Rotten 1/5
| Rotten 0%
| Jack Said (2009) | "
Makes Guy Ritchie look like Dostoyevsky. Awful lines, bad acting – Danny Dyer’s appearances stand out as dazzlingly professional, which says it all – unredeemed by a taste of Act 2 of Mozart’s Figaro, a bizarre rococo touch." Financial Times Posted Sep 25, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 27%
| Fame (2009) | "
Unconnected shreds of plot suggest severe editing at some stage and neither characters nor musical routines add up to much." Financial Times Posted Sep 25, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 45%
| Management (2009) | "
Unable to decide between being a romantic comedy, a zany farce or a thoughtful study of two emotionally repressed losers finding fulfilment, it ends up a mess; but an intriguing mess." Financial Times Posted Sep 25, 2009 |
Rotten 3/5
| Rotten 40%
| Born in 68 () | "
The problem is not length but shallowness." Financial Times Posted Sep 25, 2009 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 85%
| White Lightnin' (2009) | "
In White Lightnin’, style and content meet, blend and writhe in the memory, a haunting nightmare." Financial Times Posted Sep 25, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Rotten 55%
| The Soloist (2009) | "
The revelation of poverty, squalor and mental illness in LA’s underclass is horrific. But the film suffers from uncertainty of tone." Financial Times Posted Sep 25, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 59%
| Creation (2009) | "
A sub-plot features an orang-utan; it is no exaggeration to say that she is the most moving performer on screen." Financial Times Posted Sep 25, 2009 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 89%
| O'Horten (2009) | "
Gently surreal to quizzically observant, fully deserving that lump." Financial Times Posted May 8, 2009 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 87%
| Blue Eyelids (2008) | "
Beautifully acted by Enrique Arreola and Cecilia Suárez, an actress both withdrawn and hauntingly luminous." Financial Times Posted May 8, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Fresh 87%
| Sounds Like Teen Spirit () | "
Sounds Like Teen Spirit has its share of emotional manipulation but this documentary on the Junior Eurovision leaves one saddened by so much hope, enthusiasm, ambition and energy expended on such a tacky concept." Financial Times Posted May 8, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Rotten 24%
| Little Ashes (2009) | "
Paul Morrison’s evocation of the meeting in 1920s Madrid and subsequent tortuous relationship of the young Salvador Dalí, Luis Buñuel and Federico Garcia Lorca is such a labour of love that you forgive its incongruities." Financial Times Posted May 8, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Rotten 54%
| Cheri (2009) | "
Dazzlingly designed, the film salvages recognisable humanity in Rupert Friend’s Chéri, aka the unromantic (to Anglo-Saxon ears) Fred. Elsewhere the movie is as insubstantial as a soufflé, and less intellectually challenging." Financial Times Posted May 8, 2009 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 89%
| Coraline (2009) | "
The vision of Henry Selick adds a darkness to this sometimes sinister fairy tale." Financial Times Posted May 8, 2009 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 94%
| Star Trek (2009) | "
But idolaters need fear no iconoclasm and newcomers no exclusion. The start of a presumably new chapter in the franchise is marked by affectionate respect tempered with an eye for modern visual tastes." Financial Times Posted May 8, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 65%
| The End (2009) | "
The film, a success on the festival circuit, has been described as “carving, visceral, right in your face... scary, gob-smacking”. I merely concur, in case they know where I live." Financial Times Posted May 1, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 75%
| Helen (2008) | "
Just as the story grips you it ends, leaving you mystified beyond the call of the enigmatic plot." Financial Times Posted May 1, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Rotten 55%
| Funuke domo, kanashimi no ai wo misero (2007) | "
The calm, deadpan chronicling of what, one trusts, is an untypical rural Japanese family suggests a very black comedy. Slightly too long but hypnotically told, beautifully acted and not at all depressing." Financial Times Posted May 1, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 44%
| Hannah Montana The Movie (2009) | "
The film ends in infectious good-humour. It seems perfectly calculated for its intended market, unlike Wolverine." Financial Times Posted May 1, 2009 |
Rotten 1/5
| Rotten 36%
| X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009) | "
Fans will appreciate this more than the casual filmgoer trapped in this high-tech junkyard of not-so-special effects, scarcely noticeable dialogue, incoherent plotting, inconsistent psychology and garbled motivations." Financial Times Posted May 1, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 66%
| Is Anybody There? (2009) | "
Is Anybody There? has so many good intentions and engaging moments it is hard to define why it doesn’t quite add up." Financial Times Posted May 1, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Rotten 27%
| Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (2009) | "
The film cuddles its Dickensian soft centre in a Mills & Boon soft casing. Où sont les wisecracks d’antan? Almost extinct." Financial Times Posted May 1, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 84%
| Sweet Land (2006) | "
Nostalgic, gentle, loving: the elegiac mood set against endless rural space inevitably suggests Malick’s Days of Heaven. What next from this considerable talent?" Financial Times Posted Sep 5, 2008 |
Fresh
| Rotten 59%
| RocknRolla (2008) | "
Guy Ritchie’s latest is not as bad as his critics, professional and amateur, hoped." Financial Times Posted Sep 5, 2008 |
Fresh
| Fresh 64%
| Never Apologize: A Personal Visit with Lindsay Anderson (2008) | "
An uncinematic form, perhaps, but of absorbing interest to cinema-lovers." Financial Times Posted Sep 5, 2008 |
Rotten
| Fresh 61%
| The Duchess (2008) | "
“Banality of banalities, all is banality,” saith the critic emerging from The Duchess as he hums the locations, wigs and furniture." Financial Times Posted Sep 5, 2008 |
Rotten
| Rotten 2%
| Disaster Movie (2008) | "
Of Disaster Movie it is difficult to speak, or even think, articulately, a handicap that seems to have afflicted the film’s makers." Financial Times Posted Sep 5, 2008 |
Rotten
| Rotten 9%
| Bangkok Dangerous (2008) | "
A (slightly belated) reappraisal of his way of life recalls John Wayne in The Shootist, and evidently this is intended as more than a gore fest. The result is surprisingly dull." Financial Times Posted Sep 5, 2008 |
Fresh
| Fresh 87%
| Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008) | "
The film shows a certain wit and a refined eclecticism: a director who in a few seconds combines Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto, a quotation from Tennyson’s In Memoriam and two monsters singing Beautiful Freak deserves watching." Financial Times Posted Aug 22, 2008 |
Rotten
| Rotten 36%
| You Don't Mess With The Zohan (2008) | "
Images of a thrusting male pelvis haunt the sensitive critic yet." Financial Times Posted Aug 15, 2008 |
Rotten
| Rotten 39%
| Wild Child (2009) | "
The types are such extremes that the partisans in the audience will continue to hate American brats and English snobs respectively, rapprochement between two sets of caricatures seeming unlikely." Financial Times Posted Aug 15, 2008 |
Rotten
| Rotten 19%
| The Clone Wars (2008) | "
what Star Wars: The Clone Wars serves up is a rehashed Thunderbirds with a dash of Japanese anime." Financial Times Posted Aug 15, 2008 |
Rotten
| Fresh 78%
| Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day (2008) | "
American Lee Pace, from TV’s Pushing Daisies, manages not one but several creditable English accents, sometimes unfortunately all in the same sentence, but whose emotional depth shows up this ball of fluff as insubstantial. Forgettable." Financial Times Posted Aug 15, 2008 |
Fresh
| Fresh 79%
| Jimmy Carter Man From Plains (2007) | "
Not ground-breaking cinema, but a reminder that Christians can be tolerant and politicians principled." Financial Times Posted Aug 15, 2008 |
Fresh
| Rotten 56%
| The Banishment (2007) | "
There are prize-winning performances, seductive landscapes and hallucinatory shots of empty urban streets and shadowy interiors." Financial Times Posted Aug 15, 2008 |
Fresh 3/6
| Fresh 74%
| The Magic Flute (2006) | "
Apart from a fascination with the hate-spitting mouth and throat of Lyubov Petrova’s vocally pyrotechnic Queen of the Night, the visual gimmicks are individually tolerable. But they don’t add up to anything particular." Time Out Posted Nov 29, 2007 |
Fresh
| Fresh 100%
| John Waters: This Filthy World (2007) | "
Very funny." Financial Times Posted Sep 29, 2007 |
Fresh
| Fresh 86%
| Gypsy Caravan (2006) | "
Gypsy Caravan – When the Road Bends evokes the US tour of Roma musicians whose astonishing diversity ranges from the Indian group with their bejewelled drag dancer to oompah-based Romanians." Financial Times Posted Sep 29, 2007 |
Fresh
| Fresh 84%
| Rocket Science (2007) | "
Lovely performances all round create small-town competitiveness, frustrations and aspirations." Financial Times Posted Sep 29, 2007 |
Fresh
| Rotten 54%
| Across the Universe (2007) | "
The film’s too long but when it works, as in a slickly choreographed military induction scene with Taymor’s trademark giant puppets and carnival heads, it’s exhilarating." Financial Times Posted Sep 29, 2007 |
Fresh
| Fresh 67%
| The Right of the Weakest (2006) | "
The downbeat mood convinces. What might have been tedious becomes an involving and nail-biting thriller." Financial Times Posted Sep 29, 2007 |
Rotten
| Rotten 43%
| The Brave One (2007) | "
The film’s final unforgivable fault is its sheer, plodding dullness." Financial Times Posted Sep 29, 2007 |
Fresh
| Fresh 90%
| Michael Clayton (2007) | "
A potentially corny plot is stylishly executed, abetted by a perfect cast." Financial Times Posted Sep 29, 2007 |
Fresh
| Fresh 96%
| Withnail and I (1988) | "
A modern classic? A brilliant vignette of a certain time and attitudes? A self-indulgent jeu d’esprit? One thing is certain: Richard E. Grant touched greatness." Financial Times Posted Sep 7, 2007 |
Rotten
| Fresh 86%
| Small Engine Repair (2006) | "
Not so much shapelessness as unvaried pace and emotional monotony spoil the engaging Small Engine Repair." Financial Times Posted Sep 7, 2007 |
Rotten
| Rotten 50%
| Someone Else (2006) | "
Too shapeless and unplotted; and Mangan’s not-too-ruffled rueful affability hails more from sitcom land." Financial Times Posted Sep 7, 2007 |
Rotten
| Rotten 48%
| Run, Fat Boy, Run (2008) | "
Pegg exudes his usual air of faint self-congratulation playing an unlikeable prat whom nobody in their right mind would prefer to the high- flying Azariah or indeed to anyone." Financial Times Posted Sep 7, 2007 |
Fresh
| Fresh 82%
| Atonement (2007) | "
A handful of brilliant performances makes Atonement worth seeing." Financial Times Posted Sep 7, 2007 |
Rotten
| Rotten 39%
| No Reservations (2007) | "
The ingredients of the German original Mostly Martha this time produce a cliché Chinese dish, forgotten a mere five minutes later." Financial Times Posted Aug 31, 2007 |
Rotten
| Rotten 20%
| Death Sentence (2007) | "
Lurches on too long and topples into bathos." Financial Times Posted Aug 31, 2007 |
Rotten
| Fresh 78%
| 1408 (2007) | "
It all rather sidesteps the question of why reluctant manager Samuel L. Jackson fails to demand a written disclaimer from a guest insisting on a room that has seen 56 deaths, including drowning in chicken soup." Financial Times Posted Aug 31, 2007 |