Life Itself

“For a generation of usa citizens,” wrote President Obama on the death of Roger Ebert in Apr 2013, “Roger was the films. once he didn’t sort of a film, he was honest. once he did he was effusive… the films won’t be a similar while not Roger.” It’s arduous to overestimate the cultural significance of Ebert’s work, that tried each thrillingly universal and entertainingly factious. Having cut his teeth as a editor in chief, Ebert became film critic at the "Chicago Sun-Times", wherever he wrote ahead-of-the-curve responses to newest movies like Bonnie and Clyde. On tv, he developed a combative relationship with "Chicago Tribune" film critic Gene Siskel, and along they pioneered the infamous ‘Thumbs Up! Thumbs Down!’ verdicts that were multifariously understood as either the scourge or saviour of contemporary movie-reviewing.

This wondrous life-affirming documentary from director Steve James – whose initial feature, "Hoop Dreams", Ebert championed – puts either side of the argument, and finds shot footage that suggests that the Roger/Gene competition was no on-air contrivance. Elsewhere, Martin Scorsese struggles uproariously to seek out something smart to mention regarding Russ Meyer’s Ebert-scripted selfish person "Beyond the vale of the Dolls", however remains a fanatical advocate of Ebert’s incisive criticism, that he credits with encouragement him on at key moments in his own career.

Intimate footage of Ebert’s later battles with cancer (the loss of his entire jowl couldn’t dampen his spirits) paints an image of a person encircled by a admiring family in whose company he found nice happiness; his adult female, Chaz, may be a glorious presence – Associate in Nursing example of the simplest in attribute, a theme to that Ebert came back obsessionally in his writing. Werner Herzog calls him “a soldier” and describes an odd epiphany once walking over his star on "Hollywood Boulevard"; Errol Morris wonders whether or not he would have had a career were it not for Ebert and Siskel’s early support.

Crucially, James’s intelligent, moving film charts Ebert’s early adoption of the web – a resource that some thought would kill film criticism, however that just widened its scope, giving Ebert back his voice once his body failing him. Taking its title from Ebert’s bestselling memoir, this pretty, perceptive film may be a splendidly watchable tribute to a really medium life. I laughed, I cried; i used to be galvanized and elated. Thumbs Up!

source:http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/nov/16/ife-itself-review-delightful-tribute-film-critic-roger-ebert

Movie Info
Acclaimed director Steve James (Hoop Dreams) and government producers film maker (The Departed) and Steven Zaillian (Moneyball) gift LIFE ITSELF, a motion-picture show that recounts the ennobling and fun lifetime of world-renowned film critic and social commentator Roger Ebert - a story that's by turns personal, funny, painful, and transcendent. supported his bestselling memoir of an equivalent name, LIFE ITSELF, explores the heritage of Roger Ebert's life, from his Pulitzer Prize-winning film criticism at the Chicago Sun-Times to turning into one among the foremost prestigious cultural voices in America. (C) Magnolia

• Rating:     R (for transient sexual images/nudity and language.)
• Genre:     Documentary , Television , interest group
• Directed By:     Steve James
• In Theaters:     Jul four, 2014 restricted
• On DVD:    Gregorian calendar month seventeen, 2015
• US Box Office:     $0.8M
• Runtime:    a pair of hour.

Magnolia Pictures - Official Site

source:http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/life_itself/

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The Voices

Ryan Reynolds may be a Hollywood star whose star appearance area unit therefore cartoonishly clean-cut that they verge on the bum, whose high-voltage grin are often completely creepy. The actor has appeared in blockbusters, indie flicks and stinkers alike, however he finds what could also be his good niche in The Voices, Marjane Satrapi 's lurid tale of Associate in Nursing seemingly standard Joe World Health Organization skips his medication and becomes a psycho-killer assailed by demons.

Iranian-born Satrapi kicked off as Associate in Nursing artist, won the Cannes jury prize for her animated city and melded cartoons with live-action on 2011's attractive Chicken With Plums. On The Voices, operating off a script by Michael Perry, she rustles up a sort of flesh-and-blood horror comic. Everything here is deliberately exaggerated and amplified and soaked in gore. Jerry (Reynolds) works within the shipping department of a bathroom manufacturing plant in a very inactive city. He pines for his colleague Fiona (played with simply the proper level of absurdity by Gemma Arterton) and pursues her for a date. The date goes badly. Jerry hits a cervid on the road then finishes up stabbing Fiona to death within the forest, apologising copiously as he will therefore.

Part of the matter is that Jerry's not been taking his pills. His pets keep rebuke him. The dog, Bosco, is sweet and sort and tells him to show himself in to the cops. The cat, Mr Whiskers, isn't smart and sort and instructs him to avoid jail by cutting up the body and storing the top within the refrigerator. The dog may be an angel however the cat is a devil. i am estimate it had been Bosco that suggested Ryan Reynolds to star within the glorious The Nines and Mr Whiskers that told him to form The Proposal and also the change-of-pace, though the film doesn't directly address this.

Jerry cannot envisage himself as a serial murderer. however "Mr Whiskers" will so, too, will the top of Fiona, that is growing lonely within the refrigerator and demands a fan for company – presumably that sweet Lisa (Anna Kendrick) World Health Organization works in accounts. From here it is a noisy piece of ground ride through to the destination. The bolts area unit loose, the belts will not fasten and Satrapi's louche very little creepshow finally does not quantity to a hill of beans. perhaps that is fine. The Voices provides Associate in Nursing pleasantly trashy remedy to the standard Sundance fare of emotional drama and crusading documentary. Bosco may denote that there area unit much better movies on the schedule than this one and Bosco would be right. however Mr Whiskers feels that life is just too short to be therefore prissy. Go and gorge yourselves, says Mr Whiskers. droop the implications.

source:http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/jan/22/sundance-film-festival-the-voices-review

Rating: R (for bloody violence, and for language together with sexual references)

Genre: Comedy

Directed By: Marjane Satrapi

Written By: Michael R. Perry , Michael Perry

In Theaters: February half dozen, 2015 Wide

On DVD: Gregorian calendar month seven, 2015

Runtime: one unit of time. 47 min.

Lionsgate Films

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The Immigrant

Movie Info 

In James Gray's The Immigrant, Ewa Cybulski (Marion Cotillard) and her sister sail to ny from their native Poland in search of a replacement start and also the ambition. after they reach Ellis Island, doctors discover that Magda (Angela Sarafyan) is unwell, and also the two women are separated. 

Ewa is free onto the mean streets of Manhattan whereas her sister is isolated. 

Alone, with nowhere to show and eager to reunite with Magda, Ewa quickly falls prey to Bruno (Joaquin Phoenix), a captivating but wicked man who takes her in and forces her into prostitution. The arrival of Orlando (Jeremy Renner) - a dashing stage magician who is additionally Bruno's cousin - restores her self-belief and hopes for a brighter future, becoming her only chance to flee the nightmare within which she finds herself. 
(c) Weinstein Co

• Rating : R (for sexual content, nudity and a few language)
• Genre : Drama , Romance
• Directed By : James Gray
• Written By : James Gray , Ric Menello
• In Theaters : could sixteen, 2014 Limited
• On DVD : Apr seven, 2015
• US Box Office : $2.0M
• Runtime : 2 hr.

The Weinstein Company - Official Site

source:http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/nightingale_2013/ 

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A Most Violent Year

And not simply A Most Violent Year, either: the foremost violent year. The third film by J. C. Chandor, World Health Organization wrote and directed Margin Call and All Is Lost, could be a neck-prickling ethical heroic tale set in the big apple town, 1981: statistically speaking, the deadliest twelve months within the city’s history, and no time to create a good living.

In the District Attorney’s workplace, murder and corruption cases compile on desks just like the gray snow that collects within the alleyways outside. From the shores of borough, you'll almost see Manhattan within the distance, the skyline of the money district lead-blue and gleaming, the dual towers of the globe Trade Center looming massive.

For Abel Morales (Oscar Isaac), that sort of success remains a far off dream, however he’s creating higher progress than most. This first-generation migrant runs a heating-oil business together with his Brooklyn-born better half Anna (Interstellar's Jessica Chastain), World Health Organization handles the accounts. Business is nice, though recently, the corporate has been hit by a spate of hijackings, with anonymous gunmen holding up fuel trucks and spiriting them away to places unknown. One night, Abel spots a wierd figure outside the couple’s lavish new Westchester home. He chases him off, however the subsequent morning, within the bushes by the door, the couple’s girl finds a loaded gun.

Abel is convinced this can be the work of 1 of his rivals, World Health Organization between them have the city’s oil market sculpted up sort of a Mafia protection racket. however due to associate assistant D.A. (a subtle, very good David Oyelowo) with a keen interest within the company’s books, it’s Abel who’s tarred as a criminal. notwithstanding, he desires to play things straight; build his empire on ground.

“I wish to own the items i take advantage of,” he tells a bunch of Jewish Orthodoxy Jews World Health Organization provide to rent, then eventually sell, him a warehouse down by the harbour. WASPy white faces area unit largely conspicuous by their absence. The city belongs to incomers, and Abel desires them, in turn, to belong to him.

You underestimate adult male. and Mrs. Morales at your peril – and, for that matter, Isaac and Chastain. As one or two they’re a dramatic dream team, giving Abel and Pakistani monetary unit a beautiful, acidic chemistry that comes from compounding an excessive amount of business with not enough pleasure. Isaac, with gray streaks through his hair and a slate-coloured suit, yet again skulking spherical chilly the big apple streets once Inside Llewyn Davis, seems like a for good suspicious crow, whereas Chastain, all ruby-red lips and fine silk blouses, has the poise of a steel sculpture.

In a terrific scene, the couple hit a ruminant in their automotive on the means home one evening, and whereas Abel hovers miserably over the spasm animal, clutching a hand tool and psyching himself up for the mercy kill, pow! pow!– Pakistani monetary unit attracts a firearm from her handbag and blasts the beast out of its misery. Chandor doesn’t roleplay the amount setting, however like Sidney Lumet, he hunkers down on the pavement together with his characters, showing North American nation their energy and determination to climb higher, as circumstances and their rivals grasp at their ankles.

At one purpose, Abel happens by accident to be within reach once one in all his trucks is hijacked, and, recognizing an opportunity to finally learn who’s sabotaging his business, he follows in his automotive – an exploration that becomes a panic-stricken chase down the city’s backstreets, over patches of waste land, through railway yards so on foot and on the subway. On the means Abel finds a gun, and also the temptation for him to use it, and play by the city’s rules instead of his own, is overwhelming. The sequence is controlled and exhilarating – an ethical action sequence – however it additionally reminds Abel, and us, that even this purportedly successful man is at the mercy of spiderly external forces.

“You’ve been walking around this whole time thinking this comes right down to your toil, your smart luck, your charm,” snorts "Anna" once he returns home that night. “Mr. F_____’ American Dream. Chandor’s film offers the Dream associate authentic, unreal texture. Here, success is even scarier than failure: it’s a nocturnal fantasy, tempting and ablaze with threat.

source:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/film/a-most-violent-year/review/

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Cut Bank

Cut Bank is the sort of copycat, self-consciously comedic violent noir of which there were far too many at the Sundance Film Festival in the years after the Coen Brothers and Quentin Tarantino strode onto the scene. Clever enough to provoke a few abrupt laughs along the way, this big screen debut for two television stalwarts, director Matt Shakman (It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia) and writer Robert Patino (Sons of Anarchy, Prime Suspect), is sabotaged by some frightfully on-the-nose expository dialogue and an adamantly prosaic visual style.

Still, the solid cast will probably earn this a distributor for limited theatrical release. The yarn is set (but was not filmed) in the tiny (pop. 3,100) Montana town that proudly announces itself as the "coldest spot in the nation," although, as the story is set during the summer, this has no bearing whatever on the plot. An embarrassingly informational initial scene has handsome dumb cluck Dwayne (Liam Hemsworth) telling his gullible but fetching girlfriend Cassandra (Teresa Palmer) something she scarcely needs to hear again, that he wanted whisk her to L.A. three years ago but for now he’s stuck caring for his sick old dad.

As if in preparation for imagined film careers, Dwayne takes his young lovely out to a floral field to take some lyrical video footage of her, only to also capture, in the background, a figure emerge to fire to two shots at another man. The victim is the town's goofy old postman, Georgie Wits (Bruce Dern), who has heretofore been seen spending his lunch hour in his mail truck ogling nubile cheerleaders through binoculars.

As there’s a $100,000 reward in place for anyone providing evidence of the killing of a federal employee, Dwayne expectantly gives his videotape to local sheriff Vogel (John Malkovich), who’s taken aback by the advent of the town’s very first murder. However, there’s no body, nor has the day’s mail been delivered, which is a matter of extreme concern to taxidermist Derby Milton (Michael Stuhlbarg), an ultra-weirdo with bottle-bottom glasses who’s expecting a very important parcel.

Short of spilling any spoilers, which would be numerous, it’s safe to say that the lack of a corpse is simply the first of many details that suggest that things are not as straightforward as they might have seemed at first; it almost goes without saying that the body count does not end with one. Writer Patino no doubt had fun lining up all his ducks, the better to savor twisting their necks and plucking their feathers, and there are minor pleasures to be taken watching pros like Dern, Stuhlbarg, Malkovich and Oliver Platt, playing a visiting D.C. official, employ delayed reactions and well-practiced stares to milk maximum value out of the script’s surprise turns.

But thick-headed Dwayne and bubbly Cassandra, who dreams of being crowned Miss Cut Bank before leaving for Hollywood stardom, are dull characters, as is the latter’s stern father (Billy Bob Thornton).

Even more deleterious, however, is the by-the-numbers direction; especially with this sort of story, which has been done a thousand times before, stylistic flair and visual inventiveness are de rigueur, the only justification, in fact, for further exploits in this much-traversed field. Shakman’s handling of it is strictly presentational, creating no special mood, atmosphere or character.

Some very good talent behind and before the camera has been put to quite ordinary use here.

source:http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/laff-film-review-cut-bank-713607

Movie Info

Dwayne McLaren (Liam Hemsworth) dreams about escaping small town life in Cut Bank, Montana, "the coldest spot in the nation," with his vivacious girlfriend Cassandra (Teresa Palmer). When Dwayne witnesses an awful crime, he tries to leverage a bad situation into a scheme to get rich quickly but he finds that fate and an unruly accomplice are working against him. Thrust into the middle of a police investigation spearheaded by the local sheriff (John Malkovich), everything goes from bad to worse in this all-American thriller. Directed by Matt Shakman and also starring Billy Bob Thornton, Bruce Dern, Michael Stuhlbarg, and Oliver Platt. (C) Official Site
 

Rating:	R (for violence and language)
Genre:	Mystery & Suspense
Directed By:	Matt Shakman
Written By:	Roberto Patiño
In Theaters:	Apr 3, 2015 Limited
On DVD:	May 25, 2015
Runtime:	1 hr. 33 min.

A24 - Official Site

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/cut_bank/

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Jinn

Despite OK visual effects, a few chills and some newfangled movie monsters, writer-director Ajmal Zaheer Ahmad’s supernatural thriller “Jinn” often feels like one-half of an old grindhouse double bill.  It’s a watchable if rather convoluted effort.

The titular jinn, according to Eastern mythology, are one of three races created “In the beginning…” (the other two are man and angels).  Conveniently--for a horror film, anyway--the mysterious jinn are nothing if not flexible.  These time- and shape-shifting beings can be good or bad, peaceful or violent, invisible or in your face (at times they resemble upright fireplaces).  Whatever, you want them on your side.

Unfortunately for Shawn (Dominic Rains), a model-handsome Michigan auto designer married to the equally pretty Jasmine (Serinda Swan), he must suddenly do battle with a vicious sect of the jinn, the Shayateen, due to a family curse that stretches back to 1901.  Suffice to say this ancestral history is news to Shawn and it’s delivered the old-fashioned way: on a VHS tape.

What follows is a frantic few days in which Shawn must collaborate with an unlikely trio of jinn experts--a shadowy priest (William Atherton), a protective tough guy (Ray Park) and a manacled mental patient (Faran Tahir)--to learn how to fight the fiery Shayateen at their own miserable game and, y’know, save the world.  This demands that, among other things, Shawn pass an ancient ritualistic test called the Chillah (don’t ask).

Meanwhile, Jasmine, who may or may not be pregnant with Shawn’s child, has allegedly been abducted by the bad jinn. Cue the stacked deck.

Magical swords, evil doppelgangers, a sexy black muscle car, an unremarkable final showdown and lots of first-draft dialogue factor into this thankfully brief (about 80 minutes plus end credits) frightfest. 

As for the film’s closing promise: “The Jinn will return”--don’t hold your breath.

~ By Gary Goldstein

source:http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/moviesnow/la-et-mn-review-jinn-cant-rise-above-horror-cliches-20140405-story.html 

 

Movie Info

In the beginning, three were created. Man made of clay. Angels made of light. And a third made of fire. For centuries, stories of angels and men have captured the imagination and been etched into history crossing all boundaries of culture, religion and time. These two races have dominated the landscape of modern mythology, shrouding the evidence that a third was ever created. This third race, born of smokeless fire, was named the jinn. Modern man has all but forgotten this third race ever existed. It is time for him to remember. 

(c) Freestyle

 

Rating:	PG-13 (for some intense sequences of violence and terror)
Genre:	Horror , Mystery & Suspense , Science Fiction & Fantasy
Directed By:	Ajmal Zaheer Ahmad
Written By:	Ajmal Zaheer Ahmad
In Theaters:	Apr 2, 2014 Limited
On DVD:	Apr 12, 2015
US Box Office:	$0.1M
Runtime:	1 hr. 37 min.

Freestyle Releasing - Official Site

source:http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/jinn_2014/

 

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The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

“So began a battle that none had expected,” wrote JRR Tolkien in the third-from-last chapter of The Hobbit. “And it was called The Battle of the Five Armies, and it was very terrible.” Peter Jackson’s expansion of this epochal but barely-described fracas, in his third and final film from this slim book, is neither very terrible nor remotely unexpected. It’s a series of stomping footnotes in search of a climax.

In terms of story so far, it ends virtually when it starts – with super-peeved dragon Smaug (Benedict Cumberbatch) raining down fiery destruction on the pitiful residents of Laketown, and facing the last-ditch heroism of an archer called Bard (Luke Evans).

Everything else is scraps, in both senses. Jackson’s one recourse is to ape the here-we-go-again war mania of The Return of the King. Humans, dwarves and elves duke it out with orcs and wild wolves. It's a whopping great grudge match, a squabble over the contents of Smaug’s mountain lair, and goodness knows what else.

The trouble is that Jackson can’t make it mean very much: when every life on Middle Earth is seemingly at stake, few individually grab our attention. There’s more aftermath than plot left, and very little of it has to do with Bilbo (Martin Freeman), who feels increasingly like a forlorn bystander in his own franchise.

The further and more competently the movie trundles on, the more it begs not to exist, really: hindsight favours a two-part adaptation at most. This isn’t to say there aren’t bright spots. However it was fudged, 92-year-old Christopher Lee doing Shaolin kung fu with his magic staff is great value. And the last third is rescued by one meaty, entertaining set piece – crumbling citadel, frozen lake, one-on-one duels between orcs and the principal cast. Freeman, and Evangeline Lilly as the not-in-Tolkien elf maiden Tauriel, inject some unforced pathos which puts many of their dewy-eyed co-stars to shame.

The bloom has come off Orlando, though, whose main achievement as Legolas – other than some ridiculous mid-air running up collapsing masonry – is to illustrate perfectly what Joey Tribbiani from Friends called “smell the fart acting”.

When the dwarf leader Thorin (Richard Armitage) imagines himself drowning in a pool of molten gold, Jackson’s pet message that Greed Is Bad rings out again – but you have to wonder if a triple-your-money release strategy is quite the seemliest context to preach it in. At 6ft 2", Armitage must be the tallest actor ever to play a dwarf. The film is the opposite: a paragraph on steroids.
source:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/filmreviews/11260252/The-Hobbit-The-Battle-of-the-Five-Armies-first-look-review-begs-not-to-exist.html

Movie Info

From Academy Award (R)-winning filmmaker Peter Jackson comes "The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies," the third in a trilogy of films adapting the enduringly popular masterpiece The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien. "The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies" brings to an epic conclusion the adventures of Bilbo Baggins, Thorin Oakenshield and the Company of Dwarves. 

Having reclaimed their homeland from the Dragon Smaug, the Company has unwittingly unleashed a deadly force into the world. Enraged, Smaug rains his fiery wrath down upon the defenseless men, women and children of Lake-town. Obsessed above all else with his reclaimed treasure, Thorin sacrifices friendship and honor tohoard it as Bilbo's frantic attempts to make him see reason drive the Hobbit towards a desperate and dangerous choice.

But there are even greater dangers ahead. Unseen by any but the Wizard Gandalf, the great enemy Sauron has sent forth legions of Orcs in a stealth attack upon the Lonely Mountain. As darkness converges on their escalating conflict, the races of Dwarves, Elves and Men must decide - unite or be destroyed. Bilbo finds himself fighting for his life and the lives of his friends in the epic Battle of the Five Armies, as the future of Middle-earth hangs in the balance.
(c) Warner Bros

Rating: PG-13 (for extended sequences of intense fantasy action violence, and frightening images)
Genre: Action & Adventure , Science Fiction & Fantasy
Directed By: Peter Jackson
Written By: Philippa Boyens , Guillermo del Toro , Fran Walsh , J.R.R. Tolkien , Peter Jackson
In Theaters: Dec 17, 2014 Wide
On DVD: Mar 24, 2015
US Box Office: $255.1M
Runtime: 2 hr. 24 min.
Warner Bros. - Official Site

source:http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_hobbit_the_battle_of_the_five_armies/

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