowly avert, the 1962 Cuban missile crisis?
This may be the most overtly Christian mainstream picture since 'The Passion of the Christ.' However, Malick's film comes with a generosity of spirit large enough to get all sorts of people (including non-believers) thinking about the nature of faith and what it's all about
The swank, engaging documentary 'L'Amour Fou' does what it can to explain why Yves Saint Laurent found much of that profession difficult, deadline-dependent -- a grind, at times, like any other line of work. Even as he retreated from public view, waging battles with chemical addiction and depression, Saint Laurent remained the public image of high fashion
'The Hangover Part II' substitutes Bangkok for Las Vegas. Stu is marrying a Thai-American woman in her family's native land. Again, a night of extreme debauchery leaves the lads clueless and foggy-brained, searching for a missing person, and trying to be funny
Kung Fu Panda 2 delivers more heart than laughs. Cuddly Po is now an accomplished Dragon Warrior, meting out justice with his mad kung fu skillz. But there is a new threat, Lord Shen who has a new weapon that could be the end of kung fu
You can read the story as a psychological fable, with T.J. as the questing ego, Hesher as the uninhibited id and Paul as the disapproving, controlling superego, all learning to cooperate. Or you can just kick back and take it on the level of a wild, gritty and slyly funny
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides
Director Rob Marshall's effort does remind us that Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) really was a good time in the first installments of this franchise. The fountain of youth serves as the booty here, and its eternal riches are being pursued by Sparrow, Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush), a rogue Spanish pirate (Penelope Cruz) and Blackbeard (Ian McShane), among many others
This based-on-a-true-story film begins with surfer girl Bethany Hamilton (AnnaSophia Robb) sketching out the details of her life in a voice-over. She lives in Hawaii, has a loving family and wants nothing more than to be a pro surfer.
"Source Code" takes place mostly on a train speeding toward the Chicago Loop carrying a terrorist's bomb. Jake Gyllenhaal plays war veteran Colter Stevens who must relive the 8 minutes before detonation repeatedly as part of some top-secret government experiment.
New home, new life: That's what the couple played by Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne and their three kids want from their new bungalow. The family slowly realizes that it's playing host to supernatural guests. First, a few bumps in the night, a missing keepsake or two. Then ...
This latest animation / live-action movie from the producing-writing team behind "Despicable Me" is almost unashamedly middle of the road about its intentions. Russell Brand voices E.B., teenage rabbit heir to the noble mantle of Easter Bunny
Relentless in its diagrammatic A-to-B-to-C progression, director David Schwimmer's "Trust" is a squirm-inducing story of the seduction, criminal sexual assault and traumatic recovery of a 14-year-old who runs afoul of an online predator
A sports movie in which winning is neither everything nor the only thing. Friendship, honesty and a clear conscience all count for more in 'Win Win' than the triumph of the human spirit, though in its depiction of an underdog wrestling team getting it together, it offers enough of that material -- in a funny, low-key way, that is
Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules
The first 'Wimpy Kid' film did little justice to the books. It did, however, capture enough of the fan base to warrant a sequel. Greg (Zachary Gordon) is heading into 7th grade. His tormenting older brother Rodrick (Devon Bostick) plays drums and has rock n' roll dreams. Rodrick and Greg become enemies, then uneasy allies, then enemies, then friends
The time is the 1960s. Up in Brattleboro, Vt., a greedy, quasi-incestuous stepfather commits his stepdaughter to an asylum. With a lobotomy in her near future, this young woman, Babydoll (Emily Browning), joins forces with a few other tough-as-nails unfortunates -- Sweet Pea, Rocket, Blondie and Amber -- and plots an escape
The moody, well-acted new adaptation of Charlotte Bronte's novel honors the source material. What makes Jane Eyre worth watching, for starters, is Wasikowska. Bronte's Jane is bullied, beaten, humiliated and marginalized by her guardians and the wider world around her. Then she arrives at Thornfield Hall and her destiny
The Lincoln Lawyer gives Matthew McConaughey his due, a role that plays right into his wheelhouse, a slick, hustling lawyer. But what game can Mick (McConaughey) run when he is hired by Beverly Hills money to defend a very rich and seemingly quite dangerous young man who insists on his innocence? Mick quickly realizes he's in over his head
If you allow its windswept silences to work on you, 'Meek's Cutoff' gathers its own snakelike sense of momentum, as the people on screen make their way across the high plain desert en route to the Cascade Mountains (they hope) and the West Coast. The film observes characters under duress
Annie (Kristen Wiig), an unemployed pastry chef, is a bit of a sad sack. When her best friend, Lillian (Maya Rudolph), recruits Annie to be her maid of honor, Annie's ego gradually absorbs a series of blows inflicted by Lillian's newfound best pal, Helen (Rose Byrne)
The alcoholic son of an alcoholic, sales manager Nick Porter was born in a Raymond Carver short story. In this film, Will Ferrell brings him to life. It's the story of a bad day that turns into a five-day blur. Nick gets canned. He comes home to find all his belongings on the front lawn.
I've seen the fabulously acted Italian thriller 'The Double Hour' twice now, and for all its intricate manipulations, it stays with me for a very simple reason: The love story at its bittersweet heart is played for keeps.
On the planet Asgard, King Odin must choose an heir to the throne, either Thor or his undermining brother Loki. When his bloodthirsty actions get him banished, Thor is whooshed to New Mexico into the laps of research team members
Manhattan corporate attorney Sabrina Watson (Paula Patton) comes from money and from parents on the brink of divorce. Sabrina's broker fiance is the overprotected son of a postal clerk struggling with anger management
In 'The Beaver,' Mel Gibson plays Walter, the successful head of a toy company who has spiraled into a deep depression, to the horror of his wife (Jodie Foster), the skepticism of his valued colleague (Cherry Jones) and the confusion of his two sons
We join the original crew of road-racing bandits - Vin Diesel, Paul Walker and Jordana Brewster - robbing trains in Rio de Janeiro. With FBI agent Dwayne Johnson on their tail, they plan a $100 million caper that will allow their team [...]
Hayden Panettiere voices Red, who has taken time off from the Happily Ever After enforcement agency to train with the Sisters of the Hood, a variation on the Green Berets. In her absence, an villainous crone makes off with Hansel and Gretel. It's up to Red to [...]
Now this is how you adapt a play for the screen. Not by opening up the action in extraneous, travelogue-minded ways. But by burrowing so deeply into the characters' psyches, their discoveries become [...]
Limitless is a sleek black comedy about a pill that allows you to access your brain's full potential. Bradley Cooper plays Eddie Morra. Failing at life, Eddie runs into his ex-brother-in-law who slips him a pill by the name of NZT. Alakazam! Eddie's the most successful man alive! He scores in the stock market so well that mogul Carl Van Loon (Robert de Niro) comes calling. But of course, NZT comes with some side effects
Red Riding Hood takes place in a little village with a werewolf problem. All becomes paranoia when the monster kills the sister of the prettiest thing in town, Valerie (Amanda Seyfried). Valerie's hot for the woodcutter (Shiloh Fernandez), suffers from psychic communication with the wolf, and winds up getting accused of witchcraft by the local wolf-removal specialist (Gary Oldman)
Aliens attack Earth. They need water, and lots of it. A staff sergeant played by Aaron Eckhart must lead the charge and find a way to defeat these slimy, heavy-artillery-bearing jerks. It's about a handful of people trying to get to safety and not get killed in the process. The saving-the-world part is almost an afterthought. A refreshing take on a familiar story
The performance-capture animation isn't quite human and isn't quite animated, sticking the stylization in the uncanny valley of inexpressivity. Martians bring an earthling mother back to Mars to tend to their babies that pop out of the ground like potatoes. Joan Cusack plays the mom. Her reunion with her son (Seth Green) plays out against a 'Time Machine'-like Martian society
The Adjustment Bureau unfolds on two separate planes of reality: the human world as we know it and the world of the fate-masters pulling our strings and controlling our destinies. Senator David Norris (Matt Damon), by chance, meets a dancer, Elise (Emily Blunt). Their connection is immediate. They part. But the mysterious 'bureau' tries to prevent him from redirecting his future
Poetry is a small film and also a great one. 'Great' is a word I don't use often. Rampant critical overuse of 'great' has caused moviegoers to disbelieve claims of greatness on principle. But 'Poetry' was the most supple and satisfying narrative picture I saw last year at the Cannes Film Festival, and seeing it again nine months later has, for me, confirmed its value
This beery, coke-y tale is set among early 20-somethings looking for love and meaning in Los Angeles. Topher Grace plays a disillusioned MIT graduate stuck working at a video store in 1988, when cell phones the size of dinosaurs ruled the earth. The comedy echoes one '80s artifact after another, as Grace lies to impress his high school crush played by Teresa Palmer
A pet chameleon (voiced by Johnny Depp) finds himself suddenly free but lost in the desert, guided by a Quixote-like armadillo toward his destiny. This involves becoming the new sheriff of a miserable town called Dirt, the mayor of which controls the precious water supply. No one expects the new, citified boy in town to last long
Hall Pass stars Owen Wilson and Jason Sudeikis as Rick and Fred, married pals trying to score outside their marital playing fields with the one-week permission of their wives, Maggie, played by Jenna Fischer, and Grace, played by Christina Applegate.
In his latest film, 'Kaboom,' writer-director Gregg Araki is having a blast -- in more than one sense of the word -- that harks back to his cult films. The story here centers on a good-looking college freshman named Smith (Thomas Dekker), who becomes tangled up.
After a tragedy renders Jacob (Robert Pattinson) an orphan, he hops a freight train that winds up sweeping him up into the mad, mad world of the Benzini Bros. Circus. Jacob falls for the star of the show, Marlena (Reese Witherspoon), and has to deal with her sadistic ringleader husband played by Christoph Waltz
POM Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold
Morgan Spurlock makes first-person documentary filmmaking look easy and fun. He cracks up frequently on camera, in a "Get this!" or "Isn't this wild?" moment, and he's nothing if not a self-promoter, selling his latest feature-length stunt with, as they say, personality
Teenage girls at home by themselves on a dark night watch horror movies and get a phone call from the killer right outside. The film is jam-packed with stabbings, but the gore doesn't impart that salacious 'Saw'/'Hostel' feeling.
On April 17, 1865, three days after John Wilkes Booth assassinated Abraham Lincoln, boarding house owner Mary Surratt, along with seven others, was arrested on charges of conspiracy to kill the president. In the film version, Robert Redford directs an impressive cast
When Blue, a macaw, gets smuggled from his Brazilian jungle home to America, he finds himself in the care of Linda. Discovering that he's one of only two macaws left, Blu and Linda return to Rio to search for the other
Julian Schnabel broadens his canvas for his fourth film, 'Miral,' turning his lens on multiple protagonists and a half-century of Middle East strife. On the face of it a bold undertaking, the Jerusalem-set feature plays out with an awkward staidness.
In writer-director James Gunn's 'Super,' Rainn Wilson plays Frank, a sullen fry cook who is sick of feeling like a loser. His recovering addict wife has been seduced by a drug-dealing Lothario. Frank speaks to God, pleading for guidance.
The new 'Arthur,' which offers a fair number of laughs, will live or die at the box office on Russell Brand's brand of louche comic authority. Arthur falls for a sweet tour guide but is engaged to marry a rich girl. Helen Mirren reprises John Gielgud's role as the 'help'
In this well-made yet repellent action film, Saoirse Ronan plays the role of the teenage daughter of a trained CIA assassin, played by Eric Bana. In snowy Finland, the father schools his little girl in all manner of combat and survival tactics.
Danny McBride plays the weed-smoking younger brother of a hero figure played by James Franco. Their quest involves vanquishing their kingdom's archenemy and the recovery of Franco's squeeze-in-distress. Natalie Portman is the boys' fierce yet babesome partner in questing
Sleek and entertaining, 'Unknown' is a film about a man who knows who he is but everybody around him has forgotten. Botanist Martin Harris (Liam Neeson) and his wife, Liz (January Jones), arrive in Berlin for a biotechnology summit. One near-fatal taxicab accident later, Harris is in a coma. When he comes out of it, everything has changed
On the run from vicious Mogadorians who wiped out their beloved planet of Lorien, two surviving Loriens have taken the form of a teenage boy and his 'father,' the new guys in town. The boy (Alex Pettyfer) falls for an earthling (Dianna Agron) as the world-destroying Mogadorians try to keep them apart
"Just Go With" It fits the mold of most of Adam Sandler's latest ventures. Sandler plays a wealthy plastic surgeon with Jennifer Anniston as his forgiving assistant. Aniston's character agrees to pose as her boss's wife so that Sandler's latest squeeze (played by Brooklyn Decker) believes he's about to get divorced. Et cetera, et cetera
You've never seen Shakespeare told like this. This film is a deft, British animated re-telling of Shakespeare's romance set in adjacent English backyard gardens, with a lot of Elton John thrown in. Lady Blueberry keeps her blue gnomes on her side of the garden fence. But Gnomeo (James McAvoy) would rather be racing lawnmowers and chasing girls, in particular Juliet -- a red gnome
Set in 2nd century Roman Britain, this film stars Channing Tatum as Marcus, the warrior son of a warrior, who is determined to venture north of Hadrian's Wall with his Briton slave (Jamie Bell) in search of a mystical, golden eagle statue. Director Kevin Macdonald's middleweight epic meets expectations but can't exceed them, immersing audiences in the grime and chaos of Marcus' quest
Modest in every way, the screenplay by Phil Johnston is enjoyable in the telling even when the details smack of contrivance. Ed Helms, 'The Daily Show' alum who saved 'The Hangover' from its crassest impulses, plays the most sincere insurance agent in (fictional) Brown Valley, Wisconsin
Photographed with the same technology as Avatar, this film is the high-type 3-D. The characters, the dialogue, the tension -- well, Sanctum has some problems with those. An underwater cave diver, played by Richard Roxburgh, is leading his crew deep into 'the largest unexplored cave system in the world' off the coast of New Guinea
From South Korea, but straight out of Hollywood in spirit, the sleek remake of the sexual thriller 'The Housemaid' is best approached as an examination of what happens to wealthy people and their employees who live in a house decorated and furnished with a complete lack of earth tones
Young Michael (Colin O'Donoghue) opts to become a seminary student but can't go all the way. A tragic accident winds up sending Michael to Rome on a training program for exorcists. There he's assigned to shadow Father Lucas (Anthony Hopkins) a wizened pro. For an hour, the film delivers the expected, but with panache - even going so far as to acknowledge 'The Exorcist' leanings
Natalie Portman plays a bright but emotionally guarded L.A. doctor-in-training, who reconnects with a sometime acquaintance, played by Ashton Kutcher. His character has three defining traits: He's nice, annoyingly happy and a good lay. While Kutcher can't seem to carry a lead role, Portman's role is pleasantly nuanced, and the supporting cast is frustratingly talented here
Oscars Night Fit for The King's Speech
'The King's Speech' winds up the big winner at the 2011 Oscars, winning four Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Actor
83rd Academy Awards: Best Picture Nominations
83rd Academy Awards: Best Lead Actor Nominees
83rd Academy Awards: Best Lead Actress Nominees
My Favorite (Not Necessarily Best) Top 10 Movies
Top 12 Must-see Movies in 2011
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1
The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest
