The first half of this movie should have been called STALLED. It takes 45 loooooong minutes to set up the main character, the romance, and what will eventually become the main plot...and they do it with about five minutes worth of script. That being said, once this clunker gets back on the road it becomes … Continue reading DRIVE

Bliss! An intelligent, gripping, superbly acted drama about what led to the current financial meltdown, told not as a docu-drama, but through the prism of a fictional Goldman Sachs-type mega-firm. Even if there had been talented unknowns in the cast, the whip-smart screenplay would have carried the audience along with them. But oh my stars … Continue reading MARGIN CALL

People who think George Clooney is merely a pretty face who occasionally throws over his beautiful girlfriend for another one aren't paying attention. Mr. Clooney is a producer, a director and most impressively an actor. Last year he was largely overlooked in THE AMERICAN and was underrated in UP IN THE AIR the previous year. … Continue reading THE DESCENDANTS

It would be unfortunate if people let director Brett Ratner's shortcomings as a human being lead them to dump on his latest movie. Rather, TOWER HEIST should be trashed on its own demerits -- the mechanical plotting, the paperboard characters, the labored stunts and the almost complete lack of anything fresh or amusing. As plastic … Continue reading TOWER HEIST

This film tries so hard to be "arty" that it completely lost me. MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE (MMMM from here on), is about a young woman who escapes from a cult and runs back to her only family, her sister. Nothing is overt in this movie. You have to pay attention and watch as the … Continue reading MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE

The previews for TOWER HEIST give the impression that this is first a comedy and second a "heist movie". Turns out it's a "heist movie" with a ton of laughs. But, whatever it is, it all begins with "story" and Brett Ratner has a great one. Ben Stiller is the manager of The Tower, the … Continue reading TOWER HEIST