Rotten 2/5
| Fresh 83%
| Avatar (2009) | "
It's baggy, longwinded and, for all the light-speed imagery, just not quick on its feet. Cameron used to be the tautest film-maker around, but he just got slack." — Guardian [UK] Posted Dec 11, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 46%
| Nativity! () | "
A pretty shambolic effort, despite its undeniable good-heartedness." — Guardian [UK] Posted Nov 27, 2009 |
Fresh 5/5
| Fresh 87%
| A Serious Man (2009) | "
The Coen brothers may just have made their masterpiece with this, their 14th feature and yet another hairpin-bend change of direction, which has been their trademark for their entire career." — Guardian [UK] Posted Oct 30, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 80%
| Michael Jackson's This Is It (2009) | "
This Is It a testament of a kind, and one that is no disgrace to his memory." — Guardian [UK] Posted Oct 28, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 78%
| I P Man (2009) | "
There's a pleasingly old-fashioned air to all the flying drop-kicks and straight-finger jabs, even if it lacks the cinematic agility we have now come to expect from this kind of thing." — Guardian [UK] Posted Oct 4, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 58%
| Vinyan (2008) | "
Du Welz never manages to generate enough menace - this is no Apocalypse Now." — Guardian [UK] Posted Oct 4, 2009 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 100%
| The Army of Crime (2009) | "
Guédiguian manages to make this a worthy companion piece to Melville's resistance classic Army in the Shadows; the same remorseless dread stalks both." — Guardian [UK] Posted Oct 4, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Fresh 71%
| District 13: Ultimatum (2009) | "
Light on its feet, but heavy in its brain." — Guardian [UK] Posted Oct 4, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 100%
| Ghost in the Shell 2.0 (2009) | "
It looks great, for sure: demonic cityscapes, lysergic mind-trips and aestheticised military hardware. And it's admirably grown-up in its aspiration too." — Guardian [UK] Posted Oct 4, 2009 |
Fresh 4/5
| Fresh 100%
| Toy Story (1995) | "
Its lightness of touch has not diminished, nor has its near-miraculous kidult-fusion humour." — Guardian [UK] Posted Oct 4, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 10%
| My Life in Ruins (2009) | "
Feels like its been churned out by some auto-plot generator." — Guardian [UK] Posted Oct 4, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Rotten 40%
| Surrogates (2009) | "
There's enough sugar-rush energy on display to ensure it's never dull." — Guardian [UK] Posted Sep 25, 2009 |
Rotten 1/5
| Rotten 0%
| Jack Said (2009) | "
There's not much to be said for this overcooked, overheated Brit gangster thriller... Barrelling uncertainly between mockney-hoodlum cliches and wannabe noir stylings, it's only enlivened by a brief cameo from Danny Dyer." — Guardian [UK] Posted Sep 25, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 83%
| Heart of Fire (2008) | "
The story, taken from a memoir by Senait Mehari, has come in for considerable criticism as to accuracy... but Falorni's film certainly feels utterly plausibile." — Guardian [UK] Posted Sep 25, 2009 |
Fresh
| Fresh 94%
| BirdWatchers (2009) | "
Bechis may not be the greatest cinematic stylist around, but his heartfelt purpose is there for all to see." — Guardian [UK] Posted Sep 18, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| N/A | Shank (2009) | "
A well-meaning but not always convincing attempt to hoodie-ise the gay coming-of-age drama." — Guardian [UK] Posted Sep 11, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 38%
| Passchendaele (2008) | "
Director-star Paul Gross may have noble intentions, but his film is plodding, to put it kindly: filled with over-scrubbed sets, glutinous tinkling music, and desperately pedestrian dialogue exchanges." — Guardian [UK] Posted Sep 4, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 96%
| Big River Man (2009) | "
A bizarre, occasionally troubling documentary." — Guardian [UK] Posted Sep 4, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| N/A | Shooting Robert King (2009) | "
An intriguing documentary." — Guardian [UK] Posted Aug 24, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 83%
| Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009) | "
David Yates knows how to play all the cards. Although a touch ungainly, his film is solidly constructed, with lots of fine effects." — Guardian [UK] Posted Jul 17, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Fresh 70%
| Summer Scars (2008) | "
Richards opts for grimy realism over stalk'n'slash, but he doesn't appear to possess the cinematic chops to make it work." — Guardian [UK] Posted Jun 5, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 25%
| Shadows in the Sun () | "
The film ends up verging on the inconsequential." — Guardian [UK] Posted Jun 5, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 32%
| Terminator Salvation (2009) | "
Terminator has been smothered in quasi-religious symbolism and primary-school philosophising." — Guardian [UK] Posted Jun 5, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 23%
| Jonas Brothers - The Concert Experience (2009) | "
This TV-special-sized feature comprises songs from the trio's recent Burning Up tour, along with gobbets of behind the scenes action." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 29, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 66%
| Fugitive Pieces (2008) | "
Anne Michael's complex, poetic novel is here adapted into a stolid, somewhat po-faced film, but one that still manages to tease some affecting drama out of its scholarly premise." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 29, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 25%
| Fireflies in the Garden () | "
A sickly sweet family drama stuffed with exceptionally high-profile performers - so much so that they threaten to overwhelm it just by their presence." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 29, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 68%
| Fermat's Room (2008) | "
It's all done with style, with very little of the strain you might expect from filming in such a restricted environment." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 29, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 92%
| Drag Me To Hell (2009) | "
Raimi is a master at maintaining a particular type of cinematic tone: scary without being unwatchable, and revolting without losing wit." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 29, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 76%
| Tormented (2009) | "
Despite its weaknesses, though, there's something appealing about Tormented. It may or may not portend a revival of popular British horror, but at least no one can mistake this for the grim compulsions of the torture-porn aficionado." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 22, 2009 |
Fresh
| N/A | Painters Painting - The New York Art Scene: 1940-70 (1972) | "
A studious film of the kind they don't make any more." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 22, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 73%
| Objectified (2009) | "
This is real hothouse stuff, and Hustwit does a nice job elucidating it." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 22, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 84%
| The Mark of an Angel (2008) | "
A moving, assured portrayal of a damaged woman in a film following in the coolly measured steps of I've Loved You So Long." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 22, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Fresh 87%
| Louise Bourgeois: The Spider, The Mistress and The Tangerine (2008) | "
Despite Bourgeois's on-camera effusiveness, this film suffers a little from curtailing much background information; but fans of Bourgeois as a personality will find a lot to like here." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 22, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 89%
| Everlasting Moments (2009) | "
Shot in atmospheric sepia tones, this is a modest film with gentle, pleasing sentiments at its heart." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 22, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 93%
| Slepe Lásky (2008) | "
Some surprising magic is worked by this careful Slovakian documentary." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 22, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Rotten 38%
| Awaydays (2009) | "
To these figures, Sampson applies an almost hysterical level of romanticisation, and it sort of works - especially when all the impossibly yearning post-punk music on the soundtrack really gets going." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 22, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 73%
| Alice Neel (2007) | "
There's much pungent detail on offer here, chronicling Neel's unorthodox lifestyle in Cuba and Spanish Harlem, and the struggles she had in an era when abstract painting was triumphant; all of which is given a little more edge than you might expect." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 22, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 44%
| Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian (2009) | "
This is a throwback to those disreputable 70s comedies that found a spot for every unemployed layabout in Hollywood." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 22, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Rotten 41%
| Fighting (2009) | "
You couldn't call Fighting great - at its core it is simply too cruddy - but Montiel has managed to inject it with the smell and feel of the streets that he clearly once knew well." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 15, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 56%
| French Film (2008) | "
The result, however, is uneven: lurching from little-Englander spoofery to heartfelt emotionalising and back again - often in the same scene." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 15, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 53%
| Viva (2008) | "
Where her film lets itself down, though, is it's simply not funny; you assume that a certain kind of hipster audience may be tickled by all this, but the laughs will be as forced as those that bray out of the screen at all too regular intervals." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 15, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 87%
| Sounds Like Teen Spirit () | "
An entertaining, if slight, documentary about the Junior Eurovision song contest, which has the same trappings of wholesome glitz and polite nationalism that distinguishes the grown-up version." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 8, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Rotten 36%
| X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009) | "
It's hard to see how anyone other than hardcore fans will find much to entertain them." — Guardian [UK] Posted May 1, 2009 |
Rotten 2/5
| Fresh 91%
| In Search Of Beethoven (2009) | "
At such length and in such detail, there are certainly dramas to describe and insights to be had, but a film this static and self-important doesn't really do them justice." — Guardian [UK] Posted Apr 17, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Rotten 32%
| Good (2008) | "
To its credit, Good is at least a piece with something serious to say, with little of the meretricious responsibility-deflecting that The Reader dealt in." — Guardian [UK] Posted Apr 17, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 86%
| Before I Forget (2008) | "
Before I Forget turns out to be pretty watchable, if sobering, with a fine eye for the absurdities its situations generate." — Guardian [UK] Posted Apr 17, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 61%
| Universe of Keith Haring (2008) | "
An entertaining and informative documentary." — Guardian [UK] Posted Feb 27, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 88%
| Timecrimes (2008) | "
An enterprising Spanish time-travel thriller, that's light on DeLoreans and lightning bolts, but heavy on fiendish cross-currents of temporal interaction." — Guardian [UK] Posted Feb 6, 2009 |
Rotten 1/5
| Rotten 26%
| Punisher: War Zone (2008) | "
You couldn't call it shoddy, exactly, and the actors take it painfully seriously; it's just dispiriting to see all this endeavour in the service of something so humourless and disgusting." — Guardian [UK] Posted Feb 6, 2009 |
Fresh 3/5
| Fresh 100%
| North Face (2008) | "
Stölzl films their harrowing ordeal out on the "Murderwall" with tremendous skill, but the rest of his movie is lumpen to say the least." — Guardian [UK] Posted Dec 12, 2008 |
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