Est. 1998
“No funny stuff! And by funny stuff I mean holding hands, googoo eyes, misdirected woo- which is pretty much any John Woo film.” Yeah, I know, I quoted that Homer Simpson quip already in my Windtalkers review, but it unfortunately still applies. Who would have thought, back when Woo’s Hong Kong classics found their way into American video stores, that he’d end up making nondescript overblown Hollywood…
Many of this film’s detractors, and even some of its fans, will take part in furious Cruise-bashing, making cracks about his perfect white teeth, his perfectly coifed hair, his limited acting abilities… This has happened with every single flick Tom Cruise’s ever appeared in and I must say that I once couldn’t stand the pretty-boy superstar either. Since “Jerry Maguire”, though, I’ve found Cruise to…
But first, an irrelevant but amusing anecdote: I’m at the Paramount multiplex in downtown Montreal for the Friday, 1:55 show. I make a stop at the little boys’ wee-wee room and who do I see taking a piss? Quebec Prime Minister Jean Charest. I’ve long hoped for the chance to tell him face to face all the contempt I feel for him, but seeing this…
Some things you just can’t explain. You know something is wrong, it’s so big you can’t miss it, but you don’t do anything about it. You let this kid grow up, feeling more and more like a misfit… Eventually, you have to confront him before it’s too late, you have to tell him: “Buddy, you’re not an elf. You’re an orphaned human who, as a…
“The Matrix Revolutions” is not as involving and groundbreaking as the first Matrix (or as sexy and cool as their Bound), but it’s certainly more satisfying than last summer’s The Matrix Reloaded. Things look dire early on, with boring supporting characters spouting Star Trekish technical nonsense or yelling at our heroes as if they were the police chief in a bad cop movie. Zion is still an ugly place,…
Scary Movie and Scary Movie 2 weren’t great films of the cinema, but who are we kidding? These are dumb, vulgar, lowbrow spoofs meant to entertain mass audiences for 90 minutes and that’s that. Chances are they won’t even achieve that ten years down the line, when all the pop culture references are outdated, but right now these flicks are good for a few laughs. You probably noticed…
Roy (Nicolas Cage) is such a good con artist that he’s conned himself in thinking that he’s spectacularly obsessive-compulsive, freaking about outdoors and dirt, full of tics and odd habits, popping pills and chain-smoking… When in fact, he’s a pretty normal guy. A little neurotic, sure, but not the twitching nutcase he sometimes works himself into. He starts thinking that maybe it’s his conscience that’s…
“You just never fucking know.” Yes, the trailer looked bad. Yes, reshoots and multiple release date changes are usually a bad sign. Yes, J-Lo and B-Aff are overexposed… But does that mean the movie during the shooting of which they met must be bashed like it’s the end of civilisation? I find it so pathetic to see the critical establishment elbowing each other to come…
8 years after their first big screen romp, the boys are back for another explosive go through the streets of Miami. Martin Lawrence is still obnoxious but, again, he’s tolerable opposite the always charismatic Will Smith. I can’t get enough of their hilarious old-married-couple bickering – I often write about the homoerotic undertones of buddy-cop movies, but here it’s so obvious that they go right out and have…
Sarah Morton (Charlotte Rampling) is an uptight, lonely British crime fiction writer, author of the best-selling Inspector Dorwell series. She’s getting tired of plotting tales of “blood, sex and money”, so her publisher offers her to go live in his house in the South of France to try and find her muse back. The film follows her around as she tours said house, a gorgeous…