The creators: Written and directed by John A. Russo, who as the cover art is hugely eager to remind you, co-wrote 1968’s Night of the Living Dead. Among the producers is Bob Michelucci, who appeared as a zombie in Dawn of the Dead and had otherwise no contact with that franchise; of the three movies […]

There might not be any 20th Century novelist as well-served by dramatic adaptations of his works as British spy author (and former British spy) John le Carré: the not-as-great films taken from his body of work feature such wholly enjoyable thinking-heavy thrillers as The Russia House and The Tailor of Panama, while the great ones […]

This review is dedicated to the mission of the Great Ape Project, which seeks to preserve the safety and moral rights of the non-human great primates. The sad life of Nim Chimpsky… but I don’t even really need to say more than that, do I? There was once upon a time in this fair world […]

One of the best surprises of Oscar season way back in 2009 was Oren Moverman’s directorial debut The Messenger, which tackled a well-worn subject* from a surprising and fresh angle.† Neither of these phrases applies to Moverman’s sophomore effort, Rampart, which is a movie about a dirty cop who is also a horrible human being […]

The newest film adaptation of Jane Eyre, written by Moira Buffini and directed by Cary Fukunaga, may very well be the best; there are many of the things, and I have not seen enough of them to have the authority to guess. Certainly, it is more faithful to the novel as well as a more […]

There is what we might call the “Dirty Harry Rule of Sequels”, except that I’m not at all sure that there are more than just the two examples I’m about to name, and two isn’t enough for a rule. BUT ANYWAY, when that movie came out in 1971, it was famously described as fascist, and […]

Pennies from Heaven was a ridiculous flop upon its initial release in the winter of 1981-’82, grossing considerably less than half of its $22 million budget back at a time when that was real money, and honestly, it makes a lot of sense that it would. It was a musical at a time when virtually […]

From among the Video Nasties L’ultmo treno della notte AKA Night Train Murders AKA Late Night Trains AKA The New House on the Left (1975, Italy) The creators: Director Aldo Lado, a giallo maker of no real import, alongside a team of writers including minor giallo figure Ettore Sanzò, semi-important Western writer Renato Izzo, and […]

By this point, Michael Fassbender has become so entrenched as one of The Great Actors of His Generation that it’s kind of weird to think of how recently he wasn’t. Like, three years ago. Oh, there was 300, but nobody watching that really had much to say about the acting, and certainly nobody noticed the […]

Given that “Christmas” is right there in the title, Arthur Christmas is surprisingly less of a holiday movie than you might think, and much more of a standard-issue CGI cartoon based heavily on the Pixar model, right down to the third-act slapstick chase that quickly morphs into a warm and gooey sentimental ending. It is, […]

The second-to-last of my long-overdue conclusion to the Carry On Campaign requests is courtesy of Vianney Boncorps, who donated twice and requested two reviews, the second of which proved awfully tricky to manage, for the unanswerable reason that the movie has never been released in the United States in any format and doesn’t seem to […]