There are two fundamental problems with the action “comedy” Pain and Gain: First, Michael Bay is the wrong director for this sort of material, and second, whoever cast the likable Mark Wahlberg and Dwayne Johnson in the film made a terrible mistake. I like Wahlberg and Johnson, and that’s the problem: In the film the criminal masterminds they portray are such losers that it’s just wrong to have these two popular actors in these roles….Read More
Review: Limitless
There’s little worse for a film critic than watching a perfectly good idea for a movie be bungled in its adaptation to the big screen. Limitless falls into this category, however, with a brilliant concept that ends up so sloppy and poorly written that it made me want to open my laptop and start writing a new script. The story is based on Alan Glynn’s novel “The Dark Fields” about a drug that rewires your…Read More
Review: Machete
After having sat through the enjoyable but mind-numbingly violent Machete, I’ve come up with a new movie category: bloodbath porn. From the very first scene in this Robert Rodriguez homage to 70s action films, Machete has a body count that I can’t recall seeing an equal of since the Rambo series. Not into decapitation? Then this probably isn’t the film for you. Machete is played by scary-looking character actor Danny Trejo, whose entire career seems…Read More
Review: Public Enemies
Biopics are an unusual challenge for a filmmaker because the storyline is already set, whether it makes sense and whether we can understand the motivations of the characters or not. As I watched the lush, but violent Public Enemies, I kept thinking that the reason there was no story, no backstory on the characters, and no depth to the film was just this reason: we were being presented with the sequence of events as they…Read More