Movie review: The new 'G.I. Joe' redeems the franchise but still badly misfires
2013 Paramount Pictures.
Whew. That was my first reaction to G.I. Joe: Retaliation (opening today), the sequel/re-boot to the horrible, childhood-memory destroying, offensive 2009 crap-heap, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.
Disclaimer: There is no bigger fan of G.I. Joe than this guy. I grew up (spoiled perhaps?) with every single G.I. Joe action figure, including those that you had to mail away for, like the hooded Cobra Commander, Super Trooper or Sgt. Slaughter. Heck, I even had the massive, 7-foot long U.S.S. Flagg in my basement, the toy battleship that sold about 10 units worldwide.
Movie review: 'The Croods' a prehistoric journey in search of new ideas
Genre: Animation, Adventure, Comedy
Run Time: 1 hour, 38 minutes, Rated PG
Starring (voices of): Nicolas Cage, Emma Stone, Ryan Reynolds, Catherine Keener, Cloris Leachman, Clark Duke
Written & Directed by Chris Sanders (Lilo & Stitch, How to Train Your Dragon) & Kirk De Micco (Space Chimps)
​Patching together elements from other popular movies that have come before it, The Croods (opening today), still manages to be passable family entertainment.
Movie review: 'Spring Breakers' not your average teenage orgy
Run Time: 1 hour, 34 minutes, Rated R
Starring: Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens, Ashley Benson, Rachel Korine, James Franco
Written and Directed by Harmony Korine (Gummo, Mister Lonely,Trash Humpers, writer of Kids )
​Talk about a buzz-kill. Spring Breakers (opening today) is getting tons of attention for the career u-turns of its three up-until-this-point wholesome actresses, Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens and Ashley Benson. All three have found fame in kid-friendly fare on the Disney Channel (Gomez) to High School Musical (Hudgens) to Pretty Little Liars (Benson). Now, they join controversial writer/director Harmony Korine for an R-rated sex-crime fantasy meant to catapult them into the world of adult entertainment.
Movie review: 'Olympus Has Fallen' is held hostage by action genre cliches
Starring: Gerard Butler, Aaron Eckhart, Dylan McDermott, Morgan Freeman, Finley Jacobsen, Angela Bassett, Melissa Leo, Cole Hauser, Rick Yune
Directed by Antoine Fuqua (Training Day, King Arthur, Brooklyn's Finest)
​​It's no mistake that Olympus Has Fallen (opening today) is chock-full of talented actors. That's not necessarily typical of big-budget action movies, but Olympus Has Fallen is not your average action movie. Until it becomes one about mid-way through.
Movie review: 'Ginger & Rosa' an exploration of fear, friendship and family
Run Time: 1 hour, 30 minutes, Rated PG-13
Starring: Elle Fanning, Alice Englert, Annette Bening, Oliver Platt, Timothy Spall, Christina Hendricks
Written and Directed by Sally Potter (Orlando, Rage, The Tango Lesson)
​The sheer size of a crisis really comes down to perspective, doesn't it? Take the Cuban Missile Crisis, which had the world facing a nuclear catastrophe of epic proportions. That's pretty heavy. But to an individual on the brink of losing her family, her best friend, her childhood and all that she has come to know? You might as well drop a bomb. In Ginger & Rosa (opening today), these themes and more are explored in a touching and intimate film from director Sally Potter (see links below for my exclusive interview with her).
Movie Review: 'Stoker' shines when at its darkest
Starring: Mia Wasikowska, Nicole Kidman, Matthew Goode, Dermot Mulroney, Phyllis Somerville, Jacki Weaver
Written by Wentworth Miller
Directed by Chan-wook Park (Oldboy, Lady Vengeance, Thirst)
​Wentworth Miller is an actor best known for his role as Michael Scofield on the cancelled Fox TV series, Prison Break. With Stoker, Miller branches out as a writer, having penned the screenplay to this dark and somewhat disturbing thriller.
Movie review: No magic to be found in the lame 'The Incredible Burt Wonderstone'
Starring: Steve Carell, Steve Buscemi, Olivia Wilde, Jim Carrey, James Gandolfini, Alan Arkin, Jay Mohr
Directed by Don Scardino (Me and Veronica, Advice from a Caterpillar)
​Everybody knows that magic only works when there is a sense of awe and wonderment, mixed with the element of surprise. With The Incredible Burt Wonderstone - a comedy opening this weekend that reunites Jim Carrey and Steve Carell (who both appeared in 2003's Bruce Almighty) - it's a surprise all right. Surprisingly unfunny.
Movie review: 'Lore' a painful journey paved with raw emotional discoveries
Genre: Foreign, Drama, Thriller, War
Run Time: 1 hour, 49 minutes, Not Rated
Starring: Saskia Rosendahl, Nele Trebs, Andre Frid, Mika Seidel, Ursina Lardi
Co-Written & Directed by Cate Shortland (Somersault)
​Where are the foreign comedies? It seems that every foreign film that makes it to stateside theaters deals with heavily dramatic fare, usually involving powerful, often times depressing, subject matter. But when such a film if beautifully made like Lore (now playing exclusively at the Main Art Theater in Royal Oak), all is forgiven.
Movie review: 'Oz the Great and Powerful' more than just smoke and mirrors
Genre: Fantasy, Adventure
Run Time: 2 hours, 10 minutes, Rated PG
Starring: James Franco, Mila Kunis, Rachel Weisz, Michelle Williams, Zach Braff, Bill Cobbs, Joey King, Tony Cox
Written by Mitchell Kapner (The Whole Nine Yards, Days of Wrath) & David Lindsay-Abaire (Rise of the Guardians, Rabbit Hole), based on the novel "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" by L. Frank Baum
Directed by Sam Raimi (Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man 3, The Evil Dead, Army of Darkness, Drag Me to Hell)
​Few films have had the endurance or the impact as the 1939 classic The Wizard of Oz. Although there have been a few spin-offs and failed attempts at returning to this fantastical world, nobody has had the guts to bring it to the big screen in blockbuster style...until now. With Oz the Great and Powerful (opening today, everywhere), we journey back to the land of Munchkins, flying monkeys and yellow-brick roads in an attempt to re-capture the amazement and wonder of the original, for a modern-day audience.
Movie review: 'Emperor' bores us with a straight- forward history lesson
Genre: Drama, War, History
Starring: Tommy Lee Jones, Matthew Fox, Kaori Momoi, Eriko Hatsune
Directed by Peter Webber (Girl with a Pearl Earring, Hannibal Rising)
​Sometimes fascinating historical nuggets don't translate into feature-length features very well and the new film Emperor (opening today) is the latest example of such.