Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 75%
| The Young Victoria (2009) | "
The Young Victoria is a very well-made if not especially memorable picture, moving with all the grace and steadfastness of a waltz Victoria and Albert share, but absent any urgency or anything particularly exclamatory." — Austin Chronicle Posted Dec 28, 2009 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 89%
| Up in the Air (2009) | "
Up in the Air isn't a challenging picture, certainly not a transportive one, but it is a well-crafted entertainment made for and about adults. Sometimes, well, that's good enough." — Austin Chronicle Posted Dec 18, 2009 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 83%
| Me and Orson Welles (2009) | "
Linklater has crafted an always genial and at times even joyful period charmer about that moment on the cusp: before a boy becomes a man and another man becomes a mythological figure." — Austin Chronicle Posted Dec 11, 2009 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 93%
| Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009) | "
Is there any question that this is a Wes Anderson picture? Not a chance. Have we seen it all before? Not like this." — Austin Chronicle Posted Nov 25, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 72%
| The Blind Side (2009) | "
Hancock mostly restricts the story’s scope to its heartwarming bits and begs off any serious investigation of race. The reason, of course, is that this isn’t that kind of movie. But I couldn’t help but wish that it were." — Austin Chronicle Posted Nov 20, 2009 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 78%
| Bronson (2009) | "
A figure this luridly fascinating, a personality this ludicrously outsized, warrants something more than your typical biopic." — Austin Chronicle Posted Nov 13, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 41%
| Brief Interviews with Hideous Men (2009) | "
Krasinski re-creates the interviews using Wallace’s original, but this isn’t exactly a letter-of-the-law adaptation -- he tightens the interviews and defangs some of the language." — Austin Chronicle Posted Nov 13, 2009 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 94%
| Good Hair (2010) | "
Hair is personal. It's also political." — Austin Chronicle Posted Oct 23, 2009 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 73%
| Where the Wild Things Are (2009) | "
I don't want to oversell the thing. It is, quite simply, something very special indeed." — Austin Chronicle Posted Oct 15, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 67%
| Paris (2009) | "
In this overpacked ensemble cast, it's Binoche you want to see more of." — Austin Chronicle Posted Oct 9, 2009 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 81%
| The Horse Boy (2009) | "
A deeply intimate and endlessly inspiring look at a condition the general public knows only at a remove." — Austin Chronicle Posted Sep 18, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 75%
| Cold Souls (2009) | "
Giamatti is masterful, swaddled in a heavy beard and an existential slump." — Austin Chronicle Posted Sep 18, 2009 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 85%
| Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs (2009) | "
All told, this is spirited play, with unlabored lessons about good citizenship and the power of pluck that slide down as easily as the ice cream snowdrifts that blanket Swallow Falls." — Austin Chronicle Posted Sep 17, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 78%
| Humpday (2009) | "
Shelton’s film takes a quantum leap in its funny and fearless third act." — Austin Chronicle Posted Sep 4, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Rotten 57%
| Mystery Team (2009) | "
The twentysomething talents behind Mystery Team are still in the comedy minors, but this nerdy, nutty, perfectly pitched first swing suggests there are major things to come." — Austin Chronicle Posted Aug 28, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 80%
| Bandslam (2009) | "
Bandslam belongs to Connell. He has the unruly 'fro and endearing shamblingness of a young Daniel Stern, and he ably brings to life that rarest of cinematic qualities: decency." — Austin Chronicle Posted Aug 13, 2009 |
Rotten 2.5/5
| Fresh 75%
| Julie & Julia (2009) | "
Julie & Julia is a romantic comedy, too, but this time the romance is between two women, and one of them, truth be told, is a dud." — Austin Chronicle Posted Aug 7, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 68%
| Funny People (2009) | "
Funny People -- sensitive, shaggy, a little bit draggy -- is as much about the maturation of Ira as a performer and George as a man as it is about Apatow’s maturation as an artist." — Austin Chronicle Posted Jul 31, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 83%
| Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009) | "
It’s always a pleasure to be in the company of Potter, and when looking back at the just-competent first outings, well, baby, you’ve come a long way. But still: Where’s the magic, huh?" — Austin Chronicle Posted Jul 16, 2009 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 89%
| Moon (2009) | "
If Jones felt any first-film jitters, they are nowhere to be seen in his debut film, the technical proficiencies of which belie the relatively low budget." — Austin Chronicle Posted Jul 10, 2009 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 97%
| The Hurt Locker (2009) | "
The hybridization of arthouse and action doesn't happen all that often, but it should, if mashing the two genres makes for film as riveting and rattling as The Hurt Locker." — Austin Chronicle Posted Jul 10, 2009 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 67%
| Public Enemies (2009) | "
Depp is playing off a marvelous foil in Marion Cotillard." — Austin Chronicle Posted Jul 1, 2009 |
Fresh 2.5/5
| Rotten 47%
| My Sister's Keeper (2009) | "
Unsubtleties be damned, our defenses fall. Meanwhile, Cassavetes' reign as the go-to waterworks man remains uncontested." — Austin Chronicle Posted Jun 25, 2009 |
Fresh 2.5/5
| Rotten 43%
| The Proposal (2009) | "
A cut above, but no more." — Austin Chronicle Posted Jun 19, 2009 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 77%
| The Hangover (2009) | "
The Hangover instantly has the feel of one for the ages." — Austin Chronicle Posted Jun 4, 2009 |
Rotten 2.5/5
| Fresh 93%
| Sugar (2009) | "
While it's interesting, it's never truly absorbing." — Austin Chronicle Posted May 14, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 36%
| Angels & Demons (2009) | "
The only thrill here comes from the adrenaline kick of the chase. Alas, it's an empty, Pavlovian kick at best." — Austin Chronicle Posted May 14, 2009 |
Rotten 1.5/5
| Rotten 27%
| Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (2009) | "
Ghosts of Girlfriends Past requires a certain finesse -- really, how do you sell a romantic comedy about a twisted womanizer, and how do you get the audience to buy his inevitable turnaround? -- and neither Waters nor his leading man are up to the task." — Austin Chronicle Posted Apr 30, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 86%
| Earth (2009) | "
This first release from Disney’s self-explanatory new arm, Disneynature, is at the very least peripherally concerned with the planet and its dwindling prospects, but the real renewable resource here is the groundbreaking Planet Earth miniseries." — Austin Chronicle Posted Apr 24, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 84%
| State of Play (2009) | "
There's still an undeniable satisfaction to be had in an intelligently executed thriller." — Austin Chronicle Posted Apr 17, 2009 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 90%
| The Black Balloon (2008) | "
A film that mostly skirts artifice and sentimentality for a truer portrait of a family battered and bruised but nowhere near broken." — Austin Chronicle Posted Apr 9, 2009 |
Fresh 2.5/5
| Rotten 28%
| Fast & Furious (2009) | "
One wishes Fast & Furious had the whole package -- as much smarts as speed -- but as an uncomplicated, undemanding lark, it'll do." — Austin Chronicle Posted Apr 2, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Fresh 72%
| Monsters vs. Aliens (2009) | "
The result traffics in rote truisms (love the skin you’re in; leave no man behind; etc.) that are admirable but perfunctory." — Austin Chronicle Posted Mar 26, 2009 |
Rotten 2.5/5
| Fresh 65%
| Duplicity (2009) | "
Too often [director Gilroy] returns to his darker, more ponderous instincts -- more like a wink and a sneer -- which has an enervating effect on a film that lives and dies by its fleetness of foot." — Austin Chronicle Posted Mar 19, 2009 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 94%
| 2009 Academy-Award Nominated Short Films (2009) | "
What can safely be said: I have seen all five nominated shorts, and they are good." — Austin Chronicle Posted Feb 19, 2009 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 84%
| Wendy and Lucy (2008) | "
Is Wendy and Lucy the Bicycle Thieves of the New Recession Cinema?" — Austin Chronicle Posted Feb 19, 2009 |
Rotten 1/5
| Rotten 18%
| New in Town (2009) | "
Forgettable films make it to the big screen all the time; what is more rare is a forgettable film about a character written and portrayed so stridently as to be both an irritant and a bore." — Austin Chronicle Posted Jan 29, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 68%
| Revolutionary Road (2008) | "
Revolutionary Road ranks right up there with Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? in its characterization of a coupling deeply scabrous and defective." — Austin Chronicle Posted Jan 9, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Fresh 71%
| The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008) | "
Fincher's selling us beautifully cheekboned movie stars frolicking in bedsheets and calling it a great love. I didn't buy it for a second." — Austin Chronicle Posted Dec 25, 2008 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 86%
| A Christmas Tale (2008) | "
There’s a giddiness to this whirling dervish of a film, with its spastic skipping from character and catharsis, its near fetishistic camera trickery, bursts of song, and loving lifts from the likes of Vertigo and Nietzsche." — Austin Chronicle Posted Dec 19, 2008 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 74%
| A Girl Cut in Two (2008) | "
A Girl Cut in Two is Hitchcock sans the whodunit, essentially a long preamble of seduction and spiritual ruin, capped by a crime everyone saw coming (and an eye-dazzling coda that twists the title from metaphor to … something else)." — Austin Chronicle Posted Dec 12, 2008 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Fresh 94%
| Milk (2008) | "
A fairly standard biopic -- if a very fine one, indeed -- but never the transcendent work one would have hoped from the filmmaker or his subject." — Austin Chronicle Posted Dec 4, 2008 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 52%
| Romance & Cigarettes (2007) |
Click here to read article — Austin Chronicle Posted Oct 18, 2008 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 80%
| The Flight of the Red Balloon (2008) | "
[A] sedate, ever-lovely looking film." — Austin Chronicle Posted Oct 18, 2008 |
Rotten 2/5
| Fresh 61%
| The Duchess (2008) | "
It’s a curiously inert, workmanlike production: a whole lot of pomp and incircumstance." — Austin Chronicle Posted Oct 10, 2008 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 94%
| Chris & Don: A Love Story (2007) | "
The documentary, made after Isherwood’s death and with Bachardy’s enthusiastic participation, is as much a love story as a chronicle of Bachardy’s maturation into a man and an artist." — Austin Chronicle Posted Oct 10, 2008 |
Fresh 3.5/5
| Rotten 41%
| Blindness (2008) | "
All this would be unbearable without Moore, who masterfully characterizes the devoted wife’s metamorphosis into a heroicism both unwanted and unheralded." — Austin Chronicle Posted Oct 1, 2008 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 54%
| Choke (2008) | "
A forgettable adaptation of Chuck Palahniuk’s 2001 novel." — Austin Chronicle Posted Sep 26, 2008 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 85%
| Ghost Town (2008) | "
By the time this imperfect little film wends its way to one of the most winning exit lines I’ve heard in a long time, it’s turned into something, well, perfectly lovely." — Austin Chronicle Posted Sep 18, 2008 |
Rotten 0/5
| Rotten 11%
| Proud American (2008) |
Click here to read article — Austin Chronicle Posted Sep 12, 2008 |
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