Splat |
Caché (2005) |
"Once the visceral vigor wears off, Haneke's ideas reveal themselves as blatantly schematic and a little bit silly. Imagine if Stanley Kubrick had directed Crash..." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Can't Stop the Music (1980) |
"It's tough to believe any movie that opens with Steve Guttenberg dancing on rollerskates could actually get worse from there, but it does -- and in such spectacular fashion!" |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Capitalism: A Love Story (2009) |
"Of course Moore's angry. I don't know anybody who isn't. But what about the movie?" |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Captain Corelli's Mandolin (2001) |
"...feels as if it has been manufactured in a chop shop of former Oscar winners and nauseating Miramax 'prestige' puff pieces." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Cars (2006) |
"Once you start running into Jay Leno as 'Jay Limo' and Bob Costas as 'Bob Cutlass,' the whole thing starts to feel almost as annoying as a DreamWorks movie. I guess it had to happen sooner or later." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Cashback (2007) |
"There's a lot of promise here, but Cashback can't get out of its own way." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Casino Royale (2006) |
"Everything old is new again in this leaner, meaner, back-to-basics re-boot. Think of it as 007's Batman Begins." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Catch and Release (2007) |
"The poor man's Julia Roberts, Garner boasts a similar coltish, awkward physicality and vaguely aquatic mouth... just none of the Movie-Star charisma." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Catch Me If You Can (2002) |
"...a carefree escapist romp awash in desperate loneliness that meditates troublingly on the American dream every time you aren't looking." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Cellular (2004) |
"A nifty little flick--precisely the kind of well-done, unambitious genre piece I always find myself overpraising to friends." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Changeling (2008) |
"Flattened out and oversimplified to the point of preposterousness...Eastwood's never handled such a squeaky-clean, insufferably perfect protagonist before, and let's hope he never does again." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Changing Lanes (2002) |
"A surprisingly acid-tongued character study that has a good deal more on its mind than cheap thrills." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) |
"Speaking as a diehard fan of Depp's strangest work, it breaks my heart that this one just doesn't come off. We're always stubbornly aware it's just Johnny being weird again." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Charlie Wilson's War (2007) |
"So sad Nichols has directed it like a sequel to Ishtar, softening the script's poli-sci body blows with broad sight gags and a puzzlingly cartoonish tone." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Cheri (2009) |
"What a drag it is getting old." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Chicago 10 (2008) |
"The anachronistic music cues and refreshing lack of hippie-dippie reminiscence make it a movie for right now -- a funny, fiendishly entertaining salute to dissent in all its forms." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Children of Men (2006) |
"With this panting, ragged chase through the end of the world, Cuarón and Lubezski have reinvented the language of the action film." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Choke (2008) |
"Cheerfully offensive and well acted, but visually pedestrian. We needed to share the character's mania, not just passively observe it." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Chronicles of Riddick (2004) |
"...a campy craptacular with elephantitis of the mythology glands, bookended by the most Duneish, Zardozzy nerd-fu since Battlestar Galactica." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Cinderella Man (2005) |
"Sure, it's obvious and corny. But there's something lovable about this dated movie and its adorable characters. Basically, imagine if Seabiscuit didn't suck." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
City by the Sea (2002) |
"A new low on the downward spiral of a once-brilliant career...could it be that De Niro has become even more washed-up and embarrassing than The Rolling Stones?" |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
The Class (2008) |
"This is a marvelous film." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
The Clearing (2004) |
"Man, aren't WASPs boring? The movie's simply not deep enough to be an art film, and nowhere near entertaining enough to pass itself off as a satisfying thriller.
" |
Sean Burns |
- |
Clerks II (2006) |
"Silent Bob Speaks: Smoking Cigarettes With Kevin Smith" |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Clerks II (2006) |
"Lacking the grubby authenticity of its predecessor, the movie feels clueless and out of touch. Sometimes you can't go home again." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Click (2006) |
"Egregiously schmaltzy... what begins as just another lousy gimmick comedy soon veers into a bizarrely masochistic death trip." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Cloverfield (2008) |
"Blair Witch's bigger-budget, slightly stupider baby sibling... it's a fleet-footed lizard apocalypse with the good sense to end right about the same time the novelty wears off." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Coach Carter (2005) |
"Thumbing its way through that well-worn inspirational-educator playbook at a leisurely pace, the picture is studiously unspectacular." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Code 46 (2004) |
"...Winterbottom's main distinction is that he's able to be dull in a lot of different genres." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Coffee and Cigarettes (2004) |
"A doodle on the notepad of a major filmmaker -- sort of a charming stopgap between bigger and better Jarmusch pictures.
" |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Cold Mountain (2003) |
"...a weirdly entertaining, genuinely bizarre mixture of the high-toned and the tacky.
" |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Cold Souls (2009) |
"A dreary-looking, glacially paced collection of missed opportunities." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Collateral (2004) |
"A pulverizing entertainment with a side order of existential dread (and if there's any justice -- Cruise's riotously flat 'Yo, homies!' will soon become a catchphrase.)" |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Colma: The Musical (2007) |
"Colma: The Musical is a great big surprise, a riotous, effervescent and even gritty treat" |
Doug Wallen |
Tomato |
The Company (2003) |
"It's all process and setting, Altman's touch so light the whole thing feels seems caught on the fly. The Company feels more like a documentary than most documentaries." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002) |
"...an aggressively unpleasant comedy-a raunchy, bloodthirsty epic of self-flagellating sex guilt and apocalyptic self-hatred. It's also about the host of The Gong Show." |
Sean Burns |
Splat F |
Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004) |
"We go home wondering exactly what lessons movies like these are supposed to be teaching our children.
" |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Connie and Carla (2004) |
"It ain't much of a stretch to believe these two shrieking magpies are female impersonators. In fact, it's actually a lot harder to buy them as women." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
The Constant Gardener (2005) |
"Noble intentions and some lovely performances... too bad the director keeps getting in their way." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Constantine (2005) |
"Obviously toned-down from the comic, it's still a pretty provocative piece - a slyly funny Biblical detective story (sort of a Sunday School film noir.)" |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
The Corporation (2004) |
"Provocative, unsettling and punishingly over-long, it just might be the scariest horror movie of the year." |
Sean Burns |
Tomato |
Crank High Voltage (2009) |
"Bigger, dumber and even sicker than the rotgut original... I had a blast, but don't say you weren't warned." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Criminal (2004) |
"The cast comes off like a buncha cute, likable kids playing dress-up, which only intensifies the movie's pointless karaoke flavor." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Crossing Over (2009) |
"The movie matches nicely with Ford's somnambulistic nonperformance -- they're both pokey, morose and don't really say much at all." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
Crossroads (2002) |
"If even half the scenes with the girls singing along to pop songs in the car were cut, Crossroads would barely qualify as feature length." |
Sean Burns |
Splat |
The Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001) |
"...plods along with all the verve and inspiration of a contractual obligation." |
Sean Burns |
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