Yearly Archives: 2016

Look at that face. Kind of Toby Jones meets Aldo Ray on Cellblock 9, right? That’s character actor Neville Archambault. And if I tell you he plays the pervert/lead in a movie about a creep who installs hidden cameras all … Continue reading →

Jake Gyllenhaal makes some interesting movie choices, doesn’t he? You don’t see him in ensemble pictures (“Everest”) often. He leans towards the idiocentric and the Jake-centric. He’ll occasionally pair up with another “name” for a “Prisoners” or “Southpaw.” But lately, … Continue reading →

“Criminal” is a Kevin Costner vehicle. But he can wait. Let’s say a little prayer of thanks for Ryan Reynolds first. It’s a sci-fi spy thriller that has the CIA (Gary Oldman, Alice Eve) order a scientist dabbling in memory … Continue reading →

The cast is too dolled-up and the titular “Barbershop” has become a shiny, unisex salon. So “scruffy” and “scrappy” no longer applies to Ice Cube’s comic franchise. But “Barbershop: The Next Cut” still has that patchwork, under-scripted feel, lurching from … Continue reading →

“Spunky” never dies. It just hides its liver spots, dons spinster glasses and never lets the strain that maintaining “perky”past retirement age show. Sally Field brings a bubbly, misdirected vitality to “Hello, My Name is Doris,” a cute better-late-than-never romance … Continue reading →

It’s derivative, it’s dark, it’s jokey and bloody. And it’s an August comic book movie release. So, “Guardians of the Galaxy” or…something less? Will Smith is the biggest name in it, re-teamed with Margot Robbie, it turns out. Jared Leto … Continue reading →

Remember, acting guru Constantin Stanislavski preached, “There are no small parts, only small actors.” He must have dreamed there’d be a film as closely scrutinized, with its tiniest performances parsed and scrutinized, as “Star Wars.” “Elstree 1976” is a documentary … Continue reading →

As I noted in my review, it can’t be healthy that Melissa McCarthy is entrusting at least a little of her career to her quite-unfunny husband, Ben Falcone. It’s “tragic” that he turns out to be, as her co-writer and … Continue reading →

I like the cast I see (Felicity Jones, an interesting actress to hang a picture on, Oscar winner Forest Whitaker, Alan Tudyck, Donnie Yen, Mads Mikkelson) and I see a fresher take — a chamber piece in the “Star Wars” … Continue reading →

“Hardcore Henry” is a dazzlingly ambitious technical exercise, the most wholly-realized “first person” point-of-view action picture ever made. Writer-director Ilya Naishuller and a trio of cinematographers, strapped up with tiny GoPro cameras, have turned a first-person-shooter (FPS) video game into … Continue reading →