Fresh
| Fresh 83%
| A Town Called Panic (2009) | "
A Town Called Panic, which has more strident colors and less synopsizable action than a year's worth of comic-book adventures, embodies a sensibility that might be termed "extreme quirk."" Village Voice Posted Dec 15, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 83%
| Avatar (2009) | "
The muscular, coming-atcha visuals trump the movie's camp dialogue and corny conception, but only up to a point." Village Voice Posted Dec 15, 2009 |
Fresh
| Rotten 38%
| My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done? (2009) | "
Herzog has gone beyond Good and Evil to reinvent himself as a candidate for the wiggiest director of comedy in America today." Village Voice Posted Dec 8, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 39%
| The Lovely Bones (2009) | "
Part Disney's Alice in Wonderland, part Fritz Lang's M, the movie is horrific yet cloying, alternately distended and abrupt, sometimes poignant and often ridiculous." Village Voice Posted Dec 8, 2009 |
Fresh
| N/A | Film Ist: A Girl & A Gun (2009) | "
Film Ist. a Girl & a Gun is not subtle, but its literalism -- which refines the avant-primitivism of older Viennese artists -- is its strength." Village Voice Posted Dec 2, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 91%
| Up in the Air (2009) | "
Like Juno, Up in the Air conjures a troubling reality and then wishes it away." Village Voice Posted Dec 2, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 84%
| Me and Orson Welles (2009) | "
Deft, affectionate, and unexpectedly enjoyable." Village Voice Posted Nov 25, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 72%
| The Road (2009) | "
Cormac McCarthy's Pulitzer Prize–winning, Oprah-endorsed, post-apocalyptic survivalist prose poem... was a quick, lacerating read. John Hillcoat's literal adaptation is, by contrast, a long, dull slog." Village Voice Posted Nov 25, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 86%
| Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009) | "
Instead of plumbing the depths of spiritual degradation, Herzog's movie is -- largely due to Cage's performance -- almost fun." Village Voice Posted Nov 17, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 91%
| The Sun (2005) | "
Though he successfully humanizes Hirohito, who is shown happily shedding his divinity, Sokurov doesn't entirely exonerate him." Village Voice Posted Nov 17, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 54%
| The Men Who Stare at Goats (2009) | "
What's mildly exasperating is that there is an actual quest involved: The Men Who Stare at Goats goes out to the desert in search of its tone—and never finds it." Village Voice Posted Nov 3, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 100%
| Rembrandt's J'accuse (2009) | "
Peering beneath the painted surface and searching in the shadows, tracking that which was cut from the canvas and mapping the network of glances that remain, the filmmaker uncovers a foul, lurid, corrupt, and perversely compelling conspiracy." Village Voice Posted Oct 20, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 73%
| Where the Wild Things Are (2009) | "
Wild Things isn't overlong, but it is underwhelming." Village Voice Posted Oct 14, 2009 |
Fresh
| N/A | Wild River (1960) | "
Sympathetic to both sides, the movie pits tradition against progress, rugged individualism against the greater good." Village Voice Posted Oct 14, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 80%
| Yes Men Fix the World (2009) | "
The anti-globalist performance guys who call themselves the Yes Men are masters of forging corporate rhetoric and media protocols." Village Voice Posted Oct 6, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 78%
| Bronson (2009) | "
The kernel of an idea -- brutish antihero as irrepressible life force -- is trampled into dust by the showy Sturm und Drang of Refn's filmmaking." Village Voice Posted Oct 6, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 77%
| Afterschool (2009) | "
Afterschool, the almost frighteningly accomplished first feature made by Antonio Campos when he was 24, is high school as horror show." Village Voice Posted Sep 29, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 85%
| Bright Star (2009) | "
England 1818 seems like a Fragonard garden, the pastoral height of civilization. Conversation is witty; summer feels eternal." Village Voice Posted Sep 15, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 100%
| Fat City (1972) | "
The movie is crafty work and very much a show. In one way or another, right down to the percussively abrupt open ending, it's all about being hammered." Village Voice Posted Sep 15, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 100%
| Liverpool (2009) | "
Liverpool opens with a big blast of neo surf, and coasts on that energy for the movie's 84 minutes, ending with a shot of corresponding impact." Village Voice Posted Sep 1, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 93%
| Suspiria (1977) | "
A movie that makes sense only to the eye (and even then . . .)." Village Voice Posted Sep 1, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 63%
| Extract (2009) | "
Here for Labor Day -- a comedy about the hilarity and heartbreak of running a small business." Village Voice Posted Sep 1, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 86%
| The Baader Meinhof Complex (2009) | "
The movie has an undeniable sweep, increasing in intensity once the principals are arrested in June 1972." Village Voice Posted Aug 18, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 88%
| Inglourious Basterds (2009) | "
Energetic, inventive, swaggering fun, Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds is a consummate Hollywood entertainment -- rich in fantasy and blithely amoral." Village Voice Posted Aug 18, 2009 |
| Fresh 75%
| I'm Gonna Explode (2009) |
Click here to read article Village Voice Posted Aug 12, 2009 |
Fresh
| Rotten 59%
| The Headless Woman (2009) | "
As dense and fluid as Martel's movie is, the viewer -- like the protagonist -- is compelled to live in the moment. And a rich moment it is." Village Voice Posted Aug 11, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 75%
| I'm Gonna Explode (2009) | "
I'm Gonna Explode dramatizes even as it demonstrates the maxim that you can't go home again." Village Voice Posted Aug 11, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 82%
| Beeswax (2009) | "
Bujalski has always been good at making closeness feel exotic, and awkwardness seem natural." Village Voice Posted Aug 4, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 100%
| In a Lonely Place (1950) | "
The grayest, most morally ambiguous of film noirs -- and arguably the most self-reflexive." Village Voice Posted Jul 15, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 67%
| Bruno (2009) | "
Outrage is entertainment!" Village Voice Posted Jul 8, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 97%
| The Beaches of Agnes (2009) | "
In a sense, Varda has done for herself what she did for Demy -- creating a work, as charming as it is touching, that serves to explicate and enrich an entire oeuvre." Village Voice Posted Jul 1, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 63%
| 10 Rillington Place (1971) | "
More highly regarded these days than when it was released in 1971, Richard Fleischer's 10 Rillington Place is a grimly efficient treatment of a once-notorious case." Village Voice Posted Jun 24, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 78%
| $9.99 (2009) | "
Etgar Keret is sometimes described as Israel's Woody Allen, but this hugely popular humorist is more fanciful and morbid in his evocation of cultural schlemielery." Village Voice Posted Jun 16, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 47%
| Whatever Works (2009) | "
Whatever Works illustrates, even as it names, Allen's artistic limitations." Village Voice Posted Jun 16, 2009 |
Rotten
| Fresh 89%
| Moon (2009) | "
Impressively pulled together on a modest budget, Moon has a strong lead and a valid philosophical premise but, despite Bell's fissured psyche, the drama is inert. Ground control to Major Tom: Moon orbits an idea, but it doesn't go anywhere." Village Voice Posted Jun 10, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 81%
| Unmistaken Child (2009) | "
The movie is a drama of faith, a Tibetan monk's search for the reincarnation of his beloved master Lama Konchog." Village Voice Posted Jun 3, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 90%
| 24 City (2009) | "
This subversively old-fashioned hymn to industrial production is filled with offbeat, vaguely absurd details." Village Voice Posted Jun 3, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 50%
| Antichrist (2009) | "
Antichrist, which, above all, wants to make pain visceral, is less successful at projecting authentic experience -- the shock tactics are ultimately numbing." Village Voice Posted May 27, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 100%
| Being Jewish in France (2009) | "
More impressionistic than analytical." Village Voice Posted May 13, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 93%
| Summer Hours (2009) | "
Too chatty to be ascetic, Summer Hours is nevertheless almost Ozu-like in its evocation of a parent's death and the dissolving bond between the surviving children." Village Voice Posted May 13, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 86%
| Tony Manero (2009) | "
Tony Manero has a purposefully murky look and a frantic feel." Village Voice Posted May 12, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 73%
| Rudo and Cursi (2009) | "
Energetic fun." Village Voice Posted May 5, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 80%
| Audience Of One (2009) | "
Ridiculous as it is, Audience of One is more chilling than funny." Village Voice Posted May 5, 2009 |
Fresh
| Rotten 39%
| The Limits of Control (2009) | "
The Limits of Control is a shaggy dog story, but it’s leaner and less precious (and more beautiful) than the past few Jarmusch films." Village Voice Posted Apr 28, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 63%
| The Girlfriend Experience (2009) | "
Grey isn’t the first porn actress to go straight, but she may be the first to allegorize her own situation -- projecting an on-screen self-confidence that’s indistinguishable from pathos." Village Voice Posted Apr 28, 2009 |
Rotten
| Rotten 14%
| The Informers (2009) | "
There's plenty of incident, but not much plot. As befits a tale of absolute self-absorption and unconscious revelation, The Informers often seems to be telling on itself." Village Voice Posted Apr 22, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 86%
| Treeless Mountain (2009) | "
Skillfully unsentimental -- because of, but also despite, the presence of two irresistible, unself-conscious performers in virtually every scene." Village Voice Posted Apr 22, 2009 |
| N/A | Oblivion (1994) |
Click here to read article Village Voice Posted Apr 15, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 93%
| Oblivion (2008) | "
The result is a tender, poetically aimless movie by someone who no longer dwells among these stoic people, but feels like she might be the only one who remembers them." Village Voice Posted Apr 14, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 84%
| State of Play (2009) | "
An effectively involving journalism-cum-conspiracy yarn with a bang-bang opening and a frantic closer." Village Voice Posted Apr 14, 2009 |