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| EFC STATS |
| Movies Listed: |
21262 |
| Total Ratings: |
231333 |
| Total Reviews: |
23759 |
![[84227270 Hits]](/cgi-bin/gd.cgi?84227270)
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| AMERICAN, THE |
"Eat, pray, navelgaze, kill."
David Cornelius says... "Oh, the loneliness of the professional killer. Of all the preposterous cinematic mythologies, this is one I just don’t get. What is it about a ruthless assassin with a heart of gold, struggling with his inner demons, that fascinates? Is it a bit of renegade wish fulfillment, these characters who live outside the law, are their own boss, travel the globe, go to bed with gorgeous foreigners? Do we want our lives to be wrought with danger and intrigue, like a secret agent but with less on-the-job responsibility? Is it our chance to imagine committing an ultimate sin but, thanks to these characters’ inherent goodness, not be a villain?" (more)
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| MACHETE |
"Weed-wackin', intestines-swingin', no-textin' fun."
David Cornelius says... "Look: we don’t need a “Machete” movie. Really. We just don’t. The original faux trailer, first appearing in the 2007 trash homage “Grindhouse,” already covered all the bases, what with the over-the-top action, ridiculous titillation, and narration dripping in sleaze. As a parody of old school previews, it was perhaps the most spot-on of the “Grindhouse” bunch." (more)
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| MACHETE |
"Viva Machete!"
Rob Gonsalves says... "I drove up to the theater with ‘80s hair metal blaring on my car stereo. It helped me get in the mood for "Machete," an ‘80s throwback if there ever was one; instead of a fancy 20th Century-Fox logo celebrating the studio’s 75 years, it should be preceded by the logo for Cannon Films or Vestron Video." (more)
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| AMERICAN, THE |
"Losing His Edge"
William Goss says... "George Clooney is going down, down stone steps and steep hills, down the map from Sweden to Italy. He’s a man known by many names – Jack, Edward, Mr. Butterfly – who always looks over his shoulder as he walks and often picks a corner when he sits. He knows how to make guns, he knows how to use them, and he knows that he’s being followed by men and women who are similarly skilled. And if he isn’t careful, then he’ll go down for good." (more)
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| LOUIS |
"A great silent comedy with great music, if that's not a contradiction."
Jay Seaver says... "SCREENED WITH LIVE MUSIC: When I mentioned to a friend that I was planning a trip to New York to see a new movie inspired by the early life of Louis Armstrong, I asked him to guess what sort of movie it was. Well, he figured, since we wouldn't be playing guess-the-genre if it were obvious, that left out the musical. It took some time to get to "silent comedy", which in 2010 has be considered an unusual (if attention-getting) choice." (more)
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| MACHETE |
"Blade Runner"
Peter Sobczynski says... "If the super-gory Mexploitaton goof “Machete” does nothing else, it reconfirms Robert Rodriguez’s standing as Hollywood’s answer to the Energizer Bunny. Once again, he has given us an unabashedly lurid serving of cinematic pulp that is crammed with so much manna from B-movie heaven--oceans of blood and guts, a bevy of babes running the gamut from half-naked to fully, goofball humor, wild stunts and wilder plot twists--and has done so with enough energy to power several mid-sized suburbs. The trouble is that, unlike more successful ventures such as “Desperado” and “Sin City,” he hasn’t balanced out that reckless energy with equal amounts of inspiration and discipline and as a result, a film that starts off as exhilarating soon becomes exhausting and most viewers will likely emerge from it feeling like they have attended a buffet dinner where they took about four trips too many to the carving station." (more)
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| GOING THE DISTANCE |
"Why Couldn't They Be Scott Pilgrim And Ramona?"
Erik Childress says... "There is breaking news in the world of studio-sponsored romantic comedies. Somebody not associated with Judd Apatow actually made a good one. It’s inevitable that his name is going to come up when discussing Going the Distance with its cavalcade of guy friends and reference-based humor, so let’s just get it out of the way. Most definitely it is a compliment, and not a back-handed one in any way to director Nanette Burnstein, screenwriter Geoff LaTulippe and their cast trying to glom on to the latest trend. We need more films like those and like this that don’t play games with its primary couple and actually tries to navigate through real-world human connections with characters who don’t feel like pawns on the board of convention. Classic status be damned if we can just say “Bravo” to those sentiments a couple times a year. As chances are dim that we may see another romantic comedy as funny and as close to honest as this all year, we should celebrate Going the Distance while we have the chance." (more)
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| AMERICAN, THE |
"I Present To You Our Ambassador, Mr. Clooney."
Erik Childress says... "You will often hear of films of the thriller variety referred to having a ‘70s sensibility. Many of the thrillers of that era were often influenced in the events surrounding Watergate and the sins inherit in Vietnam; many of which resulted in the aftermath of the JFK assassination. Jim Garrison was helping fuel the national paranoia over a shady element in our government and it resulted in favorites of the time like Three Days of the Condor, The Parallax View and, of course, All the President’s Men. Paranoia being the key word in everything above; the fear of the threat more than the direct involvement in shootouts and chases. Anton Corbjn’s ultra-spare thriller, The American, shares a direct link with that time even though it is set, as far as we can tell, today. Without making any sudden movements to call attention to its own intentions, the film becomes an interesting statement about our more recent government’s involvement in global affairs and an intimately tense tale of a man capable of more than just the violence he causes." (more)
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CRITICWATCH - THE END OF SUMMER 2010 (AND GOOD JUDGMENT)
by Erik Childress |
| "Criticwatch was off for the month of August and now that the summer of 2010 can officially be declared dead with the coming of Labor Day, we can look back upon it and see why we might have had to just get away from it for a little while. On one hand we had, almost inarguably, the worst summer season for movies ever and the movie studios still allowing quote whores and sluts to flourish even over the name of good films that could crib far more reputable praise for. On the other we had the cancellation of At the Movies and then Armond White shooting down any great film just because it lacked the auteur vision of Neveldine & Taylor. Just where was a moviegoer going to turn for an informed opinion?" (more) |
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'DO YOU KNOW MY MOVIES HAVE EVEN BEEN RECUT AFTER THEY WERE FINISHED?'
- Ed, Ed Wood
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