Splat |
Adam (2009) |
"Written and directed by Max Mayer, this anodyne romantic comedy is as predictable as the alphabet but should hold particular appeal to women whose maternal impulses inflect their mating instincts." |
Cliff Doerksen |
Tomato |
Adoration (2009) |
"Scott Speedman gives a piercing, intelligent performance." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
Adventureland (2009) |
"Like its models, this is funny, smart, and complacent." |
J. R. Jones |
Splat |
Alien Trespass (2009) |
"Sinks under the weight of its homage." |
Andrea Gronvall |
Splat |
All About Steve (2009) |
"Packaged as a romantic comedy but devoid of comedy or romance, this baffling train wreck stars Sandra Bullock as a tediously kooky constructor of crossword puzzles for a Sacramento newspaper." |
Cliff Doerksen |
Splat |
Amelia (2009) |
"With any luck this biopic of Amelia Earhart will also vanish without a trace." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato 3/4 |
American Violet (2009) |
"This flaw in the justice system might affect anyone, but American Violet shows how easily it can be racialized in a place where hardened social attitudes combine with drugs and poverty to create a permanent black underclass." |
J. R. Jones |
Splat |
Amreeka (2009) |
"Writer-director Cherien Dabis too easily resolves or dismisses the characters' problems, making way for an upbeat ending." |
Andrea Gronvall |
Tomato |
An Education (2009) |
"As a dual portrait of low-level criminality and lower-middle-class insecurity, it’s unique and indelible." |
Cliff Doerksen |
Tomato |
Angels & Demons (2009) |
"A movie that's more streamlined and action-packed than the original." |
Andrea Gronvall |
Tomato |
Antichrist (2009) |
"I can’t deny this is filled with powerfully primal images." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
Anvil! The Story of Anvil (2009) |
"Gervasi has tapped into a powerful if much-overlooked truth: humanity rocks." |
J. R. Jones |
Splat |
Armored (2009) |
"This unambitious caper flick takes a while to get moving but gradually develops a modest meat-and-potatoes appeal, compromised in the third act by a whopping and perfectly avoidable plot hole." |
Cliff Doerksen |
Tomato |
Astro Boy (2009) |
"Osamu Tezuka’s groundbreaking 60s anime series gets a stylish CGI update in this sci-fi animation." |
Andrea Gronvall |
Tomato |
Avatar (2009) |
"Watching it, I began to understand how people in 1933 must have felt when they saw King Kong." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
Alexandra (2008) |
"At least one critic has called this Sokurov's most political film, but on its deepest level it considers not a particular war but the complex feelings between mothers and the young men they send out into the world to kill or be killed." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
Allah Made Me Funny (2008) |
"Between the sets, director Andrea Kalin generates some pleasant material by following the comics around in their private lives." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
America The Beautiful (2008) |
"Unexpectedly witty and affecting." |
Reece Pendleton |
Splat |
American Teen (2008) |
"This being senior year, Burstein can't help but capture some genuine drama, but there's a stage-managed quality to the movie that reminded me of MTV reality shows." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
Appaloosa (2008) |
"In its own quiet way it delivers the goods." |
Jonathan Rosenbaum |
Splat |
Across the Universe (2007) |
"The Rent-like ensemble of yearning young people at the center of the story is a drag; I wanted to turn the sound down on them and say rude things." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
After The Wedding (2007) |
"As the premise might suggest, Jensen's dramatic structure is so visible this sometimes seems like a late Rod Serling teleplay, but Bier has proved highly adept at merging conventional drama with the immediacy of the Dogma 95 movement." |
J. R. Jones |
Splat |
Alpha Dog (2007) |
"Apart from the grim forebodings of tragedy, writer-director Nick Cassavetes seems to have modeled this ambitious docudrama on Larry Clark's kiddie-porn shockers, but he doesn't know what to leave out, and the movie becomes excessively complicated." |
Jonathan Rosenbaum |
Splat |
Alvin and the Chipmunks (2007) |
"Alvin, Theodore, and Simon have the only good lines or recognizable emotions, with Jason Lee and David Cross straining to flesh out their cardboard roles." |
Andrea Gronvall |
Tomato |
Amazing Grace (2007) |
"Screenwriter Steven Knight gracefully articulates the many domestic and international forces at work." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
American Gangster (2007) |
"Great cast..." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
Angel-A (2007) |
"[Besson's] attractive black-and-white 'Scope compositions, strong Paris locations, and effective handling of the actors makes this captivating throughout, and wholly undeserving of the drubbing it's received from many critics." |
Jonathan Rosenbaum |
Splat |
Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film For Theatres (2007) |
"Aqua Teen Hunger Force tends toward arch silliness more than actual humor, a formula that's tolerable enough in 15-minute tube installments but deadly dull in this 86-minute feature." |
J. R. Jones |
Splat |
Arctic Tale (2007) |
"Watching these endangered species evolve new approaches to hunting and shelter is fascinating, but the movie is seriously marred by a cloying screenplay and such kid-pleasing touches as shots of walruses belching and farting." |
Andrea Gronvall |
Splat |
Are We Done Yet? (2007) |
"Director Steve Carr continues his streak of numbingly mediocre family comedies." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
Arthur and the Invisibles (2007) |
"Luc Besson has never been one of my favorite filmmakers, but he seems to have found his metier in children's fantasy, and this semianimated adventure is enjoyable and imaginative despite its formulaic qualities." |
Jonathan Rosenbaum |
Splat |
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007) |
"Moseying along for 160 minutes, this revisionist western by writer-director Andrew Dominik makes a wan attempt to present the Jesse James legend as the dawn of celebrity culture in America." |
J. R. Jones |
Splat 0/4 |
The Astronaut Farmer (2007) |
"The value of [Farmer's] dream and its potential for destruction are irrelevant. Refusing to accept defeat is all that matters -- at least if you're the designated good guy." |
Jonathan Rosenbaum |
Tomato |
Atonement (2007) |
"Screenwriter Christopher Hampton and director Joe Wright have smartly dramatized the book's wartime romance and tragedy." |
J. R. Jones |
Splat |
August Rush (2007) |
"An exercise in dissonance." |
Andrea Gronvall |
Tomato |
Avenue Montaigne (2007) |
"Thompson's crowd-pleaser makes up in refined schmaltz what it lacks in innovation or profundity." |
Ronnie Scheib |
Tomato 4/4 |
Away From Her (2007) |
"It's Christie who places this powerful love story about the cruelties of aging within hailing distance of Leo McCarey's sublime Make Way for Tomorrow." |
Jonathan Rosenbaum |
Tomato 4/4 |
A Scanner Darkly (2006) |
"An ambitious animated adaptation of one of the most personal novels by sci-fi visionary Philip K. Dick." |
Andrea Gronvall |
Tomato |
Absolute Wilson (2006) |
" Katharina Otto-Bernstein's documentary provides an excellent introduction to the singular vision of avant-garde stage director Robert Wilson." |
Jonathan Rosenbaum |
Tomato |
Accepted (2006) |
"Sublimely stupid, this collegiate farce plays like a cross between Animal House and Ferris Bueller's Day Off." |
J. R. Jones |
Splat |
All The King's Men (2006) |
"The unfocused story is so bereft of any clear sense of period or location that the political melodrama sometimes seems to be taking place inside a cigar box." |
Jonathan Rosenbaum |
Tomato |
The Ant Bully (2006) |
"[It's] a rousing adventure capped with just the right measure of sweetness... John A. Davis shows heaps of invention." |
Andrea Gronvall |
Tomato |
Apocalypto (2006) |
"The production design is superb, and the actors deliver their dialogue in subtitled Yucatecan Maya, but despite all the anthropological drag, this is really just a crackerjack Saturday-afternoon serial." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
Art School Confidential (2006) |
"Even if one disagrees with some of its points, as I do, it offers plenty to mull over." |
Jonathan Rosenbaum |
Tomato |
The Aura (2006) |
"The moody ambience suggests noir writers David Goodis and Jim Thompson..." |
Jonathan Rosenbaum |
Tomato |
Azumi (2006) |
"The tone is bleak and the comic-book violence relentless, but the wirework and Yuta Morokaji's stunt choreography are impressive." |
Andrea Gronvall |
Splat 2/4 |
Adventures of Sharkboy and Lava Girl in 3-D (2005) |
"Nothing's scary, and everything's so light it's on the verge of evaporating." |
Jonathan Rosenbaum |
Splat 2/4 |
Aliens of the Deep (2005) |
"Here we know only that Cameron and his bright-eyed young scientists (who take turns narrating) are heading to the deeper parts of the Atlantic and Pacific to observe the environment and life-forms down there." |
Brian Thomas |
Splat |
Alone in the Dark (2005) |
"Christian Slater and Stephen Dorff, the reigning princes of Hollywood schlock, join forces in this brain-dead adaptation of a popular video game." |
J. R. Jones |
Tomato |
Amu (2005) |
"In Shonali Bose's tightly constructed debut feature (2005) a young Indian-American woman from Los Angeles returns to Delhi for the first time since childhood to visit her relatives." |
Joshua Katzman |
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