a&e | FILM REVIEWS
Alec Baldwin
Ridiculous Fun
Bobby Louis C.K. Cannavale
Cate Blanchett
Andrew Dice Clay
Sally Michael Peter Hawkins Sarsgaard Stuhlbarg
“Grade A. Powerful and Enthralling.” (Highest Rating)
-Owen Gleiberman, ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY
Riddick. Vin Diesel, Matt Nable and Katee Sackhoff star in a film written and directed by David Twohy.
Written and Directed by Woody Allen
Reviewed by D.J. Palladino
W
hen last seen, Richard B. Riddick (Vin Diesel) had slaughtered his way out of an inescapable space prison and fought through a high-tech alien crew into a Necromonger lordship. But he seemed a little blue. Turns out our bald-headed, glow-eyed super hominid was homesick; he’s never been great company (some might call him snobby), even when confronted with money and babes. So it’s not entirely surprising to find our favorite Furyan battered and alone on an orange-tinted landscape as this new film begins. We don’t wait long to watch him spring back to what he does best — setting his own broken leg between two alien stones and then putting screws into his own flesh to keep it straight. What a man. Except of course, he’s actually an alien, and a modified model at that. It’s a return to badass basics for Riddick, with a set of problems more in tune with the first Riddick movie, Pitch Black. The first third of this film finds our hero trying to jump a little serpent-protected pond that guards some stairs that lead to a crappy desert. The rest is him in stealth mode beating up space mercs and people from his past. Oh, and way more serpents too. It makes for cheesy fun. The sets look like T.V.’s Lost in Space and the space motorcycles seem stolen from Flash Gordon, but the appeal is simple. Riddick’s predecessors come from worlds of pulp novels like Conan or Doc Savage, where sheer can-do ruthlessness presides. There’s a lot less to these films than most sci-fi offerings — and that’s a
The New York Times
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THE PHENOMENON THAT HAS EVERYONE TALKING “GRADE: A . ONE OF THE BEST MOVIES OF THE YEAR!” RICHARD ROEPER
RIDDICK: Vin Diesel stars as the manly hero of this sci-fi flick. good thing. No great scientific ironies or moral extrapolation of contemporary issues gets explored. These are the voyages of a manly, sneaky guy trying to make his way home through a merciless universe. Who can’t relate? ■
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DRAMA OF ASTONISHING “GRADE A: AEMOTIONAL PURITY.”
Prisoners
– Owen Gleiberman, ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY
“BRIE
LARSON IS A REVELATION...
ONE OF THE YEAR’S BEST PERFORMANCES.
Short Term 12. Brie Larson, John Gallagher Jr., and Kaitlyn Dever star in a film written and directed by Destin Cretton.
An exceptional film in every way.” – Peter Travers, ROLLING STONE
“A
WONDER. EXCEPTIONAL, MOVING AND INTIMATE.
Reviewed by D.J. Palladino
Honestly earns every bit of its emotional impact.”
F
rom the outside, this great film doesn’t seem promising. A bunch of at-risk teens in a lockdown group home monitored by a bunch of twentysomethings whose emotional difficulties are only a notch less disturbing. But it isn’t long before we sense the masterful moviemaking of director Destin Cretton, who wrote and produced this based on his own experiences (and a muchpraised short film). Short Term is a small movie that manages to explore the edge of hard truths and exhilarating artifice. At times it seems improvised or documented, even though we know actors like Brie Larson from television and other films. Then Cretton throws in obvious contrivances, like the parallel structure of the opening and closing scenes, or the doppelganging of characters; it’s a daredevil flirtation with cliché that ends up making us feel like complicit victims to a brilliant illusion. But that’s mostly because it makes you cry. Just like the combination of artifice and realism, Cretton skillfully builds up patterns of tough-mindedness and sympathy. When birthday girl Jayden (Kaitlyn Dever) is stood up by her father, we helplessly watch her lapse into horrifying self-cutting and screaming fits. Calmed down by staff, she returns to her room to find the whole house has gotten together and made her homemade birthday cards. A few minutes later, we learn her darker secret, with implications that pulls the staff in, too. The tender moments devastate because the whole world is shown to be cruel, even to its defenseless young. Cretton’s real skill builds up from his finely rendered dialogue. The kids in the film combine jaded indifference
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–Kenneth Turan, LOS ANGELES TIMES
“THE
FINEST AMERICAN DRAMA SO FAR THIS YEAR.
Brie Larson gives a star-making performance.” –David Edelstein, NEW YORK MAGAZINE
“ONE
OF 2013’S BEST!
One of the most gripping films about human decency ever made.” –Bob Strauss, LA DAILY NEWS
SHORT TERM 12 : Brie Larson stars as Grace and Kaitlyn Dever as Jayden in Destin Cretton’s story of a group foster home. (“whatever” is the mantra), but they’re poets, too. Mason (John Gallagher, Jr.) jokes about the fiesta in his pants, but also sums up his love for Grace (Larson) with dazzling clarities based on her happy combo of weirdness and beauty. It sounds trite, but we get to know these people quickly and worry about them long afterward. Short Term boasts terrific acting and a great script about people and things locked inside. Maybe it doesn’t sound like much, but it’s better than almost everything I’ve seen this summer. ■
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september 12, 2013
THE INDEPENDENt
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