Tomato 4.5/5 |
500 Days of Summer (2009) |
"Probably the most honest thing in the film is the breakup scenes feel like REAL breakups, much more than they resemble the contrived obstacles to love in most romantic comedies." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4/5 |
An Education (2009) |
""An Education" is worth seeing, mostly for its superb period detail and the strong performance at its center." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4.5/5 |
Anvil! The Story of Anvil (2009) |
"The film is very funny at times, especially in its use of early '80s archival footage; the comedy of Anvil's hair, outfits, and lyrics from the '80s are worth the price of admission alone." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4.5/5 |
Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009) |
"a bizarre amalgam of source material, director and star that's just nutso enough to work" |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 1/5 |
Big Fan (2009) |
"I could imagine a very good movie being made about rabid, angry football fans in New York and Philadelphia... but Big Fan just plain doesn't work, mostly because it doesn't understand the world it inhabits." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4/5 |
The Blind Side (2009) |
"Yes, it is one of the more tired genres around, and no, it's not as good as the book. But "The Blind Side," is a nice surprise- a heartfelt drama that tells an amazing story remarkably well." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 2/5 |
Bruno (2009) |
"The film's weakness is obvious: it has exactly one trick up its sleeve, and merely repeats that trick over and over for its entire 87-minute running time" |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 1/5 |
Confessions of a Shopaholic (2009) |
"Shopaholic's biggest problem is that it wants to have it both ways. It wants to luxuriate in expensive clothes and shoes and other princess-fantasy accoutrements while at the same time posing as a heavy-handed brief against debt, shallowness and financial" |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 2/5 |
Couples Retreat (2009) |
"A patchwork collection of derivative gags and relationship drama that seems leftover from old 'thirtysomething' episodes." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 2/5 |
Drag Me To Hell (2009) |
"Drag Me to Hell can't quite live up to the Evil Dead movies, mostly because it never finds a consistent tone. Not to mention, its background mythology is both totally ridiculous and almost impossible to understand." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4.5/5 |
Duplicity (2009) |
"It's a complex and at times hard-to-follow script, but it leaves no loose ends and makes perfect sense in the end. Even the ending is a legitimate surprise" |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4/5 |
Extract (2009) |
"As with virtually all of Judge's work, Extract is based on the idea that most people are total, blithering idiots. It's all very off-beat, but a top-flight comedic cast makes it work" |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 1/5 |
Fame (2009) |
"a totally unoriginal and unnecessary remake that runs far, far away from anything edgy, controversial or interesting." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 2/5 |
Fast & Furious (2009) |
""As silly as it is derivative, with quite a bit of unintentional comedy, but the action scenes deliver, and car fetishists will find much to love."" |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4/5 |
Funny People (2009) |
"The film does a lot of things that Apatow's previous work did... but is almost ruined by a too-long running time and a third act that seems to drag on forever." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 1/5 |
The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard (2009) |
"A mediocre comedy that wants desperately to be "Anchorman" on a used-car lot, but can't measure up, mostly because it's so lacking in laughs" |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4.5/5 |
The Hangover (2009) |
"The best bachelor party movie since, well, "Bachelor Party"" |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 3/5 |
He's Just Not That Into You (2009) |
"It's far from a revolutionary film, but it's still quite enjoyable, thanks to an attractive cast and some funny moments." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4.5/5 |
The Hurt Locker (2009) |
"What makes Hurt Locker truly great is that it's most interested in telling us an honest story about these soldiers and this war, without servicing any type of political agenda." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4/5 |
The Informant! (2009) |
"It may be slow at times and structured sort of oddly, but The Informant! is one of the year's true originals, and Soderbergh's best film since the first Ocean's" |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 2/5 |
Inglourious Basterds (2009) |
"Why is Basterds such a colossal disappointment? It's mostly because Tarantino indulges all of his worst impulses as a filmmaker and ignores what he does best." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 3/5 |
The International (2009) |
"The film goes off to a sort of sluggish start, and its ending just goes on and on. But in the middle is one of the most astonishingly awesome action sequences in recent cinematic history." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 2/5 |
The Invention of Lying (2009) |
"The film has two very, very good ideas, but doesn't fit them together well; while its laughs are only sporadic, and the romantic subplot falls generally flat." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 3/5 |
Invictus (2009) |
"A deeply flawed but still impressive sports epic, which follows an unimaginative and by-the-numbers first 90 minutes with one of the most expertly staged sports sequences ever committed to film." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 2/5 |
It's Complicated (2009) |
"It's abundantly clear that the Martin character, a sweet, sensitive 60-ish man who's a good listener - and an architect, to boot - is Meyers' version of the ideal male." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 1.5/5 |
Michael Jackson's This Is It (2009) |
"A deeply creepy and disturbing exercise, in which we're exposed to footage that was likely never meant to see the light of day, featuring a performer who at the time was, literally, days away from death." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 2/5 |
Monsters vs. Aliens (2009) |
"The 3-D effects look great, no doubt, but the film ultimately falls victim to a contrived, unoriginal plot that just shows once again how far behind Disney/Pixar, DreamWorks Animation is." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 0/4 |
New in Town (2009) |
"All it does is mine stereotypes about the small-town Upper Midwest that were starting to get cliched when "The Music Man" was first staged in 1957." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 3.5/5 |
Notorious (2009) |
"Even though it brings little that's new or innovative to the table, "Notorious" is a must for anyone even moderately interested in the history of hip-hop in the 1990s." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4/5 |
Observe and Report (2009) |
"This is a movie about damaged, deranged people, who you wouldn't want to be near if you met them in real life.You'll ask yourself if you should be laughing- until you shrug and laugh anyway." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 1/5 |
Paper Heart (2009) |
"The biggest problem is that Yi's quest for love, and understanding of such, simply isn't all that interesting." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 3.5/5 |
The Proposal (2009) |
"It breaks no new ground, is predictable at every turn, and no one will remember a thing about it a week after they see it. All that said, The Proposal is above-average." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 3/5 |
Public Enemies (2009) |
"Mann doesn't let his movie breathe. It's a downright beautiful production... everything looks great- so why not show it?" |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 5/5 |
A Serious Man (2009) |
"Never has a movie packed with so much hostility or existential angst made me smile from start to finish as this one did." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 1/5 |
Sherlock Holmes (2009) |
"No, the problem isn't that the movie makes the Holmes character more of an action hero than Doyle ever intended. It's that it sticks Holmes and Watson into one of the dumbest, most boring stories imaginable." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 2/5 |
The Soloist (2009) |
"There's a lot the movie gets right, but fails completely when it tries, cinematically, to depict what schizophrenia is like" |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4.5/5 |
Star Trek (2009) |
"The film is a success because of beautiful visuals, swift storytelling that never loses its momentum, and the sheer joy of having these characters back in our lives again." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 2/5 |
State of Play (2009) |
"The film is ultimately sunken by a shaky and ugly handheld visual style, as well as a contrived, convoluted plot with perhaps one twist too many." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 1/5 |
Sunshine Cleaning (2009) |
"Formulaic, "gritty" indie films don't get much more cloying or pointless... it's as generic as generic indie gets." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 0/5 |
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009) |
"The worst thing about the movie, out of many, is that it takes a $200 million budget and a two-and-a-half hour running time, and not a single memorable, impressive or fun thing happens." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 1.5/5 |
The Twilight Saga: New Moon (2009) |
"The scenery is still there, but just about everything else that worked in the first film doesn't in 'New Moon.' For one thing, the structure is a mess." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4/5 |
Two Lovers (2009) |
"A true gem, a fascinating character study that appears to actually live in the real world." |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 1/5 |
The Ugly Truth (2009) |
"A truly wretched romcom, which combines tired battle-of-the-sexes cliches with a shocking amount of raunchiness. It's a romantic comedy that fails at both romance and comedy." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 5/5 |
Up (2009) |
"A beautiful film in every sense of the word, UP belongs at or near the top of the list of Pixar's best movies." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 5/5 |
Up in the Air (2009) |
"What could be more perfectly in tune with the zeitgeist at the end of the '00s as a movie about a guy who's job it is to fire people? The best movie of 2009." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4.5/5 |
Where the Wild Things Are (2009) |
"Charming, affecting and heartbreaking. It could have gone wrong in any number of ways, but never does" |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4/5 |
21 (2008) |
"The movie introduces a world and sells it extremely well. It does a good job of explaining the rules of the card-counting scam, and the actual blackjack scenes are quite exciting" |
Stephen Silver |
Splat 2/5 |
Australia (2008) |
"Luhrmann... apparently decided this time to make about five movies at once, as Australia fluctuates wildly among many genres and many more different tones. And it's long. So, so long." |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4/5 |
Bigger, Stronger, Faster* (2008) |
""It's hard to dislike any movie that begins with footage of Hulk Hogan defeating the Iron Sheik in 1984, although knowing how closely Vince McMahon guards the WWE's tape library, I don't know how Bell got permission to use the footage in the film."" |
Stephen Silver |
Tomato 4/5 |
Body of Lies (2008) |
"Body of Lies is the movie Syriana and The Kingdom wanted to be." |
Stephen Silver |
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