Harry Brown - 2010

Director: Daniel Barber

Writer: Gary Young

Starring: Michael Caine, David Bradley, Emily Mortimer

"The Marines were a lifetime ago. I was a different man then." Harry Brown (Caine), an ex-Marine widower, is pushed to the breaking point when escalating gang violence in his area of south London results in the death of his friend Leonard Atwell (Bradley). Brown decides the only thing he can do is start fighting back, but the police give him a spot of trouble along the way.

There are certain actors in the business that will achieve nearly universal appeal, but still have a few moviegoers crying foul. Michael Caine is not one of them, and if his Oscar nominations every decade from the 1960s through 2000s isn't evidence enough of that, this film should be. An incredible feature debut for director Daniel Barber, Harry Brown, while a bit graphic at times, never disappoints, and Caine's performance is squarely the source. No other character really has a significant or developed role, but the script works well all the same. And while the action isn't over-the-top a la RED, for example, it's entertaining nevertheless, probably for the same reason. The police in the film doubt an emphysema-ridden pensioner would commit such acts of vigilanteism, but the audience accepts it perfectly. A-

Greenberg - 2010

Director: Noah Baumbach

Writers: Noah Baumbach & Jennifer Jason Leigh

Starring: Ben Stiller, Greta Gerwig, Rhys Ifans

"The thing about you kids is that you're all kind of insensitive. I'm glad I grew up when I did cos your parents were too perfect at parenting- all that baby Mozart and Dan Zanes songs; you're just so sincere and interested in things! There's a confidence in you guys that's horrifying. You're all ADD and carpal tunnel. You wouldn't know agoraphobia if it bit you in the ass, and it makes you mean. You say things to someone like me who's older and smarter with this light air... I'm freaked out by you kids. I hope I die before I end up meeting one of you in a job interview." Roger (Stiller), after suffering a nervous breakdown in New York City, is flown to Los Angeles to housesit for his brother and attempt to "do nothing." Here he meets Florence (Gerwig), his brother's assistant, and the two begin an awkward romance.

I absolutely hated Baumbach's last film Margot at the Wedding. Haven't seen Squid and the Whale, but it gave us Jesse Eisenberg, so it can't be too bad. Greenberg, in and of itself, is a pretty good film. There's a strong sense of realism in the character interaction. Where this film excels is its balance between the comic and tragic, especially at the same time. It's nothing like what Hollywood makes these days, so naturally I call it a must-see. A-

Never Let Me Go - 2010

Director: Mark Romanek
Writer: Alex Garland
Starring: Carey Mulligan, Andrew Garfield, Keira Knightley

Kathy (Mulligan), Tommy (Garfield), and Ruth (Knightley) are students at Hailsham, a seemingly idyllic British boarding school in the 1960s. They have virtually no interaction with the outside world, not even a connection with their own families. There couldn't be any ulterior motive for their existence, could there?

I went into this movie knowing (what apparently is supposed to be) a major spoiler, so maybe that's why I didn't care for this movie. I nearly fell asleep three times in the theater. THIS NEVER HAPPENS TO ME. Don't get me wrong, the performances are solid, but when the story's as weak as this one, it just isn't enough. Maybe the book went into more detail, but half the questions raised by the film (most in the characters' dialogue, even) is barely addressed, much less answered. The cinematography's nice too, but I was ready to let this go before the credits rolled.

Leaves of Grass - 2010

Director: Tim Blake Nelson
Writer: Tim Blake Nelson
Starring: Edward Norton, Keri Russell, Tim Blake Nelson, Richard Dreyfuss, Susan Sarandon


"If everyone goes around making up their own rules, how can you find any truth?" English professor Bill Kincaid (Norton) is lured back to his Oklahoma roots with a false report of his twin brother Brady's (Norton) death by crossbow. Soon after his arrival, Bill realizes that he's there solely to provide an alibi for Brady, in case Brady's scheme against local drug lord Pug Rothbaum (Dreyfuss) goes wrong.

The best kind of film, to me, is one in which everyone involved is on the same page from day one, and this is one of them. Without Norton's involvement, there would have been no film. He was so integral that he took a 50% pay cut to play 100% more characters than usual, and it was well worth it. He excels in the dual role of professor and pot dealer (two brothers who have more in common than you might think). Dreyfuss's angry energy makes you yearn to see him on-screen more, but the romantic subplot with Russell's character seems as though it was added in last-minute, and the boys' relationship with their mother is also not addressed to the extent I thought it needed to be. There's also a sudden turn toward the violent at the hour mark, and the film ends up far from the madcap antics of identical twins that trailers made it out to be. However, it's far from the worst film out this year, so check it out if you run across it. B

RED - 2010

Director: Robert Schwentke

Writers: Jon & Eric Hoeber

Starring: Bruce Willis, John Malkovich, Morgan Freeman, Helen Mirren, Karl Urban

When a team of assassins appears under cover of night at the home of ex-CIA assassin Frank Moses (Willis), he does the only thing he can do: fight back, and proceed to get his old team back together, as they may also be under siege from this mysterious threat.

Earlier this year, filmgoers were treated to The Losers, another over-the-top graphic novel-based action/comedy, which (in my opinion) failed miserably. Going into the theater for this, I was ready for RED to take up that mantle as a shining example of what could have been. Unfortunately, this one falls short too, although it's nowhere near as bad as Losers. While quick to establish a premise, the movie spends nearly half its duration merely getting its four protagonists united. There also seemed to be a bit of a lack of character development. Now, I understand that they're all supposed to be ex-CIA, and at one point Willis's character's 99% redacted personnel file is shown, but knowing why the characters are the way they are and how they got there is an important part of any good script. Bruce Willis can kick just as much ass as he did in the first Die Hard, Helen Mirren is stellar as the long-range weapons master, and John Malkovich is a laugh and a half as the paranoid-because-the-govenment-gave-him-LSD-for-11-years guy. I wouldn't say it's a film you need to see in theaters, but definitely give it a chance when the DVD hits shelves. C

The Hudsucker Proxy - 1994

Directors: Joel & Ethan Coen

Writers: Joel & Ethan Coen and Sami Raimi

Starring: Tim Robbins, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Paul Newman

"I just got hired today. You know, entry level. But I got big ideas." Before their mainstream breakout with 1996's Fargo, the Coen brothers made the screwball comedy The Hudsucker Proxy, a paean to many films of the 1930s and 1940s, in which Norville Barnes (Robbins) is quickly promoted from the mail room of Hudsucker Industries by chairman of the board Sidney J. Mussburger (Newman) as part of a scheme to keep "any slob in a smelly tee-shirt" from buying shares in the company after founder and CEO Waring Hudsucker jumps to his death from the 45th floor.

The Big Lebowski may have a great cult following, and the Coens' serious work as of late has Oscar nods aplenty, but I'm calling this my favorite film they've made to date. The snappy dialogue moves quickly enough to amaze yet still be made out, characters are well developed, and we're never left wondering "why." Roger Deakins's cinematography and Carter Burwell's score compliment the Coens' style beautifully as always. I'm hard pressed to find a single weak point in this movie, aside from a brief foray into the impossible near the end. This is a goal for any comedic filmmaker to strive for. A

Sky High - 2005

Director: Mike Mitchell
Writers: Paul Hernandez, Bob Schooley, & Mark McKorkle
Starring: Michael Angarano, Danielle Panabaker, Kurt Russell, Kelly Preston, Steven Strait, Mary Elizabeth Winstead

"You look at them and see the defenders of the world. All I see is my dad wearing tights." Will Stronghold (Angarano) is the son of the world's two greatest superheroes: Jetstream (Preston) and the Commander (Russell). The only problem: he's heading off to Sky High, the training school for heroes and sidekicks, with no powers of his own. Unbeknownst to them all, an evil plot is being hatched to take down the school, and superherodom as we know it.

This movie was terrible. The costumes are tacky, the special effects budget was nowhere near what it needed to be, and the plot is wildly predictable, not to mention a plothole vital to the climax that you could drive a truck through. The acting's decent, but there just isn't a lot for the actors to go on. There are some nice nods to legitimate superhero media like the Wonder Woman TV show (Lynda Carter and Cloris Leachman have small roles) and Spider-man (a line of dialogue about how quickly some people get powers), but that's ruined by more blatant references, like Carter's character virtually confessing to be Wonder Woman, on top of spinning to activate her power. They also depict X-ray vision with red beams a la heat vision, which any superhero film worth its salt should know better than to do. Also: this (minor spoiler). HERO LIGHTING ONLY WORKS WHEN IT DOESN'T LOOK UNNATURAL. Oh, and how this film got away with having a redheaded girl with control over plants without getting sued by DC is beyond me, if Lynda Carter wasn't allowed to wear gold bracelets. I put this film on par with Ghost Rider and Schumacher's contributions to the Batman franchise. D

Buried - 2010

Director: Rodrigo Cortés

Writer: Chris Sparling

Starring: Ryan Reynolds

"My name is Paul Conroy, I'm a truck driver in Iraq, and I need help." Cortés makes his English-language feature debute with this thriller about Paul Conroy (Reynolds), a private contractor sent to Iraq to deliver supplies, whose convoy is ambushed while on a routine drive. The film opens with Conroy gaining consciousness in a coffin scarcely large enough to contain him, along with a lighter and a cell phone. His initial attempts to reach the outside world prove unsuccessful, his captors are demanding an unreasonable ransom of $5 million, and saying that finding a single coffin buried in the Iraqi desert is a difficult undertaking is a gross understatement.

This film is incredible. It's probably the most intense, thrilling movie I've seen all year, and maybe since I've started seriously watching movies. Buried is, if nothing else, a tour de force for Reynolds, but it has to be; he's virtually the sole living thing you see for 90 minutes (the first seven of which are completely sans dialogue as he discerns and comes to terms with his location as best he can). Along with the acting, cinematography makes this film a double-header. Aside from a few overhead shots, the camera is always inside the coffin, heightening the sense of claustrophobia. The only way to further get inside Conroy's head would be to shoot it all in POV, which probably wouldn't have worked as well. The above screenshot is the brightest the movie gets, with most of the duration wavering between total darkness and shots like this. The script is very well written, despite a plothole or two (which any movie can have if you pick it apart enough), and some arguably unnecessary suspension of disbelief regarding the effect of a Zippo lighter on a limited air supply. I was initially wary that ex-Van Wilder put in such a limited space might not be worth my time and money, but my fears were completely unfounded. A+

Note: I saw the film with my girlfriend, who had a diametrically opposed opinion about it. Most of her complaints stemmed from either overuse of the lighter and lack of proactivity on Conroy's part regarding his situation. Saying any more would spoil it, but I'd really like to hear what you all think about this one. Please see it if you can.

The Fifth Element - 1997

Director: Luc Besson

Writers: Luc Besson & Robert Mark Kamen

Starring: Bruce Willis, Milla Jovovich, Ian Holm, Gary Oldman

"Leeloo Dallas multipass." A mysterious alien race shows up, interrupting an archaeological discovery on Earth in 1914, explaining that "the stones are not safe" on Earth due to the coming war, and in 300 years when "a great evil" comes, the aliens will return with the stones. Cut to 2214, and ex-military-man-turned-cab-driver Korben Dallas (Willis) having the good fortune to be dropped in on by the mysterious Leeloo (Jovovich), who asks to be taken to priest Vito Cornelius (Holm). It turns out the woman has a connection to the stones destined to save the universe from aforementioned great evil. The three are pursued by the evil Zorg (Oldman), intent on taking the stones for his own nefarious purposes.

This is, very nearly, the best action sci-fi film I've ever seen. (The best dramatic sci-fi film is, of course, Moon.) The plot is a great twist on a classic motif of mythology, and the visuals of Besson's future world are richly detailed. Few excel more than Willis at being a normal guy who hides his badassery, and Oldman with that pseudo-Southern accent is possibly my favorite movie villain of all time. Then, out of nowhere, this happens:

Chris Tucker plays a radio DJ named Ruby Rhod, who in about 30 seconds of screentime, eclipses Superbad's Fogell/McLovin as the most annoying character ever captured on film. He serves no purpose to the plot whatsoever, and we don't even get the pleasure of seeing him die. Rhod was the overdone piece of meat in an otherwise gourmet meal. A

Easy A - 2010

Director: Will Gluck

Writer: Bert V. Royal

Starring: Emma Stone, Amanda Bynes, Thomas Haden Church, Patricia Clarkson, Lisa Kudrow, Malcolm McDowell, Stanley Tucci

"The rumors of my promiscuity have been greatly exaggerated." A sort of reverse take on The Scarlet Letter, Easy A follows the exploits of Olive (Stone) as she has a series of fictitious sexual escapades for the social benefit of both the gentlemen involved and herself. However, the rumor mill inevitably spirals out of control, and Olive ends up with quite a bit more than she hoped for.

This movie was a lot better than I was expecting it to be, and had a lot of good things going for it. The script is surprisingly well written considering most entries in the genre, and Stone plays a powerful, eloquent, intelligent, and admirable female lead, far too few of which exist in film. Stone along with Tucci and Clarkson make for one of the most believable and enjoyable to watch family dynamics in recent years. Church hasn't had a role this good since Sideways, and even Kudrow is far more tolerable than her usual Phoebe-from-Friends roles. The high point of the film (which comes after a slam against an Alamo Drafthouse-type theater) is a monologue bemoaning the lack of John Hughes moments in the average modern teenager's life, something instantly identifiable for the current generation, especially one familiar with the works of the late Mr. Hughes (as everyone should be). Unfortunately, the film's far from perfect. Malcolm McDowell, having made a career on playing evil men, was horribly miscast as a high school principal in the film; it's painful to see main droog Alex from A Clockwork Orange doling out detentions. There's also an incredible sharp, sudden shift in tone from comedy to drama about halfway through the film. As I've said, the worst thing a movie can do is suffer from tonal identity crisis. While it's better than a great deal of the tripe that's come out this year, it won't make my top ten. B