April 19, 2010
Although its story recalls the hope and determination of the first Rocky (John G. Avildsen, 1976), Rocky Balboa is a pale copy.
February 16, 2011
Blue Valentine follows a married couple in turmoil, and recalls their relationship’s romantic beginnings as it threatens to unravel in the present.
April 24, 2011
Black Swan is marked by Nathalie Portman's grandiose performance, but Aronofsky’s regresive aesthetic hinders the movie’s themes and narrative.
March 22, 2010
A reviewer compared City of God to Goodfellas (Martin Scorsese, 1990) and many parallels could be made between the two. As they both fall into the genre of gangster films, they depict violence in a raw, uninhibited way, in a realist fashion. City of God, with its documentary-style aesthetic—camera shakes, voice-over narration, etc., uses that realism to emphasize its story’s […]
March 29, 2010
Michael Clayton suffers from its intellectualism, just as Syriana (Stephen Gaghan, 2005) did, and never lets you connect to the stakes emotionally.