Week of « Prev | Next »
8 articles
Blu-Ray Review: Give Johnny Depp, Michael Mann’s ‘Public Enemies’ Another Chance
9 hours ago
Chicago – On paper, Michael Mann’s “Public Enemies” looked like it would be a clear contender for end-of-the-year consideration but it has been largely forgotten, only a few months after its release. The cold, dense film didn’t register strongly enough with critics or audiences and it looks like it could disappear without much fanfare. What I think is more likely is that Mann’s dark, complex film will slowly get the recognition it deserves on the home market and it starts with this Blu-Ray release.
Blu-Ray Rating: 5.0/5.0
“Public Enemies” is an examination of the intersection of the end of the era of the bank robber and the beginning of the legend of the G-men. The former is represented by one of the “public enemies” of the day, John Dillinger (Johnny Depp), and the latter by the man assigned to catch the elusive mastermind, Melvin Purvis (Christian Bale). Dillinger stole »
- adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
Blu-Ray Review: Ultimate Edition of ‘Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’
10 hours ago
Chicago – Clear some shelf space for the gigantic Blu-Ray releases of the first two “Harry Potter” films, timed with the not-as-enormous edition release of “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” the same week. These ultimate editions, complete with collectibles and new special features, are great collector’s set gifts for the holidays for the Potter nut in your family but feel a bit like overkill for everyone else.
Blu-Ray Rating: 3.5/5.0
One has to truly love a film to allow it to take up the space of 4-5 others on their Blu-Ray shelf. While I recognized that there are many, many people who do love “Sorcerer’s Stone,” I’m not one of them. For me, the series doesn’t really click until the third film, “The Prisoner of Azkaban”. Three and four are great, five and six are good, but one are two are hampered by director »
- adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
Video Game Review: Addictive, Gorgeous ‘Assassin’s Creed 2’ is a Must-Play
12 hours ago
Chicago – The team behind the highly anticipated “Assassin’s Creed 2” have delivered one of the most remarkably realized and complete video game worlds of the year, a journey back in time to when a man’s word meant as much as the edge of his sword. With very few hiccups, “Assassin’s Creed 2” gives fans exactly what the expect, improving significantly on the original without deviating from what worked about the first hit game.
Video Game Rating: 4.5/5.0
The word I keep thinking of to describe “Assassin’s Creed 2” is depth. Both the depth of the visual scale of the game - very few, if any, looked more impressive this year - and the scope of the gameplay, an element that gets richer and richer as the title goes along. Coming off the white-knuckle, ammo-heavy experience of “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2,” it took me some time to get into the »
- adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
‘Up in the Air,’ ‘Nine,’ ‘Glee’ Lead 2009 Golden Globe Nominations
14 hours ago
Chicago – The nominees for the the 67th Annual Golden Globe Awards were revealed today and the George Clooney dramedy “Up in the Air” and the Daniel Day-Lewis musical “Nine” led the way in the film categories with six and five nominations, respectively, while acclaimed new show “Glee” led the way in the television category with four nominations.
Films with more than three nominations include “Avatar,” “Inglourious Basterds,” “The Hurt Locker,” “Invictus,” “It’s Complicated,” and “Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire”. Double nominees include “(500) Days of Summer.” “Brothers,” “Crazy Heart,” “The Informant!,” “Julie & Julia,” “The Last Station,” and “Up”. As for snubs, the highly acclaimed “An Education” and “Where the Wild Things Are” only registered with one nomination a piece and “The Road” was completely unrecognized.
George Clooney (left) and Vera Farmiga in “Up in the Air”.
Image credit: Dale Robinette
The television side of the nominations were »
- adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
Blu-Ray Review: ‘Julie & Julia’ an Appetizer in Need of a Main Course
14 hours ago
Chicago – 2009 has been a year of supremely underwhelming biopics, primarily because Hollywood has bent over backwards to make them marketable. You’d think that the idea of Meryl Streep playing Julia Child, or Morgan Freeman playing Nelson Mandela, or uncanny newcomer Christian McKay playing Orson Welles would be enough to sell a picture.
But each of these great actors and their respective characters are reduced to supporting roles in their own films, in favor of more commercially viable subjects, such as a hip blogger, a rugby game and Zac Efron. It’s infuriating to see such talent and potential go to waste.
DVD Rating: 3.0/5.0
“Julie & Julia” is the latest effort from the reigning queen of benignity, Nora Ephron. She seems incapable of writing any movie without including a cheerfully prosaic protagonist straight out of a mid-90s’ Meg Ryan vehicle. One can only imagine what Julia Child would’ve thought »
- adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
Clint Eastwood, Morgan Freeman Deliver Predictable Drama With ‘Invictus’
14 December 2009 2:18 PM, PST
Chicago – Director Clint Eastwood has given up on subtlety, choosing instead to tell old-fashioned, direct stories with as much technical skill and dramatic competency as possible. There’s nothing particularly wrong with the legendary director’s “Invictus,” but it’s also not nearly as memorable or thrilling as it could have or, given the true story that it tells, should have been.
Rating: 3.0/5.0
Personally, I find Eastwood the most interesting when he deals in gray moral situations like the ones at the core of “Mystic River,” “Unforgiven” or “Million Dollar Baby”. Lately, with films like “Flags of Our Fathers,” “Changeling,” “Gran Torino,” and, now, “Invictus,” there is no gray. He seems to have lost any interest at all in striking a subtle chord. Every single character development and plot turn is telegraphed in the previews and merely underlined by the film itself. It’s old-fashioned cinema and, in this case, »
- adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
Blu-Ray Review: Overly Manic ‘Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian’
14 December 2009 1:41 PM, PST
Chicago – The CGI smorgasbord that is “Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian” is likely to suffice as a babysitter this holiday season as eggnog is made or holiday shopping is concluded. Families are likely to be satisfied by the everything-and-the-kitchen-sink mania that will work for toddlers hopped up on Christmas candy, but the film itself will collapse for their parents, babysitters, and even their older siblings.
Blu-Ray Rating: 2.5/5.0
A slight improvement over the original (a film I truly didn’t like) merely due to the inclusion of Amy Adams and the absence of that film’s overcooked father/son story, “Battle of the Smithsonian” follows the “turn up the volume” model of sequels. “What worked about the original? Let’s make it bigger! And louder!”
Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian was released on Blu-Ray and DVD on December 1st, 2009.
Photo credit: Fox Home Video
Where »
- adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
Blu-Ray Review: ‘A Christmas Tale’ Offers French Take on Family Dysfunction
14 December 2009 9:23 AM, PST
Chicago – When American filmmakers throw a colorful familial ensemble under one roof for the holidays, the result often feels like a forced sitcom. Consider 2005’s “The Family Stone,” an ungainly fusion of slapstick laughs, scathing satire and feel good fuzziness.
The family members and their significant others each came equipped with their own specially designed quirks, including a matriarch battling cancer, and a deaf son with a black male lover (they’re portrayed as the only “normal” people in the film). French filmmaker Arnaud Desplechin’s “A Christmas Tale,” has the same basic outline, yet its style is more evocative of the New Wave than bad television.
Blu-Ray Rating: 4.5/5.0
Not since Ingmar Bergman’s “Fanny and Alexander” has a film so enchantingly merged jubilant holiday magic with melancholy family drama. It’s an exhilaratingly off-kilter picture, with a story both sprawling and simple. The film opens with a man, Abel »
- adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
8 articles
