Tuesday, May 15, 2012
Johnny Depp delivers a memorable, Van Winkle-esque performance
Has Johnny Depp ever turned in a poor performance? If so, I’ve never seen it. Whether he’s channeling Keith Richards (Pirates of the Caribbean), Hunter S. Thompson (The Rum Diaries), Ed Wood or even Edward Scissorhands, Depp always turns in a wonderful performance, and in Dark Shadows he again demonstrates his remarkable acting prowess. Depp is easily the best actor of his generation, sporting the intelligence and depth of Laurence Olivier, the suave charm of Adolphe Menjou and the humorous potential of Charlie Chaplin. He does whore himself out with the endless Pirates train of sequels, but hey, in some ways, we all have to sell out somehow. Even Orson Welles pimped wine (when it was time). I arrived at the Cinemark Louis Joliet Theater a…
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
This scarefest has a lot of charm.
I was prepared to despise The Cabin the Woods based on its previews, and until the last minute, I debated going to see Chimpanzee instead. I am so glad I took a pass on the primates and opted for the horror instead. There’s nothing subtle about Cabin (and subtlety is overrated anyway), but there’s enough humor and tongue-in-cheek (more like tongue-on-the-floor-after-it’s-been-chopped-off) pop culture references in this one to keep even the most desperate-for-amusement moviegoers intrigued. The premise seems like one we’ve all heard before: Attractive college-aged kids decide to escape for a weekend to a remote destination, enjoying their time “off the grid” and entertaining nature-based possibilities like swimming, off-road motorcycling …
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
"American Reunion" is a fun taste for gross-out enthusiasts.
Let us now praise Eugene Levy. The bespectacled, Ontario-reared comedian has humor chops to spare, and the most famous set of eyebrows of anyone that’s not named Marty Scorsese. His deadpanned, TMI-spewing character of Jim’s dad here doesn’t quite carry the show (Seann William Scott as the caustic Steve Stifler does), but Levy’s contributions are definitely memorable in this third sequel to the gross-out classic American Pie. Levy’s cut-each-other-off banters with son Jim Levenstein (Jason Biggs) in this movie are worth the price of admission alone. The two talk over each other like a pair of Vaudeville-era jugglers, to great comedic effect. However, based on the audience’s audible reactions, the slapstick, genital-crushing funny bits are …
Tuesday, April 3, 2012
Feel the "Wrath" of Liam Neeson’s Hair in this clunker.
I’ve alluded to this before, but 2012 is shaping up to be the hairiest year ever on the silver screen. Wrath of the Titans, with the main characters’ long manes and Orthodox-length beards, even outshags The Hunger Games, which I proclaimed “an early candidate for the most Hirsute Film of 2012.” Is there a barber strike in Los Angeles or something? Any enterprising hairdresser could make a fortune by setting up a salon at Hollywood and Vine. Meanwhile, this same trend also puts the Shorewood/Joliet/Plainfield area at the cutting edge of popular culture. These days we’re best known for mustaches and male use of hairspray, as exemplified by the incarcerated Drew Peterson and his arch-nemesis, our finely coiffed and muscle T-wearing Will …
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
"The Hunger Games" is worth seeing
I really enjoyed The Hunger Games. There, I’ve said it. I should have hated it for three prime reasons: 1) I didn’t read the book, 2) I’m not in the targeted demographic (teens) and 3) the film contained barely any humor. But somehow, the filmmakers here engaged my attention and kept it, despite the marathon length of the picture (a whopping two hours and 22 minutes — I did take a much-needed personal intermission at approximately the halfway point). I went on Sunday morning at 10, and probably 200 other patrons joined me at the Cinemark Louis Joliet Mall, including a 40-something couple all over each other who plopped down right next to me (in the end it was OK, they didn’t mind me taking notes on my mobile device, so their mashing and …
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Dave found the over-the-top "Project X" to be a pleasant surprise.
For the third time since I began reviewing films, the Cinemark at Louis Joliet Mall was packed with high-school aged people, odd since Project X is rated R and should therefore be off-limits to people under the age of 18. A crowd of five or six loud, baseball-hat sporting guys (and the crowd was mostly young men) who didn’t look a day over 15 plopped down in the same row. “Are you guys 18?” I asked somewhat authoritatively (and jokingly). “What is with you people?” one shot right back. Silenced and humbled after the exchange with my fellow viewers, I nonetheless grew to enjoy their energy and humorous asides throughout the filmgoing experience last Friday evening. More of their contributions are at the end of this article. As the movie …
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Dave doesn’t mind the gross-out humor in this one.
In Wanderlust, art imitates life, in that Paul Rudd (George) and Jennifer Aniston (Linda) feel the aftereffects of a still-smoldering recession. It’s a fun movie that tends to plod, but overall it’s an enjoyable picture — if you don’t mind the f-bombs and sexually loose themes (it’s rated R). The couple buys a tiny New York City apartment (jokingly referred to as a “microloft”), but are soon sent packing to the suburbs of Atlanta when George’s office is busted by the FBI and he loses his job. They stumble into a commune one night on the way to Atlanta, and they return semipermanently after a failed attempt to cohabitate with George’s brother in Georgia. The commune is loosely led by a Mansonian Seth (Justin Theroux) and the patriarch-ish …
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Dave recommends skipping Safe House, but make a comment and join him at the cinema this weekend!
Want to compare notes with me on an upcoming movie, courtesy of the Shorewood Patch? Simply leave a comment below this week’s review. The comment can just be “Comment” or something equally mundane. At the end of the week, we’ll put all the names in a hat and draw out one lucky reader, who will get the opportunity to attend a film with me next weekend! How fun is that? Safe House’s premise is an interesting one: The highest levels of international intelligence, and therefore their governing bodies, are diseased and corrupt. These organizations are populated with rogue individuals, often missing in action for years, ratting out fellow spies, reporting to no one while still drawing a paycheck. It’s a paranoia-inducing premise, and it’s a …
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Throwback horror flick "The Woman in Black" will frighten all ages of scare fans.
I can safely say that moviegoers of all ages will get gleefully creeped out by The Woman in Black. Although it’s PG-13, I’d feel totally comfortable trying to scare the Cap’n Crunch out of my 6-year-old sons with this one, and I’d feel comfortable sharing it with the prudish Baptists down the street too (although the occultish overtones might scare the staunchest of nihilists). The Woman in Black is unique because it’s a horror flick not punctuated with f-bombs, unnecessary violence or quease-inducing blood and guts. It relies wholly on suspense, surprise and eerie music to both frighten the audience and move the story along. It hearkens back to the glory days of 1940s and 1950s horror flicks. This throwback cinematic mindset could be …
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Max Landis goes with the hackneyed perspective of handheld camera, but still displays "wild cinematic imagination," says Dave.
Chronicle offers up yet another cinematic instance of on-screen characters using handheld cameras to advance a storyline. We saw it first in 1999’s The Blair Witch Project, and it continued with this winter’s The Devil Inside. When first unveiled, this technique was an original idea, but now, the dizzying effect of actors filming things is just another Hollywood cliché. Filmmakers, let’s ban the handheld cameras. In this movie , three high school friends wander off into the woods from a party. They discover a sinkhole and contract telekinetic (the parapsyphological ability to move objects without touching them) powers by touching a rock/ice-like substance they find down there. Telekinesis first appeared on film in 1968’s The Power, …
Dave Wilson
2:40 pm on Tuesday, May 15, 2012
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