Ghost World (2001) Movie Review

Saying that Terry Zwigoff’s Ghost World is quirky and funny is like saying the sky’s blue. It’s obvious and doesn’t need anyone to toot its horn. Ghost World was adapted by Zwigoff along with the property’s original creator, comic book writer Daniel Clowes, and follows the...

February 18th, 2002 | Read More

Ordinary Decent Criminal (2000) Movie Review

Michael Lynch, the ordinary decent criminal of the title, is an ordinary Irish fellow who happens to make a living as a professional bank (and whatever else you got) robber. He has a big household, is married to the beautiful Christine, and is also sleeping with Christine’s sister, Lisa, out in...

February 18th, 2002 | Read More

Ashes of Time (1994) Movie Review

Wong Kar-wai’s “Ashes of Time” is a rare film. It manages to be complex, thoughtful, and incredibly entertaining at the same time. Based on a novel of the same name by Louis Cha, “Ashes of Time” is truly an amazing film, one of the best, if not the best, Hong Kong melodrama/action...

February 16th, 2002 | Read More

Failan (2001) Movie Review

Kang-Jae is not much of a man. In fact, he’s not much of a human being. He’s boisterous and loud, a tough guy without any toughness in him. His boss abuses him and his fellow gangmembers have no respect for him whatsoever. The first time we meet Kang-Jae (Min-sik Choi) he’s just been...

February 14th, 2002 | Read More

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001) Movie Review

The year 2001 has been a banner year for fantasy novels turned event films. Both well-known book series, The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter have been adapted from their print form into much-anticipated movies, each one with legions of fans waiting to pay any price to see them. Of the two, Rings is...

February 12th, 2002 | Read More

Soldier (1997) Movie Review

Soldier is not a deep movie. It’s a sometimes too-violent film, but it’s never boring. At least, I never found it to be boring. The plot is a simple one: old supersoldier Todd and his group of supersoldiers, trained since birth to be killing machines, are replaced by another group of supersoldiers...

February 11th, 2002 | Read More

For Love or Country: The Arturo Sandoval Story (2000) Movie Review

For Love or Country: The Arturo Sandoval Story opens in 1991 with Cuban-born trumpeter Arturo Sandoval (Andy Garcia) entering an American embassy in London and asking for political asylum in hopes of defecting. David Paymer plays an unidentified State Department man who interviews Sandoval to determine...

February 10th, 2002 | Read More

Avalon (2001) Movie Review

Pointless. That’s how I feel after finally finishing a First Person Shooter (FPS) game. It doesn’t matter if the FPS was a good game, a bad game, or if it was too hard, too easy, or somewhere in-between. At the end, when the credits roll, and I shut down the game, I feel as if I’ve...

February 10th, 2002 | Read More

Gonin (1995) Movie Review

A movie like Gonin astounds and fascinates me. Writer/director Takashi Ishii is obviously a very talented man. There are visuals and camera framing in Gonin that just takes my breath away. The man has a great eye for detail and knows how to set up his cameras to convey the point that he wants conveyed....

February 9th, 2002 | Read More

Exit Wounds (2001) Movie Review

Exit Wounds is one of those movies that you just have to shake your head at and let out a chuckle, because to do otherwise would be giving it too much credit, and it’s a movie that certainly deserves very little credit for anything. If there were awards for the Worst Casting and Goofiest Movie,...

February 9th, 2002 | Read More

Planet of the Apes (2001) Movie Review

Dumb. No other word can aptly describe this 2001 “re-imagining” (the filmmakers’ word, not mine) of the classic 1968 Charlton Heston sci-fi movie of the same name. There is absolutely nothing about this movie that is even remotely smart. Ironically, it’s more entertaining to point...

February 6th, 2002 | Read More

New Dragon Inn (1992) Movie Review

The thing about New Dragon Inn is, I really don’t care all that much for the movie or its ridiculous plot. Still, I can’t bring myself to completely dislike it, if only for the appearance of Brigitte Lin as Mo Yan, a female warrior who is the real heart of the movie. Without Lin’s character,...

February 5th, 2002 | Read More

Amelie (2001) Movie Review

On more than one occasion in writer/director Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Amelie a character leaves his motorpad unattended and unlocked for long periods at a time, but it’s always there when he comes back for it. In another scene, the heroine witnesses a corner grocer browbeating his helper and...

February 3rd, 2002 | Read More

Zoolander (2001) Movie Review

Writer/director Ben Stiller’s Zoolander is a mixed bag. It’s funny as hell when it hits the right note, but drags seemingly forever when Ben Stiller is onscreen for too long, furrowing his forehead at us. The funniest scenes involve other people interacting with Zoolander, but director Stiller...

February 2nd, 2002 | Read More

Oceans 11 (2001) Movie Review

Danny Ocean has just been released from prison after a 4-year stint. He’s a confidence man (re: conman) who has lost his wife, Tess, after being incarcerated, something he hasn’t accepted yet, and doesn’t plan to. He’s back in the real world, alone, and with a scheme almost as...

February 1st, 2002 | Read More

The Others (2001) Movie Review

Spanish filmmaker Alejandro Amenabar’s The Others came along at the perfect time. The spooky horror film entered the marketplace at a time when teenybopper slasher flicks and supposedly “horror” films that relied on CGI ghosts were gobbling up money and turning the minds of hapless...

January 31st, 2002 | Read More

The Musketeer (2001) Movie Review

Alexandre Dumas is a French novelist, although you wouldn’t know it from all the countless film versions of his books by Americans, including ad nauseam versions of “The 3 Musketeers,” “The Count of Monte Cristo”, and “The Man in the Iron Mask.” Dumas is a popular...

January 27th, 2002 | Read More

Hana-Bi (1997) Movie Review

Detective Nishi (Takeshi Kitano) is having a very bad week. It starts with the death of his 4-year old daughter, which leads to his wife’s hospitalization and discovery that she has terminal cancer, and while visiting his wife, Nishi’s partner, and best friend Horibe (Ren Osugi), who Nishi...

January 26th, 2002 | Read More

Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) Movie Review

Peter Jackson’s “The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring” is an amazing film to behold. Consider that the movie, the first in a trilogy based on the J.R.R. Tolkien books, is probably the most ambitious filmmaking project in the history of film, and that it took 2 years and $300...

January 25th, 2002 | Read More

The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) Movie Review

I love period movies, but with one minor exception: I hate movie that takes place in the ’70s. I don’t know what it is about the era, maybe it’s the clothes that just completely turn me off. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but there’s just something about that era that...

January 22nd, 2002 | Read More