There are good musical biopics (“Love and Mercy,” “Walk the Line,” “La Bamba,” “Straight Outta Compton”) and there are bad ones (“Jolson Sings Again,” “The Doors,” “Great Balls of Fire!,” “Notorious”), and there are solid, but mediocre presentations like the latest, All Eyez On Me. Directed by Benny Boom (“Next Day Air”), All Eyez On…
The premise of Good Mourning, Lucille sounds promising. A young woman searches for her twin sister’s killer by capturing on camera the actions of those closest to her. Makes you want to know more, doesn’t it? But that’s about where the intrigue ends in this somewhat hapless tale that’s weighed down by a weak cast…
The dreadful The Shadow Effect, equal parts 80s action movie and 90s conspiracy thriller, is one of those movies that starts out puzzling and ends up incomprehensible. Overplotted and overacted, the movie is as subtle as a heart attack in a public library. It’s not, however, weighed down by such niceties as nuance and cleverness,…
For some, watching an M. Night Shyamalan film is an experience that fills them with dread. But this dread can be separated in two distinct camps: First, the good kind of dread that accompanied Shyamalan’s first blockbusters in Hollywood — “The Sixth Sense,” “Unbreakable,” “Signs” — all quietly unsettling thrillers that, despite some weaknesses, still…
There have not been many exceptional War War I films save for a handful like “Lawrence of Arabia,” “Grand Illusion,” “Dr. Zhivago,” “Joyeux Noel,” “The White Ribbon,” “Paths of Glory,” “Gallipoli” and “All Quiet on the Western Front” (okay, that may be more than a handful). Recent attempts such as “Flyboys” and “War Horse” and…
Who doesn’t want a movie to start and end and basically be one big bang? More conflict (and guns) brings better drama, right? In the case of Free Fire, that axiom does not, regrettably, hold true. The film is about an arms deal that goes terribly wrong — and because it goes so very wrong,…
This mediocre captivity-and-ordeal thriller, Valley of Ditches, is bound up in some atmospheric visuals and moody dark ambient music, but it’s too vague and too shallow to make a real impact. Its initially bold premise soon gives way to repetition — and frankly the simple hope that none of the characters will utter any more…
