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Even if you were a fan of 80% of the SNL skits turned into movies (we’re talking borderline stuff like Night at the Roxbury and Superstar ) you had to be nervous about MacGruber . I mean, this is a parody of a pre-existing ‘80s TV show ( MacGyver ) with the same punchline…every…single…time. That doesn’t give you much to work with. Maybe that’s why the more successful elements of star Will Forte’s film take aim at Reagan-era clichés (mullets, removable tape decks and the bad music we played on them) rather than MacGruber himself, who is an unlikable A-hole. In fact, although his character is based on the Will Ferrell idiot man-child routine, Forte boxes himself into a corner with this expanded version. We just plain don’t like him. Ferrell’s characters always had a sweet chewy center, but MacGruber is crude and obnoxious with absolutely no redeeming qualities. You can squeeze a few laughs out of that, but not 90 minutes worth. Director Jorma Taccone does a great job of recrea...

When it comes to TV show finales, very few of them are able to stick the landing. For every M.A.S.H. or Newhart there are dozen Seinfelds which seem to crack under the pressure of wrapping up a decade worth of characters and quips into one comprehensive package. Which is what makes Lost’s accomplishment that much more impressive. After six seasons of mysteries, conspiracies and enough time-traveling to earn frequent flier miles to the moon and back, writers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse finally buckled down and came to the realization most of us understood from the beginning: the show was never really about the island, it about the people on it. The reveal that this season’s “sideways” world was actually a pleasant form of purgatory, designed to help each our travelers “let go” and move into the next world, can be viewed as a cheat if you actually took any of that Dharma initiative crap seriously. But experienced TV viewers should realize that most shows aren’t mapped out six ...

As I child of the ‘80s I can tell you from experience that you had to work pret-ty darn hard to get a look at naked ladies. Before the corruption of the world wide web, curious kids only had a few magazines (always placed strategically out of reach or covered by those damn brown bags!) and scrambled cable channels to peruse after hours. Loose Screws: Screwballs 2 was one of those Porky’s clones you tried to catch a glimpse of after Mom and Dad went to bed. And, man, does it deliver the raunchy goods! As a direct sequel to Screwballs (which was more parody that soft-core copycat) the same horny foursome are sent to summer school where they bet bragging rights on who can catch a glimpse of the hot French teacher, Miss Mona Lott, in the buff. Miss Mona stays clothed until the end, but every other female student is definitely clothing-impaired. Made up of one raunchy sketch after another, Loose Screws is a near constant barrage of nudity and crudity with a script that wouldn’t ev...

Other than a few class acts, ‘80s slasher movies relied almost exclusively on their creative “kills” to attract attention. And after beheading, puncturing, smashing and exploding a literal army of zombies in the original Dawn of the Dead , make-up legend Tom Savini was up to just about any challenge. The Prowler actually has a leg up on Savini’s work in Friday the 13 th (shot a year earlier) at least in terms of its gruesome effectiveness. There’s a convincing pitchfork to the midsection, butcher knife through the brain, throat slitting and a pre- Scanners head explosion that splatters the screen like the 4th of July! Helmed by Joseph Zito (who went on to direct a Friday the 13 th chapter as well), the film bears a striking structural resemblance to My Bloody Valentine , with a 1945 preamble massacre that bans a local college graduation dance for 35 years. Of course, when the party is resurrected so is the titular killer, complete with army fatigues and assorted weaponry. As...

Other than the famous maestros Fellini, Antonioni and Leone, Italian directors really never get much respect. But watching Sandok for the first time in its original scope photography, you get the sense that there wasn’t anything Hollywood could put on screen that “spaghetti “directors could do just as well. Case in point, this rousing old-school adventure based on the popular novels by Emilio Salgari which features just the sort of Saturday matinee ingredients (snakes, rats, tigers, crocodiles, rare diamonds and dangerous thugs) that were later co-opted by Spielberg and Lucas to create Raiders of the Lost Ark . Director Umberto Lenzi is working in the classic Hollywood style, with opulent sets and exotic locations, but he keeps the tone light and loose with his two main characters – Alan Foster (Richard Harrison), an American thief on the run in India and Sitama Wilbert Bradly), a native fakir whose sacred vows are flexible depending on the situation. Their adventures in pursuit o...

Denzel Washington has been nominated for two Emmys, five Oscars (he took home two) and is arguably one of those finest actors working today. He swings from blockbusters to serious dramas without missing a beat and really has nothing left to prove to anyone. Except that he’s got mad kung-fu skills! I’m not sure how much actual “Denzel” made it into The Book of Eli ’s copious action scenes, but he’s pretty spry for a 55 year-old man. As the star of Albert and Allen Hughes’ apocalyptic Road Warrior -meets- The Ten Commandments mish-mash, Washington wanders through the wasteland on a mission from God to deliver his copy of the Bible (the very last copy, apparently) to a deserving community. Instead he runs afoul of Gary Oldman and his band of marauding survivalists who want to use the book’s inherent Biblical power to convert more followers. By now we’ve seen so many versions of this end-of-days scenario, that the Hughes brothers have their work cut out for them…even with Denzel in...

Universal’s remake of The Wolfman came awfully close to being an “Alan Smithee” production. You know, the nome de plume director’s take when their work has been hacked to unrecognizable pieces by studios who feel their work isn’t commercial enough. One director walked out (music video vet Mark Romanek) and another ( Jurassic Park 3’s Joe Johnston) went through a number of reshoots before the movie was put on a shelf like a wheel of cheese to be aged for more than a year. The odds were pretty high that Benecio Del Toro’s transformation into a hairy howling beast was going to need some serious grooming. But, as they say in professional sports, “that’s why they play the game.” And surprisingly much of the high-profile artistry shines through in this updated but engagingly retro version of the 1941 classic. The sets, scenery and photography are all gloriously Victorian. Anthony Hopkins is enjoyably hammy. And make-up artist Rick Baker’s designs hearken back to Universal’s glory d...

Like the flowers, card and candy, Valentine’s Day “the movie” is just one of those things men are expected to suffer through. It’s not really meant for anyone with a Y-chromosome despite sporting its fair share of eye candy both female (Jessica Alba, Jennifer Garner, Jessica Biel) and male (Jamie Foxx, Ashton Kutcher, Eric Dane). In fact, it easier to list who’s not involved in the all-star cast than sit through the lengthy credits. The wraparound story involves several different couples who are either breaking up or hooking up on this the most romantic of holidays. Will Ashton Kutcher and Jennifer Garner realize that they’re more than just best friends? Will Anne Hathaway’s second job as a phone sex operator ruin her chances with Topher Grace? Will Hector Elizondo and Shirley MacLaine patch up their marriage? OK, no one really cares about that last one; this is a movie for the smartphone generation through and through. But it’s also heavily inspired by the far superior Bri...

Despite sporting subtitles, being set in Saigon and featuring an all Vietnamese cast, Owl and the Sparrow doesn’t really fall into the typical foreign film category. And Stephane Gauger, the Vietnamese-American writer-director behind the film, would be the first to agree. His story of a flight attendant, zoo keeper and young flower girl whose lives intermingle over the course of five days in the city is the sort of simple, universal story that even Hollywood producers have made hundreds of times. Yet it’s not what’s in Gauger’s film that makes it different, it’s what he leaves out . There are no pratfalls, no wacky neighbors, no talking animals, no comedic misunderstandings that result in groin hits, spit takes or falls down a long flight of stairs. Owl and the Sparrow dispenses with the complications and tells the tender story of a little girl who, on the run from her callous uncle, winds up penniless and hungry on the street. Through a series of coincidences, she brings toget...

There have been countless actors throughout cinematic history who, despite their talent, charisma, good looks and professional training, just never become stars. They pop up in mediocre to bad movies, always hinting at their breakthrough potential but never living up to it. There’s plenty of blame to go around: bad luck, bad karma, and bad agents. But Paul Bettany leads the very definition of this cursed existence. After making a huge impression in A Knight’s Tale and Master and Commander , he’s limped from one lackluster film to the next finally coming to rest in Legion , a film for which he’s vastly overqualified and probably more than a little embarrassed to be emblazoned on the poster as a machine gun totin’ fallen angel escaped from Heaven to save us all from God’s wrath. Stitching together equal parts from Terminator and Tales From the Crypt’s Demon Knight , the film hints at worldwide Armageddon but only shows us the run-down diner where an unwed mother (Adrianne Palikir)...

If you’re looking for a classic Bond fix, Dorado films has your number: 077. With any new Bond films put on the backburner thanks to MGM’s financial woes, now’s the perfect time to catch up with Bond’s brother-from-another-mother: Dick Malloy, the CIA’s answer to Britain’s super-suave secret agent. He has a license to kill, punch, slap and make love to anyone that stands in his way. And as played by the burly Hollywood cast-off Ken Clark, you might just find yourself rooting for Agent 077 despite his hand-me-down villains, gadgets and overly dramatic theme songs. Copyrights be damned, these Italian co-productions lift everything that works in the Bond franchise and tweak it just enough to stay out of court. In Mission Bloody Mary , Malloy is on the trail of a new superweapon hijacked from the US and about to hit the blackmarket courtesy of the mysterious “Black Lily.” Joining him on the job is an attractive female operative (Helga Linne) who may or may not be in his corner. M...

With any new Bond films put on the backburner thanks to MGM’s financial woes, now’s the perfect time to catch up with Bond’s brother-from-another-mother: Dick Malloy, the CIA’s answer to Britain’s super-suave secret agent. He has a license to kill, punch, slap and make love to anyone that stands in his way. And as played by the burly Hollywood cast-off Ken Clark, you might just find yourself rooting for Agent 077 despite his hand-me-down villains, gadgets and overly dramatic theme songs.

Copyrights be damned, these Italian co-productions lift everything that works in the Bond franchise and tweak it just enough to stay out of court. In Mission Bloody Mary, Malloy is on the trail of a new superweapon hijacked from the US and about to hit the blackmarket courtesy of the mysterious “Black Lily.” Joining him on the job is an attractive female operative (Helga Linne) who may or may not be on his side.

Even die-hard Godzilla fans will admit that the idea of a 60-meter tall turtle stomping across Japan is patently ridiculous. Not to mention that he breathes fire and travels through the air like a jet-powered Frisbee. And yet that’s part of the charm of the Gamera series, the only legitimate contender to Toho’s “King of the Monsters” crown. Popping up for years on TV creature features across the country (and most recently mocked on Mystery Science Theater 3000 ), the Gamera films seemed to know they were second-best when it came to kaiju eiga…but damn if they weren’t going to have a good time! With a surprise announcement I don’t think anyone saw coming, Shout Factory comes to the digital rescue by scooping up the rights to all of Gamera’s screen appearances. First up is Gamera , The Giant Monster presented for the first time in its correct aspect ratio with original Japanese language tracks. As a collector’s item for giant monster fans, this is akin to finding a Spanish doub...

Fifteen years ago, Kevin Costner was on top of the world. Now he’s standing on top of an Indian burial mound shooting mud-covered zombies in a movie that was released in only two theaters. In Costner’s defense, The New Daughter is pretty good for what it is: a slow-burn, spooky campfire story that only loses its bearings during the ridiculously sloppy conclusion. Shepherded by Spanish director Luis Berdejo, whose clever zombie movie REC was remade as Quarantine , and starring Ivana Baquero, the little girl from Pan’s Labyrinth , the film is brilliantly creepy for most of its running time. Costner moves his broken family to a quaint little house in the swamp, where his almost-teenage daughter begins acting strangely after discovering a big pile of dirt in the backyard. As with most haunted house movies, the history of the property is soon uncovered and Costner questions whether his little girl is possessed by demons or just going through some hellish hormonal changes. If Berdej...

When used correctly, sci-fi gives filmmakers a chance to comment on current society with complete impunity. If you do it right, no one even knows it’s there. But with Daybreakers , set in a world where a vampirism is the new norm and humankind is on the verge of extinction, the subtext is either entirely lacking or buried 6-feet under a pile of bat guano. Ethan Hawke (who, bless his heart, always seems willing to give genre movies the ‘ol college try) plays a vampire hemotologist searching for a human blood substitute to replace the real thing. The remnants of mankind are milked for their precious bodily fluids in a big Matrix -style storage facility, but the well has almost gone dry. Sympathetic to the survivors plight, Hawke falls in with a group of human resistance fighters (including Willem Dafoe) who have a potential cure that could set the world to rights again….that is, if the prevailing vampire government (led by Sam Neill) will let it happen. Directed by the Spierig Bro...

John Malkovich has made a career of out being creepy. I’m sure he’s capable of much more but when you can give someone goosebumps by crossing your eyes, you play to your strengths. Bouncing between artistic independents and bit parts in potential blockbusters, Malkovich seems to have an uncanny awareness of his own screen persona (how else do you explain Being John Malkovich ?) and how to use it to best effect. Which makes him a perfect choice to play the intellectually superior but morally repugnant character of Professor David Lurie, a South African instructor who manipulates attractive students into questionable sexual relations and feels not the slightest bit of regret. Based on the novel by Nobel Prize winning author J.M. Coetzee, Disgrace is a difficult film to enjoy but an easy one to admire, much like another recent adaptation, Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. Professor Lurie’s forced resignation is only the beginning of his ethical reeducation. A violent attack on his own dau...

Records are made to be broken. No one knows that better than director James Cameron who broke his own worldwide box-office take from Titanic with this sci-fi follow-up that pushed CG / 3D technology over the edge of “pretty good” to “holy crap!” The story itself is simply blue-skinned aliens laid over a Dances With Wolves blueprint (with a few spare parts from Cameron’s own films like Aliens and Terminator), but the environmentally friendly message combined with escapist entertainment hit at just the right time. There’s been an inevitable amount of backlash surrounding the film’s success, but for all its noble intentions, Avatar doesn’t aspire to be much more than 10-year-old boy fantasy…like a Boris Vallejo painting brought to startling life. In Cameron’s defense, The Blind Side didn’t hold up to much criticism either, but it was up for Best Picture! Much of Avatar’s appeal lay in the theatrical experience, something that even the impending onslaught of 3D televisions won’t repli...

In the second half of the 20th century, Italian filmmakers were merciless rip-off artists. Box office success meant a green-light for hundreds of copycat pictures hoping to capitalize on audience interest in any way possible: rampant retitling (Django anyone?), imported American stars (you’re welcome, Mr. Eastwood) and ample amounts of sex and violence. And while very few of these plagiarized productions are true classics, upstart DVD label Dorado Films knows there’s still an audience out there. And, boy, do they deliver…with pulp poster cover art packaging, actor biographies and gobs of trailers promising more to come. Thought Goldmember was the most blatant 007 title rip-off? How about FROM THE ORIENT WITH FURY starring American Ken Clark as Agent 077 Dick Malloy, a rock ‘em-sock ‘em playboy / spy on a mission to rescue a kidnapped nuclear physicist. Malloy might not have Bond’s expense account, but he gets into more fistfights than Connery had in the first three Ian Fleming a...

PONYO: Any widespread success the animated films of Hayao Miyazaki have in the U.S. can be laid directly at the feet of John Lasseter, now the head of Pixar. Lasseter’s perpetual cheerleading of the man nicknamed the “Japanese Walt Disney” eventually convinced the mouse house to release several of his older works on special-edition DVDs and even give Ponyo, his latest and rumored last film, a massive theatrical campaign. The irony is, for all the lush imagination on display, Miyazaki’s films are so culturally different from our own idea of what an animated film should be, they’ll likely never become part of the Disney lexicon. But you can see its influence in Pixar output like Up, whose airborne domicile has much in common with Howl’s Moving Castle. Even the dogfighting mutts are a reflection of the high-flying pig in Porco Rosso. Ponyo is actually a variation on Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid, but the film is unmistakably Miyazaki’s, sporting a googly-eyed goldfis...

RED CLIFF: Like many other talented foreign directors, the Hollywood system sucked John Woo dry. Sure, it gave him more money for actors and ammunition. But even his best work in the States ( Face / Off ) couldn’t hold a candle to Hong Kong classics like Hard Boiled and The Killer . So what a relief to see him back on home turf with Red Cliff, an epic retelling of the 220 AD Chinese battle between the overwhelming might of the Emperor’s army and the rebellious forces of two remaining warlords. Think Troy meets Crouching Tiger . The original film was released in two parts in Asia, but the US market only gets the condensed version, shorter by two hours and a bit confusing at the start. Even with the missing pieces, though, Red Cliff is an impressive piece of work from a guy who could have just as easily continued padding his Hollywood resume. In fact, it’s unlike any of Woo’s previous films (maybe a pinch of Windtalkers , but who saw that?) with elaborately staged military s...

ROCK ‘N ROLL HIGH SCHOOL: Bookended between Animal House and Porky’s , this Corman quickie is one of the more memorable modern efforts from the producer and his crew of “do-it-for-the-fun-of-it” writers, directors and actors. P.J. Soles (who’d just been strangled by Michael Meyers in Halloween the year before) stars as Riff Randell, a quirky rebel whose obsession with The Ramones doesn’t jibe with the new administrative regime. Stripped of her front row tickets, Riff crashes the show anyway and convinces the band to stop by and rock the roof off Vince Lombardi High. The comedy is mostly dated sight gags and embarrassing schitck, but it’s endearing all the same…even more so with the recent passing of all the original Ramones members. Director Allan Arkush leans heavily on the Hard Day’s Night formula and makes the most of the Ramones’ raw stage power. With two songs written specifically for the film (including the title track) there’s not a better intro to the Ramones’ appeal t...

THE IMAGINARIUM OF DR. PARNASSUS: Although it makes better headlines to claim The Dark Knight was Heath Ledger’s final onscreen performance, the actor’s swan song was actually in this visually ambitious but narratively frustrating film from director Terry Gilliam. The doctor himself (played by 2009 Oscar nominee Christopher Plummer) is part of a traveling carnival troupe who sells trips through his dream mirror in exchange for souls in a long-standing bet with the devil. The first one to five lays claim to the doctor’s only daughter. Ledger plays an amnesiac new member of the group with a gift for tempting new customers behind the looking glass. But the actor’s death forced Gilliam to rework the script to account for various other performers playing the same part (Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell all step up to the plate). Ironically, the last-minute identity switch is one of the more interesting and successful aspects of the film, which stumbles about like a clumsy Fran...

SUBURBIA: As one of the inaugural films in Shout Factory’s “Roger Corman Cult Classics,” this Penelope Spheeris directed punk-rock slice of life just goes to show that Roger’s portfolio was more diversified that you might think. Recruiting genuine street kids and young anarchists (like Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers ) to play the roles of…well, street kids and young anarchists… Suburbia reeks of amateurism and heavy handed life lessons. But it also unspools with a tragic honesty and genuine alternative angst that wouldn’t work any other way. You can feel the connection between these kids, driven to live in an L.A. shack by a society that doesn’t have the patience to understand them. Actors could have played the parts with more professionalism, but they wouldn’t have been a fraction as believable. As for a plot, there’s not much of one. The kid’s gang sign (T.R. for The Rejected) turns up at a murder scene and gets them on the wrong side of the law and local residents. Wi...

THE BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL NEW ORLEANS - Nicolas Cage has always been the most unlikely of action stars. He’s uglier than Bruce Willis, has a voice more annoying that Sylvester Stallone and weighs about as much as Schwarzennegar’s left pectoral. And don’t even get me started on his hairpiece collection. Yet Con Air transformed his career from an offbeat character specialist to the go-to guy for summer blockbusters like National Treasure. His choices of late, however, have been sketchy to say the least, so it’s good to see him dip a toe back into the water of respectability again with Werner Herzog’s reboot/reimagining/reinvention of Abel Ferrara’s Bad Lieutenant. As Terence McDonagh, an egotistical, manic-depressive, pill-popping, coke-snorting cop who knows how to get things done despite all his obvious handicaps, Cage stumbles onto his best performance in the last ten years. Limping about like a hunchbacked Richard III, the actor revels in the grey area between honorab...

NINJA ASSASSIN: The guys in the black pajamas haven’t gotten much play since their hey-dey in the ‘80s. Back then you couldn’t throw a rock without hitting a ninja: comics, movies, even prime-time TV had it’s own show (The Master, with Lee Van Cleef, which was kinda like The A-Team…but with a van full of ninjas). The Wachowski Brothers of the Matrix trilogy are the brains behind Ninja Assassin and it’s certainly the most high-profile outing for the Japanese hired killers in the last two decades. South Korean pop superstar Rain, who also popped up in the Wachowski’s Speed Racer, plays an orphan raised in an all-Ninja school (they’re even tougher than Catholics!) and taught the ancient art of assassination. The clans make a living knocking-off people for hire, but one nosy Federal Agent (Naomie Harris) is getting too close to the truth. After she becomes a target, Rain develops a conscience and takes on his deadly pals to protect her. I don’t ask much of my ninja movies, but Ninj...

OLD DOGS: “You’ll never go broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.” P.T. Barnum’s quote has been tossed around for years, but Old Dogs seems to have made it into a mission statement. Less a movie than a collection of deleted scenes from The Game Plan that were too embarrassing even for The Rock, director Walter Becker, who shepherded Wild Hogs to box-office glory a few years ago, strips every actor in the film of their inherent appeal. Travolta is obnoxious, Robin Williams is reserved, and bit players like Dax Shephard, Justin Long, and Matt Dillon walk through on their way to a better movie. Forced into taking care of the biological children he didn’t know he had, Dan (Williams) recruits his egotistical buddy, Charlie (Travolta), to help him through navigate the perils of fatherhood. Much of the alleged comedy hinges on the guys being mistaken for grandparents, but both actors (Travolta especially) still make their living as perpetually young Hollywood ...

THE CRAZIES: The modern zombie that has evolved from director George A. Romero’s “Living Dead” is often completely un supernatural in origin. Danny Boyle’s gutmunchers in 28 Days Later and its ilk are usually toxic in nature; a side-effect of man’s meddling with forces beyond his control. But before you dismiss Romero’s less genetically-complex creations out of hand, check out his take on The Crazies , an early roadmap for his seminal zombie opus, Dawn of the Dead , and a precursor to the man-made monstrosities that are currently all the rage. The town of Evans City, Pennsylvania falls under a state of martial law when a germ warfare experiment gets out of control. The symptoms materialize as rampant psychosis and spreads throughout the population. A mismatched group of survivors attempt to make it out of the hot zone to freedom, but find themselves falling victim to the “superbug” at an alarming rate. Typical of Romero’s homegrown productions, this one stars a cast of unknowns...

LAW ABIDING CITIZEN: Half a century ago, B-movies knew their place in the Hollywood system. They starred second-tier actors, journeyman directors, and sported the sort of outlandish plots that supposed “A-listers” would never stoop to produce. Law Abiding Citizen is an excellent example of that sort of filmmaking methodology, despite the fact that it stars an Oscar winner (Jamie Fox), an action hero (Gerard Butler) and probably cost more to produce than most studios spent in a year in 1956. Butler is a bonafide family man who loses everything during a violent home invasion. Foxx is the hotshot prosecutor who makes a deal and lets one of the bad guys get off with a slap on the wrist. Cut to ten years later. Turns out Butler is a master CIA tactician who’s been plotting his revenge with the sort of attention to detail usually reserved for James Bond super villains and bitter ex-girlfriends. Soon everyone associated with the case is winding up dead…despite the fact that Butler h...

LOVE HAPPENS: Romantic comedies have been in a real rut these days. Which is why it was so refreshing to discover Love Happens isn’t a romantic comedy at all, despite marketing that might argue otherwise. Aaron Eckhart plays Dr. Burke Ryan, a motivational speaker on the cusp of national success helping people deal with their grief. Trouble is, he’s never dealt with his own following the accidental death of his wife over three years ago. In the midst of this double-life, he finds himself attracted to Eloise (Jennifer Aniston), and despite the typical first act push-pull, they dip their toes into a satisfying relationship. Love Happens has plenty of opportunities to follow the well-trodden slapstick path of other rom-coms…most of them starring Jennifer Aniston. But it sticks with the rather poignant and emotionally powerful profile of a man who can help others, but refuses to help himself. It might be considered a “George Clooney” role, but Eckhart’s chin is up to the challenge....

AMELIA: There’s no question that the life of Amelia Earhart is worthy of a glossy cinematic adaptation. In fact, the famous lady flyer appeared in two films last year. So how wrong is it that I actually prefer the wax figure brought to life in Night At The Museum 2 (played much gusto by Amy Adams) over the historically accurate but overwhelmingly gloomy portrait embodied by Hilary Swank? Buoyed by the sort of old-Hollywood production values you rarely see invested in such “dated” material, Amelia is a gorgeous film to look at, sporting extravagantly beautiful flying footage and a supporting cast of dashing, experienced actors (Richard Gere, Ewan McGregor). But Swank is such a “Debbie Downer” in the lead role that the film has to work overtime to create enthusiasm for Earhart’s accomplishments, which include flying solo across the Atlantic before disappearing on her ambitious attempt to cross the globe. While Swank may deliver a more realistic portrayal (newsreel footage on the Bl...

ONG-BAK – THE THAI WARRIOR: The world has been waiting impatiently for the next Bruce Lee to surface ever since his untimely death in 1980. Jackie Chan and Jet Li both stood to inherit the crown but chose their own path to martial arts sainthood. Now the torch has been passed to Tony Jaa, whose debut in Ong Bak serves as a demo reel for his unique fighting style, combining Lee’s quickness with Van Damme’s groin-stretching flexibility. Jaa’s signature move, a pair of elbows to the top of the head, is just one of the many Muay Thai combat moves that make use off all the body’s pointy parts. Like the early Bruce Lee films, the story is only a loose structure used to introduce one fight sequence after another. Yet the film’s best assist goes to Petchtai Wongkamiao as Jaa’s fellow villager and comic relief, who keeps the film from falling into a monotonous series of Bloodsport-style deathmatches. Jaa himself doesn’t have much charisma when he’s not throwing a punch – unlike Lee, whos...

THE ALCOVE: Believe it or not, there’s an art to making a good dirty movie. And no one was better than the late Joe D’Amato. He made movies with an artist’s eye and Tiger Wood’s libido. His most famous cinematic collaborator was the lovely Laura Gemser. Together they milked the Emmanuelle franchise for all it was worth, transforming the soft-core erotica title into a parade of sequels, each more shockingly tasteless than the one before. By comparison, The Alcove is almost timid. Yet there’s still plenty of Cinemax-style skin on display in the story of an African princess (Gemser) brought back to Europe by an army officer to act as personal servant to his wife…who’s already having her own love affair with her husband’s personal secretary (Annie Belle). 3/4s of the movie is filled with the required heavy petting, but then things get ugly when someone suggests making a snuff film. The Alcove ’s unexpectedly brutal finale might come out of left field, but it’s that kind of unpred...

PANDORUM - When he was cutting trailers for low-budget kingpin Roger Corman, director Joe Dante confessed he kept a special reel of explosions, car wrecks and topless babes to be spliced in if the actual film itself wasn’t exciting enough. Didn’t really matter if the movie lived up to those expectations; getting butts in the seats was his job. Today, almost every film makes a good trailer. But it’s still a rare thing that they actually deliver the goods. When I caught the commercials for Pandorum , a sci-fi horror hybrid that lifted elements of Alien , Event Horizon and the PS3 hit Dead Space , it had my “Spidey-sense” tingling: “No way can that be as good as it looks.” And you know what? It wasn’t. But it comes surprisingly close…and that’s high praise in today’s quick-cut era of awesome trailers and mediocre movies. Ben Foster stars as a member of the flight crew of a long-distance space vessel, reawakened from hyper-sleep with little to no memory of his mission. Dennis...

CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS: Let’s talk about the elephant in the room first. No one makes animated movies as well as Pixar. That clear enough? But Sony’s animation division should be pretty proud to come in second. The Ice Age films and Open Season were pleasant enough diversions. But they finally put the cherry on top with this adaption of the classic children’s book about an invention that results in precipitation of the edible kind. Flint Lockwood (Bill Hader) is the scientist looking for acceptance. Sam Sparks (Anna Faris) is the weathergirl looking for her big break. But it’s Mr. T himself who steals the film out from under them as a secondary character helping to stave off the all-you-can-eat catastrophe that results when the machine malfunctions. Sony’s artists go wild in the finale, creating a self-aware mountain of food that looks like something out of John Carpenter’s The Thing . But pre-teens will go wild at the idea of their favorite treats falling fro...