Fresh
| Fresh 93%
| Up in the Air (2009) | "
The tension between the bleak and the blithe, the prime source of this movie’s strength, is sustained by Reitman to the end." Posted Nov 30, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 37%
| 2012 (2009) | "
2012 is so long, and its special effects are at once so outrageous and so thunderously predictable, that by the time I lurched from the theatre I felt that three years had actually passed and that the apocalypse was due any second." Posted Nov 16, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 82%
| Broken Embraces (2009) | "
Seems a touch too long, too airless, and too content with its own contrivances to stir the heart." Posted Nov 16, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 91%
| Precious: Based on the Novel PUSH by Sapphire (2009) | "
What rescues Precious is the performance of Mo’Nique as Mary, the heroine’s Medusa-like mother." Posted Nov 2, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 54%
| The Men Who Stare at Goats (2009) | "
Clooney gives it everything, but what does he get in return? A void where the story is meant to be." Posted Nov 2, 2009 |
Fresh
| Rotten 49%
| Antichrist (2009) | "
A word to the squeamish: there is no shame in leaving as the tools—and I use the word advisedly—come out. In a way, you will be getting the best of Antichrist, which until now has been a film of awkwardness, confusion, and great beauty." Posted Oct 19, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 56%
| The Invention of Lying (2009) | "
The last third of the movie is as bad as anything I’ve seen this year, with the laughs trailing off, and half of the supporting characters, the zestier ones, being airbrushed from the frame." Posted Oct 5, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 71%
| Walt and El Grupo (2009) | "
This may be the first documentary that contains not a single American, living or dead, who is anything but merry of disposition. That cheer carries over to the on-the-spot gusto of el grupo’s sketchbooks -- a more accurate tribute than the final cartoons." Posted Sep 21, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 65%
| Coco Before Chanel (2009) | "
I missed the desperation that goaded the real Coco—not just the sulks that pass like rain showers across Tautou’s prettiness but that brisk contempt for existing conditions which led Chanel, like any French revolutionary, to overturn them." Posted Sep 21, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 90%
| District 9 (2009) | "
You don’t feel bamboozled, fooled, or patronized by District 9, as you did by most of the summer blockbusters. You feel winded, shaken, and shamed." Posted Sep 7, 2009 |
Fresh
| Rotten 56%
| 9 (2009) | "
Here's the strangest thing of all: it works." Posted Sep 7, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 86%
| The Baader Meinhof Complex (2009) | "
I have seen The Baader Meinhof Complex three or four times now, and, despite exasperation with its fissile form, I find it impossible not to be plunged afresh into this engulfing age of European anxiety." Posted Aug 24, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 49%
| Taking Woodstock (2009) | "
You can’t deny the smiling mood that wafts through the film like incense, and to that extent it honors the original three days; but not once does a character’s show of feeling stir you, send you, or stop you in your tracks, and the loss is unsustainable." Posted Aug 24, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 74%
| Cold Souls (2009) | "
This is a comedy, not a philosophy lesson, and thus richer in bafflement than in understanding." Posted Aug 3, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 93%
| Not Quite Hollywood: The Wild, Untold Story of Ozploitation! (2009) | "
Although Not Quite Hollywood was clearly put together with fanatical love, the suspicion remains, as often with genre cinema, that these trash-rich movies are a lot more fun to hear about, and to watch in snatches, than to sit through." Posted Aug 3, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 83%
| Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009) | "
All in all, despite the verve that drives the grander set pieces, it’s hard to avoid the sensation of a film toiling overtime to convince itself of its own solemnity." Posted Jul 20, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 95%
| In the Loop (2009) | "
By the end of the film, you just want to get away from these people." Posted Jul 20, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 67%
| Bruno (2009) | "
Wholly unsuitable for children, yet propelled by a nagging puerility that will appeal only to those in the vortex of puberty, or to adults who have failed to progress beyond it." Posted Jul 13, 2009 |
Fresh
| Rotten 47%
| Whatever Works (2009) | "
This is pretty broad stuff, but Clarkson is so much more vital and amiable than anyone else that you instantly root for her." Posted Jun 15, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 52%
| The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (2009) | "
Can a director be arrested for the attempted hijack of our emotions?" Posted Jun 15, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 87%
| Jerichow (2009) | "
So compact and controlled is this fine film." Posted May 26, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 32%
| Terminator Salvation (2009) | "
Terminator Salvation is a confused, humorless grind, with nobody, from the stars to the set designers, prepared to prick its self-importance." Posted May 26, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 95%
| Star Trek (2009) | "
Quinto is the one person here who may leave teen-aged viewers more perplexed than puffed up; he somehow rebukes the movie’s whole obsession with backstory and immaturity by seeming riper and wiser than the charmless folly that is spun around him." Posted May 7, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 40%
| The Limits of Control (2009) | "
For all its cinematic references, [the movie] seems impatient with the need to tell a narrative at all, as if its secret wish were to be a photography exhibit, or an album of half-connected songs." Posted Apr 27, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 91%
| Il Divo (2009) | "
You could dismiss Servillo’s portrayal as a cartoon, but the great actors know that beneath the dark surface of caricature lies a heightened and vivifying truth, as potent as fortified wine. Consume with great caution, and with joy." Posted Apr 27, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 98%
| Anvil! The Story of Anvil (2009) | "
The most stirring release of the year thus far." Posted Apr 13, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 76%
| Shall We Kiss? (2008) | "
The result is that Shall We Kiss? puts its viewers in a bind worthy of the lovers themselves: should we organize a Socratic symposium on the issues raised by the film, or hurl our popcorn violently at the screen?" Posted Mar 30, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 72%
| Monsters vs. Aliens (2009) | "
As I took off my gray-lensed 3-D spectacles at the end of Monsters vs. Aliens, I felt not so much immersed as fuzzy with exhaustion." Posted Mar 30, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 72%
| The Great Buck Howard (2009) | "
The cast is speckled with lively souls like Steve Zahn and Griffin Dunne, but the only person who wakes the movie from its slumbers is Emily Blunt." Posted Mar 16, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 92%
| Tokyo Sonata (2009) | "
For all its oddities, this movie does carry weight, and, with more than eight per cent of Americans out of work, the timing of its release here could not be more acute." Posted Mar 16, 2009 |
— | Fresh 96%
| Gomorra (2008) |
Click here to read article Posted Mar 5, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 100%
| Leave Her to Heaven (1945) | "
As for the brother’s death, with Ellen looking on coolly in white robe and shades, it remains one of the most perturbing in the history of Hollywood." Posted Mar 2, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 64%
| Watchmen (2009) | "
Incoherent, overblown, and grimy with misogyny, Watchmen marks the final demolition of the comic strip, and it leaves you wondering: where did the comedy go?" Posted Mar 2, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 83%
| Two Lovers (2009) | "
However moody, Two Lovers didn’t strike me as a downer, for the simple reason that it wells with sights and sounds that are guaranteed to lift, not sink, the spirits." Posted Feb 17, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 91%
| Gomorrah (2009) | "
The result demands a patient viewing, and maybe more than one; only after a second dose did I get the measure of [director] Garrone’s mastery, and realize how far he has surpassed, not merely honored, the author’s courageous toil." Posted Feb 17, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 57%
| Taken (2009) | "
[Neeson's] performance is the most perturbing thing in the film, even more so than its electrical-torture sequence or its revelations about sex-trafficking." Posted Feb 2, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 86%
| California Dreamin' (2009) | "
It could use a trim, but only rarely does it strain for effect, and, for a young man, Nemescu was uncannily versed in the emotions of middle age." Posted Jan 26, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 62%
| Che (2008) | "
For all the movie’s narrative momentum, Che retains the air of a study exercise -- of an interest brilliantly explored. How else to explain one’s total flatness of feeling at the climax of each movie?" Posted Jan 12, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 61%
| Valkyrie (2008) | "
The problem is not that we know the outcome. The problem is the buildup." Posted Dec 29, 2008 |
Rotten
| Fresh 77%
| Doubt (2008) | "
If only Doubt had been made in 1964, shot by Roger Corman over a long weekend, and retitled Spawn of the Devil Witch or Blood Wimple, all would have been forgiven." Posted Dec 8, 2008 |
Rotten
| Fresh 62%
| The Reader (2008) | "
The whole film, in fact, with its loping pace and plaintive score, feels like a woefully polite, not to say British, take on a foreign horror; was there really no one, from the fierce new wave of German filmmakers, prepared to dramatize the Schlink?" Posted Dec 8, 2008 |
Fresh
| Fresh 98%
| The Wrestler (2008) | "
What Rourke offers us, in short, is not just a comeback performance but something much rarer: a rounded, raddled portrait of a good man." Posted Dec 8, 2008 |
Fresh
| Fresh 86%
| A Christmas Tale (2008) | "
Watching A Christmas Tale is like getting to know a family other than your own by leafing through its scrapbooks and laughing at its photograph albums, while it bickers in the next room over stuff you may never understand." Posted Nov 17, 2008 |
Rotten
| Fresh 93%
| Slumdog Millionaire (2008) | "
There are no surprises in this movie, and most people will be able to predict, within the first ten minutes, roughly how the last ten will pan out." Posted Nov 17, 2008 |
Fresh
| Fresh 64%
| Quantum of Solace (2008) | "
Quantum of Solace is too savage for family entertainment, but, as a study in headlong desperation, it’s easier to believe in than many more ponderous films." Posted Nov 10, 2008 |
Fresh
| Fresh 67%
| High School Musical 3: Senior Year (2008) | "
Its winning formula is driven not by narrative but by what isn't there: no sex, no drugs, and no rock and roll-- unless you count the logjam of thundering power ballads." Posted Oct 27, 2008 |
Rotten
| Fresh 67%
| Synecdoche, New York (2008) | "
If you want to show a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, go right ahead, but give that hour all the life you can." Posted Oct 27, 2008 |
Fresh
| Fresh 86%
| Rachel Getting Married (2008) | "
A minor work, but so menaced by distress that the characters take every opportunity to dance the dark away." Posted Oct 18, 2008 |
Rotten
| Rotten 59%
| RocknRolla (2008) | "
If RocknRolla clings to the company of ne’er-do-wells, it’s not because they bristle with the frustrations of society, but purely because Ritchie wants to borrow their cheeky charm -- a virtue that, in reality, none of them possess." Posted Oct 13, 2008 |
Rotten
| Rotten 28%
| Filth and Wisdom (2008) | "
In technical terms, more professional productions than this are filmed and cut on iMovie, by ten-year-olds, a thousand times a day." Posted Oct 13, 2008 |
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