It’s unfortunate that this film doesn’t really come together.  I’m a big Ellen Page fan, and even she was tied down by the restraints this film placed on her and the other cast members.  These restraints include the script that comes from us from first time writer Mark Poirier, which is witty, and clever, but one hundred minutes of stinging zingers and caustic sarcasm do not a good film make.

The rest of the cast didn’t hold much promise for me, so I didn’t expect much.  I was, however, pleasantly surprised by Sarah Jessica Parker’s performance.  She got all frumpy (well, she wasn’t all fashionista, at least) and played a toned down part that wasn’t all self-important, and I liked it. This whole mess was accompanied by one of the most annoying, acoustic, emo-bull-shit soundtracks I’ve ever heard.  It’s like Murro was afraid the audience (apparently he didn’t expect smart people to see his film) wouldn’t catch on that each scene was touched with a tinge of melancholy, but also a little hope.  See the tracklisting here for songs not to listen to.  Ever.

The whole thing wasn’t a loss, there were some funny moments where I actually laughed out loud (but just a little).  And if you’re one for happy endings, then this is for you!  But for me, it wasn’t worth waiting to get there.

1.5 out of 4 stars

Rottentomatoes: 49% – Cream of the Crop: 48%

Rated R for language, brief teen drug and alcohol use, and for some sexuality.

Having finally watched this film, I’ve now exposed myself to Anderson’s entire oeuvre (yeah, I know it’s only 5 feature length films, and one short film, but still…).  All were a hit except for that one misstep, ‘The Life Aquatic,’ and we’ll pretend that never happened.

Rushmore was written through a team effort from Anderson himself and his college buddy Owen Wilson (which explains the Luke Wilson cameo).   The film follows Max Fischer (played by Jason Schwartzman) and his overly ambitious endeavors at his prep school, Rushmore.  This is Schwartzman’s first film, and has since entertained us with his hilarity in movies like I Heart Huckabees and Sophia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette. At Rushmore, Max befriends Herman Blume (Bill Murray), the father of some of his fellow classmates, and falls in love with elementary school teacher Rosemary Cross (Olivia Williams).  The three promptly fall into a quirky love triangle in classic French New Wave style.

I like to think of Wes Anderson as a sort of Tim Burton on Prozac.  Not to say Anderson is any less original than Burton, but he has a totally original, distinctive, and pleasing style.  His more recent projects The Darjeeling Limited, and The Royal Tenenbaums follow in the same suit.

Rushmore is hilarious and doesn’t depend on the crassness and potty humor trend that comedies seem to be following these days.  Murray and Schwartzman make a great team and I wish they’d work together again, (Side note: although they both haven’t actually been in the same film together since, they both went on to star in films directed by Sophia Coppola who is Schwartzman’s cousin.  Once again, proof that all the things I love are interconnected).

I’ve heard this film described as a ‘boy movie.’  But it’s not true.  This film is for everyone!

3 out of 4 stars

Rottentomatoes: 86% – Cream of the Crop: 76%

Rated R for language and brief nudity.

(If you decide to buy this film, be sure and get the Criterion Collection edition, and read the blog ‘Stuff White People Like’ about Wes Anderson films.)

When I saw Brittany Murphy listed, my mind made an inaudible, ‘Ahhhh’ (Ahhhh in the bad, disappointed way, not like the Ahhhh you make when you see puppies).  But then I continued to read: Toni Collette, Giovanni Ribisi (okay, he’s questionable), Rose Byrne, James Franco (who only won me over last week with his performance in Pineapple Express), Josh Brolin, Marcia Gay Harden, and several others. Then I asked ChaCha what it got on RottenTomatoes and was pleasantly surprised to find out it received 74%. This resulted in a renting.  An ensemble cast like that had to at least be interesting.

The film is made up of several vignettes with simplistic titles like ‘The Stranger,’ ‘The Mother,’ ‘The Dead Girl.’  Each vignette varies greatly in interest (often connected to the acting talent of the main players), although all are disturbing in there own way.  In the same vein as Robert Altman’s Short Cuts and P.T. Anderson’s Magnolia, each seemingly unrelated story ends up being related, in some way or another, to the discovery of the body of a dead girl.  I definitely can’t say that all parts of the film are worth watching, but some definitely are (particularly the section with Rose Byrne).

Writer/director Karen Moncrieff doesn’t have much experience writing or directing (to date, she’s stuck mostly with TV, including directing an episode of Six Feet Under). But still there’s something to her direction, the film definitely has some shining moments.  The Dead Girl failed to achieve it’s lofty ambitions (I’m pretty sure the limited release on December 29th meant she had award season dreams), but deserves respect for it’s attempt at originality.

2.5 out of 4 stars

Rottentomatoes: 74% – Cream of the Crop: 63%

Rated R for language, grisly images and sexuality/nudity.

This movie seems to have everything going for it.  Literally, everything.  It’s directed by Fernando Meirelles.  The man we can thank for the near perfect City of God, and the 2006 Oscar favorite The Constant Gardner.  This Academy Award nominated director knows his stuff, if you don’t believe me, watch either of the two previously mentioned movies, give me a call, and I’ll say I told you so.

Blindness is based on the book of the same name, written by Nobel Prize winner Jose Saramago, the plot follows a city wide epidemic causing blindness in 90% of the population.  The city’s ultimate and immediate goal becomes containment of the infection.  Those afflicted are quarantined to an abandoned mental hospital, where they are left with meager food rations and no contact with the outside world.  Left completely to their own devices, a sightless, savage society is formed based on gree and brutality.  Power is left in the hands of those that control food and supplies.  Left to their own devices, this ‘society’ quickly devolves and loses it’s humanity (a la Lord of the Flies).

The cast offers an endless supply of some of the most talented actors in Hollywood today. The Julianne Moore (Magnolia, Boogie Nights, Children of Men) plays the wife of a Mark Ruffalo (Zodiac, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) who’s infected.  She follows him to the quarantined hospital, keeping her sight a secret while leading/protecting the underdogs.  The film also stars the wickedly talented Gail Garcia Bernal (The King, Babel), Sandra Oh (Hard Candy, Sideways), Danny Glover and scores more.  Check out the full cast here.

Blindness is set to be released September 26th and while it’s not yet rated, if it stays true to Saramago’s novel, it will most likely be rated R.  Check out the official movie site at blindness-themovie.com.

Check out the following trailers and teasers as well (some of which feature the ridiculously awesome original score to Danny Boyle’s Sunshine).

It’s hard to review a film you completely didn’t care about in the first place.  I never watched the TV series, and I think I caught about 85% of the first film on TBS.  If truth be told, I only watched this movie because I had a short window of time that needed to be filled and neither Mamma Mia! nor Space Chimps had times that fit my schedule.

Director Chis Carter brings us this second feature length installment in the X-Files (and hopefully the final chapter?).  Both Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny reprise their roles and Scully and Mulder.  After the four year hiatus, the sexual chemistry between the two is still as strong as ever (why can’t they just be together?), and their performances never miss a beat.  They share exactly one on-screen kiss in I Want To Believe and one awkwardly filmed scene that shows the two in bed (not too much is shown…Scully was just not in the mood)

The boring part of this film is that even though some slightly mysterious events lure the two out of retirement, their involvement in the case doesn’t advance the investigation at all.  The film gets really creepy when, get this, the pedophile psychic leading FBI teams to frozen, severed limbs hidden in the Virginian wilderness starts to cry BLOOD!  It’s sooo weird.  Can’t you hear the theme music now?

Two thirds of the way through the movie, all creepiness comes to a screeching halt, and Carter apparently started taking his cues from made-for-TV movies and it’s difficult to stay focused for the remaining 20 minutes or so.

Granted, I don’t know enough about X-Files to say whether or not the cult following will enjoy this or not, but I can pretty much guarantee the average viewer will be somewhere in between bored and underwhelmed when viewing this movie.

0.5 out of 4 stars

Rottentomatoes: 35% – Cream of the Crop: 27%

I enjoyed the film, a lot.  I’ll probably go see it again.  Heath Ledger was haunting and brilliant in his performance, the action was endlessly entertaining (the more elaborate scenes were filmed in IMAX).  But I left the theater feeling slightly underwhelmed.  This isn’t Christopher Nolan’s fault, who deserves such high praise for reminding us that high-budgeted, big studio movies can be more than just mindless drivel.  It wasn’t the actors’ fault (the cast was stellar; let’s thanks the folks with Scientology who mind-controlled Tom Cruise into forbidding Katie Holmes from reprising her roll as Rachel, Maggie Gyllenhaal is a better actor than Holmes will ever be.).   But I daresay it was the fault of the studio who previewed this film so much to critics, so far in advance, that I’ve been expecting a damn near perfect film since mid-June.

The studio really couldn’t care about this side effects of building such rapport.  They already have their great reviews, they already have (according to early estimations) the highest grossing opening weekend of all time.  So no one was really hurt I suppose.

I’ve had a few such experiences, when a movie is built up so much that I feel a little let down (I know someone who is definitely not me who was underwhelmed upon his first viewing of ‘The Godfather’ due to this very reason).

Of course, all this media fanfare about the movie doesn’t make the movie itself any less well made.  The two and a half hours literally flies by as you’re mesmerized by Aaron Eckhart as Two Face, Michael Caine as Alfred, the twisted love triangle between Harvey Dent, Bruce and Rachel, and all the other goodies that Nolan used to weave this masterful web.  My one  other qualm with TDK is this: Where’s Christian Bale?  It’s granted that this was Heath Ledger’s moment to shine (even more so with this being his last performance) but Bale is wicked talented, and definitely needed more screen time.  He’s the reason ‘Batman Begins’ was so revitalizing for the franchise, he should have been given more opportunity to show his acting chops.

3.5 out of 4 stars

Rottentomatoes: 94% – Cream of the Crop: 90%