http://www.grouchoreviews.com/ Tue, 07 Feb 2012 00:45:10 GMT Film/DVD reviews, interviews and features. http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4293 /reviews/4293 Above all, Farhadi’s parable teaches that a rush to judgment inevitably turns back on the judge. Fri, 03 Feb 2012 13:54:24 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4292 /reviews/4292 Perhaps the title sets an expectation Ken Kwapis’ movie can’t quite deliver. Fri, 03 Feb 2012 13:49:03 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4291 /reviews/4291 Though it does thrill with intense, close-cropped action photography, swift editing, and vivid sound design, The Grey makes as much of an impression by being unexpectedly emotional. Fri, 27 Jan 2012 15:26:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/interviews/340 /interviews/340 The surprise every morning of when that face was finally on: it was somebody that wasn‘t me. You know, I never thought of how masculine or feminine she was. Fri, 27 Jan 2012 15:11:47 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4290 /reviews/4290 Except as a tool for pediatric grief counseling, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close amounts to a fetishization of its own trappings (the boy, NYC, 9/11) more interested in Oscar than Oskar. Fri, 20 Jan 2012 19:04:03 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4289 /reviews/4289 Finds Soderbergh keeping it simple, stupid, by filling the story‘s hollowness with kick-butt action and elements of style. Fri, 20 Jan 2012 18:56:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4284 /reviews/4284 This fable of the disposable performer rising above his class transcends ordinary fiction to be an expressive visual record of the art of bullfighting: primal, brutal, repellent and magnetic in equal measure. Tue, 17 Jan 2012 02:45:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4206 /reviews/4206 A stylish genre exercise...one might just as well say the L.A. story unfolds at the corner of Michael Mann and David Lynch. Mon, 16 Jan 2012 14:00:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/2366 /reviews/2366 Proof plays cleverly with the arcane mysteries of game theory, and if it‘s only a game, happily, it‘s one worthy of exhibition. Mon, 16 Jan 2012 12:19:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4162 /reviews/4162 Condurache and Weisz’s ‘small corrections‘ make a big difference in steering the movie right, enough to make The Whistleblower a decent entry in the genre of political passion plays. Mon, 16 Jan 2012 09:07:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4226 /reviews/4226 [Faris] and Evans deserve better than a string of rom-com clichés, including the surprise date in a closed sports arena. Unless you’re Justin Beiber and Selena Gomez, it couldn’t happen to you. Mon, 16 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4283 /reviews/4283 A slow disintegration of the thin veneer of social niceties, revealing the human animalism underneath. Like Reza‘s equally popular Art, God of Carnage isn‘t as deep as it would have you believe, but both plays are catnip for actors. Fri, 13 Jan 2012 14:00:24 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4225 /reviews/4225 50/50 isn’t interested in defeatism, except as one inevitable way station of the film’s appealing emotional ramble. Thu, 12 Jan 2012 00:46:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4282 /reviews/4282 Oldman‘s mid-film music-video performance of ‘My Way‘ before a neon staircase compares favorably…as a revelation of character through performance…to Robert De Niro‘s framing monologues in Raging Bull. Wed, 11 Jan 2012 19:37:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4219 /reviews/4219 What Killer Elite never manages is to convince us of its sociopolitical import...or its emotional resonance. Wed, 11 Jan 2012 19:16:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4281 /reviews/4281 While it‘s unspooling, it has enough visual snap, narrative tension, and humor for a satisfying ‘drive-in movie‘ diversion. Sat, 07 Jan 2012 00:36:28 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4276 /reviews/4276 An orgiastic celebration of Glee concocted by its own creators...sort of like the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, but with more hot air. Sat, 31 Dec 2011 23:40:48 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4279 /reviews/4279 Shares with...Get Smart roughly the same ratio of silliness and satire, which is to say heavy on the former and light on the latter. Sat, 31 Dec 2011 22:23:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4272 /reviews/4272 Justified remains one of the most satisfying hours on television, creating a illusion of the social margins of Southern life that‘s convincing enough that we want to believe in it. Thu, 29 Dec 2011 23:03:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4270 /reviews/4270 The film‘s self-conscious gestures in the direction of fish-out-of-water comedies, buddy-cop movies and Westerns don‘t amount to much in and of themselves, but they tie together as a functional clothesline for character comedy and left-field drama. Thu, 29 Dec 2011 21:46:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/reviews/4268 /reviews/4268 A charmer in its gee-whiz, irony-light resuscitation of the movie serials of the ‘30s. Thu, 29 Dec 2011 19:13:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/features/246 /features/246 The Year‘s Best Films 1. The Tree of Life  No studio release this year was more ambitious, emotional, or elegant than The Tree of Life, Terrence Malick‘s searching epic about our place in a family, a town, a galaxy, the universe. Emmanuel Lubezki‘s innovative cinematography beautifully painted with light and shadow and color, while boy lead H... Tue, 27 Dec 2011 21:24:52 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/interviews/220 /interviews/220 Jim used to always con you into doing things by saying, ‘Oh no, it‘ll be great. It‘ll be really nice.‘ Wed, 23 Nov 2011 00:00:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/interviews/339 /interviews/339 You know, ‘I‘m gonna direct this film about a woman and her struggle to conceptualize God‘...It‘s like, ‘Are you insane?  Are you possessed?‘ Fri, 02 Sep 2011 20:58:31 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/interviews/338 /interviews/338 I have no interest in manipulating a performance. I want to unleash a performance. And I want to witness a performance. And obviously use my camera as tellingly as I can to capture that. Fri, 02 Sep 2011 14:31:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/interviews/337 /interviews/337 There is a certain level of privacy that leaves immediately when you set foot in this small town, y‘know? Everybody heard what you had for dinner last night and who you had over. Tue, 09 Aug 2011 15:28:32 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/features/244 /features/244 The Year‘s Best Films 1. Blue Valentine  This master class in acting from the next generation of top talent (Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams) takes the pulse of modern love. With American divorce rates still hovering near 50%, few stories could be more wistfully relevant than this intimate look at the birth and death of love. First-time di... Fri, 24 Dec 2010 03:52:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/features/243 /features/243 The Year‘s Best Narrative Films 1. Sita Sings the Blues  Notice a theme here? 2009 was a banner year for animated films, and the most creative was this little charmer written, directed, produced, and animated by Nina Paley (it’s legally available for free online, but don’t be a cheapskate: make a donation or buy the DVD). Paley app... Fri, 25 Dec 2009 15:54:00 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/features/242 /features/242 The Year‘s Best Films 1. Waltz with Bashir  Waltz with Bashir works equally well as a potent anti-war film and as a creative examination of the nature of memory. Mature and possessed with significant psychological depth, Ari Folman’s animated film is an autobiographical documentary as much as it is anything else. Folman, unable to recon... Sat, 20 Dec 2008 12:13:46 GMT Peter Canavese http://www.grouchoreviews.com/features/237 /features/237 Goosebump alert: the disc kicks off with one of the all-time great movie themes, the “Raiders March“...a magnificent, brassy piece of music. Tue, 29 Jul 2008 19:27:03 GMT Peter Canavese