Screen
I see clay people
Before Pixar flexed its artistic muscle (a muscle they could stand to exercise more frequently these days), the message in American animated films ranged from “always be true to yourself” to “always be true to yourself and also get heterosexually married...
Bourne to be bored
The Bourne trilogy includes three of the best action thrillers in cinema, with Jason Bourne portrayed by Matt Damon as an everyman who finds he’s been programmed by the CIA to be a deadly assassin. The third film ends with Bourne lured out of hiding by reporter Simon...
Comedians united
It seems like an odd way to start a review for a movie in which Will Ferrell tries to make Zach Galifianakis touch his testicles on stage during a debate, but The Campaign has a clever message...
Reel to reel | Week of August 16, 2012
AI WEIWEI: NEVER SORRY Ai Weiwei is China’s most famous international artist, and its most outspoken domestic critic. At Chez Artiste and Century. — Landmark Theatres THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN Peter Parker gets a new look (and an origin story) in this Marvel remake ...
Forgettable
If you’ve ever seen an online profile picture, chances are you’re familiar with the pursed-lips, craned-neck, supposedly slimming contortion known affectionately as “the duckface.” Total Recall is the sci-fi tale of a quasi-postapocalyptic duckface war between Kate ...
From artist to activist
When Chinese government officials unexpectedly detained controversial artist Ai Weiwei — keeping him for 81 days in an undisclosed location — it ignited a firestorm of protests across the world that reinforced Ai’s calls for democracy in China...
Who watches ‘The Watch,’ man?
Seeing as how it has an extraterrestrial plot, let’s describe The Watch using an astronomical metaphor. Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn, Jonah Hill and Richard Ayoade are like comedic planets that orbit a central, burning sun. And that sun is made entirely of penis jokes. ...
Savage beauty and the beasts
They should hand out oxygen tanks before each screening of Beasts of the Southern Wild because writer/director Benh Zeitlin’s debut feature film takes your breath in the very first scene and plays keep away with it for more than 90 minutes. When people kvetch about ...
