Monthly Archives: July 2014

Kevin Kline was born to play Errol Flynn, at some point. So he does, in “The Last of Robin Hood” (Aug. 29). Aged swashbuckler, pencil thin mustache, he’s well-cast as the seducer of underage women. But who would have realized … Continue reading →

“Get on Up” is a movie of uncompromising soul, unadulterated funk and unalloyed joy. Dazzling, witty and emotional, this warts-and-all musical biography of James Brown rides on the able shoulders of Chadwick Boseman. It turns out that his terrific if … Continue reading →

Laugh-out-loud funny and production-designed to death, “Guardians of the Galaxy” pops off the screen, the last but far from the least of the summer of 2014’s popcorn pictures. A willing cast playing stupid-cool characters, video-game friendly action beats, ROFL gags … Continue reading →

Will Father Lavelle die for our sins? That’s the only question that matters in “Calvary,” the latest parable of Irish faith and the violent foibles of humanity from Irish playwright and filmmaker John Michael McDonagh. He’s cast his muse, Brendan … Continue reading →

  Peter Jackson seemed to regain his furry footing with the second “Hobbit” movie. This trailer to the holiday release finale of this artificial trilogy (one book is all it took, two movies would have sufficed) suggests he’ll end his … Continue reading →

Building a raunchy teen sex comedy around the low-heat Nat Wolff of “Stuck in Love” wasn’t the smartest idea. Whatever his gifts at playing “sensitive,” he doesn’t bring the energy to do a quick and dirty teen-on-the-make farce. All by … Continue reading →

Yeah, it looks slick and cool and all that. Tom Hardy’s bigger and tougher looking than Mel Gibson. But seriously, is there anything here that wasn’t in the original version of the movie, aired on TV ad nauseum these past … Continue reading →

Saturday made it close to official. Luc Besson’s Scarlett Johansson sci-fi action pic “Lucy” will hit $44 million on its opening weekend, officially making a bankable star out of Scar-Jo, Avenger, hip indie film queen, now bodacious babe of the … Continue reading →

“Sue” was and is the most complete T-Rex skeleton in existence, a paleontological find of such importance and with such far-ranging consequences that she changed science and American legal precedent, and not just the lives of those who stumbled across … Continue reading →

  “Code Black” opens in chaos, settles into systemic calm and ends with young doctors struggling against “the failure of the system” to get back some of that chaos. But this isn’t this year’s new variation on TV’s “young doctors, … Continue reading →