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Film

Director Michael Haneke Makes Us Feel Guilty For Watching Funny Games

By Jim Ridley

Published: March 12, 2008

For the crime of obliterating high culture, for the crime of getting off on vicarious degradation — and, above all, for the crime of sitting through any movie that resembles the one he has...

Film

Austin City Limits

Man vs. nature deep in the heart of Texas in The Unforeseen.

By Jim Ridley

Published: March 12, 2008

For those growing up in weather-beaten West Texas, someone says early in Laura Dunn's The Unforeseen , "nature becomes God." A God who hands out abundance at times, to be sure, but also one who...

Film

The Signal Brings Zombies to the HotLanta

By Jim Ridley

Published: February 20, 2008

"Do you have the crazy?" a wild-eyed zombie fighter demands of his duct-taped captive. The Signal has the crazy all right, bless its cold and sick little heart. A roundelay/tag-team triptych by...

DVDish

Chafing Dishes

By Jim Ridley

Published: February 13, 2008

No Reservations (Warner Bros.) From its cheap, mid-'90s-looking package to its woefully scant extras (one pre-chewed Food Network behind-the-scenes, blech) to its wide-screen/full-screen...

Film

A Gorier, Meaner, and Uglier Rambo

By Jim Ridley

Published: January 30, 2008

A fourth Rambo? The question isn't "Why?" — it's "What took him so long?" Was America's avenging angel of meat planning to just sit out Fallujah and what we're cooking up for Iran and Syria?...

DVDish

Donkey Punch

By Jim Ridley

Published: January 30, 2008

The King of Kong (New Line) Seth Gordon's best-of-2007 documentary, about the battle for Donkey Kong supremacy, remains a work-in-progress: Billy Mitchell, the longtime title holder...

Feature

Hit List

The top movies of 2007

By Jim Ridley

Published: December 26, 2007

It's that time of year again. Our six critics don't always (or often) agree, but we've combined their top 10 lists (allowing for ties) to pretend they do! So without further ado, the 10 (or 15)...

Feature

Missed Opportunities

Kick yourself for not seeing these 10 movies

By Jim Ridley

Published: December 26, 2007

How tough is it for a movie to find its audience, above the din of blockbuster marketing and beyond the clogged distribution pipeline? Tsai Ming-liang, the Taiwanese-Malaysian director regarded as...

Feature

Counter-Strike

Steel yourself for 2008 with a look back at 2007's best scripts

By Jim Ridley

Published: December 26, 2007

The year: 2505. Your viewing choices tonight: an oldie but a goodie — a picture called Ass , a feature-length screensaver of butt cheeks punctuated by the occasional fart — or the hit...

Film

Lock Up the Kids

It's a hard-knock — and creepy life — in The Orphanage

By Jim Ridley

Published: December 26, 2007

Having a child destroys your immunity to horror, real or imagined. Before the blessed event, you could laugh off The Exorcist, The Omen , or any of a thousand gory shockers with some wide-eyed...

Film

Hock the Line

Sending up the biopic, Walk Hard sells cheap laughs, lame cameos, and lifeless Cox

By Jim Ridley

Published: December 19, 2007

As an actor, John C. Reilly is the opposite of Mr. Cellophane. He doesn't disappear into a role, roles disappear onto him — the unlikely porn sidekick of Boogie Nights , the...

Film

With Relatives Like These ...

By Jim Ridley

Published: November 21, 2007

There are comedies of discomfort, and then there's Margot at the Wedding , Noah Baumbach's scalding follow-up to The Squid and the Whale . An immersion in sibling malice and simmering...

Film

Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten Offers Hope for Old Punks

By Jim Ridley

Published: November 7, 2007

Punk died, the Silver Jews sang, the first time a kid shouted, "Punk's not dead!" The words are never uttered in Julien Temple's Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten , and maybe that's why you...

Film

Beantown Boys Make Good

The Brothers Affleck come through with a complex, sophisticated Boston crime drama

By Jim Ridley

Published: October 17, 2007

"Down these mean streets a man must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished nor afraid," Raymond Chandler wrote in 1950's "The Simple Art of Murder," smacking the ascot off the...

DVDish

You'll Laugh Dying

By Jim Ridley

Published: October 10, 2007

You Kill Me (Genius) Funny thing seeing Philip Baker Hall in You Kill Me , as he's already played the role of a drunken hit man's boss in The Matador , to which this feels like a...

DVDish

Fist Things First

By Jim Ridley

Published: October 3, 2007

Caligula: Imperial Edition (Penthouse) (Spoiler alert: Fisting!) One day back in the swingin' '70s, somebody mentioned how "absolute power corrupts absolutely," and then Bob Guccione, Gore...

DVDish

Keeping the Meter Running

By Jim Ridley

Published: August 15, 2007

Taxi Driver: Collector's Edition (Sony) "Listen, you fuckers, you screwheads: Here is a man who would not take it anymore." Martin Scorsese's 1976 vision of hell as city-of-night New York...

Film

After Sunrise

The long walk over, Julie Delpy explores what comes next (i.e., the hard part)

By Jim Ridley

Published: August 8, 2007

Back in 1995, Richard Linklater's Before Sunrise gave flesh to a Yank's fantasy of worldly European womanhood: Julie Delpy's Celine, a sprite who materialized on a passenger train for one sweet...

Film

Maybe Another Teen Movie

Is high school coming-of-ager Rocket Science quirky for good or evil? The answer's ... debatable.

By Jim Ridley

Published: August 8, 2007

It seems fitting that a movie about debate competition should produce ambivalent feelings. As a master debater says early on in Jeffrey Blitz's Rocket Science , a strong opinion is a luxury the...

DVDish

Chow Time Again

By Jim Ridley

Published: July 25, 2007

Hard Boiled: Two-Disc Ultimate Edition (Weinstein) The Criterion version of John Woo's masterpiece, about two cops (the overworked Chow Yun-Fat and the undercover Tony Leung) gunning for...