Andrew L. Urban Movie Reviews & Previews

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Andrew L. Urban

Agrees with the Tomatometer 69% of the time.

Biography:: Andrew L. Urban is Publisher & Editor of Urban Cinefile, Australia's award winning online weekly movie magazine (est. 1997). Specialising in film journalism, Andrew was Australian bureau chief for London based film trade publications from 1985 to 1994. He was Channel Host for the World Movies subscription movie channel (2002-6), and with his publishing partner and wife Louise Keller, he co-produced and hosted Movies This Week, a short movie review program, broadcast on World Movies and the Ovation arts & entertainment channel (2004-5). Since July 2005, Andrew has presented Movies Now, a contemporary movie appreciation course at Sydney University's Centre for Continuing Education. In January 2007, Andrew was commissioned by the Australian Film Television and Radio School's Centre for Screen Business to produce an extensive series of in depth on camera interviews with film and TV industry practitioners, for the CSB website; the series continues into 2008. Prior to Urban Cinefile, Andrew created the prime time social documentary series, Front Up, which ran for 9 years on SBS TV.
Publications:: Urban Cinefile

Total Reviews:: 989

Location:: Sydney, Australia

Listing Of All Reviews & Articles

Showing 1 - 50 of 989

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T-Meter	Title \| Year	Add Date
88%	Star Trek Into Darkness (2013)	" Except for the occasional 3D indulgence of things flying at your face, making you wince and duck, Star Trek Into Darkness is, for me, a pleasant surprise; thrilling and engaging, sometimes harrowing and always cinematically satisfying" — Urban Cinefile Posted May 6, 2013
81%	The Place Beyond The Pines (2013)	" With the final act, as we see the longer term impact of earlier actions, the film attains something akin to epic status, stirring notions of classic Greek tragedy before scaling back and completing itself as a contemporary morality tale" — Urban Cinefile Posted May 4, 2013
60%	Drift (2013)	" If screen surf perving is your thing, you will revel in Drift. It's a sort of amalgam story of how surf gear culture and business began in the 70s in Australia, dotted with the struggles of two brothers" — Urban Cinefile Posted Apr 27, 2013
60%	Camille Redouble ()	" This playful, sometimes whimsical, always engaging take on a familiar storytelling theme - alternative futures - manages to make the fantasy meaningful" — Urban Cinefile Posted Apr 27, 2013
90%	The Hunt (2013)	" Nuanced but robust, the screenplay is a masterclass in exposition, drama, character portraiture - and cinema. It is also a vivid warning to society that yes, 'thought is a virus' that can maim and even kill" — Urban Cinefile Posted Apr 27, 2013
78%	Iron Man 3 (2013)	" The stunts are spectacular and the suits - whether flying or fighting - are terrific, while the humans add an edginess to the always fast-paced proceedings. The adults are, as you would expect, well oiled and seamless in their roles" — Urban Cinefile Posted Apr 23, 2013
67%	Haute Cuisine (2013)	" An engaging enough film, with a few special moments amidst the procedural aspects; serious cooking always fascinates us foodies, and Hortense has a few appetizing and unique dishes with which to tempt us" — Urban Cinefile Posted Apr 20, 2013
48%	Olympus Has Fallen (2013)	" If this film were a pizza, it would be with double cheese plus all the trimmings you can pile on, and the base would be thick and heavy" — Urban Cinefile Posted Apr 15, 2013
56%	Oblivion (2013)	" Writers who direct their own rather complex stories often are too familiar with the material to be able to really clarify it for the audience" — Urban Cinefile Posted Apr 10, 2013
92%	Jurassic Park: An IMAX 3D Experience (2013)	" The thrill of seeing live dinosaurs on screen is not as acute today as it was 20 years ago admittedly, but there is still some 3D awe left in the creations that roared 65 billion years ago..." — Urban Cinefile Posted Apr 6, 2013
80%	Warm Bodies (2013)	" Most disturbingly, defence against the dead people is guns; the fact that this is common silliness in zombie movies doesn't make it any better ... It reconfirms the gun-obsession that grips America; they even shoot dead people" — Urban Cinefile Posted Apr 6, 2013
78%	Thérèse Desqueyroux (2013)	" In many respects the film is a farewell to cinema from Claude Miller, suitably hushed in tone, aptly circling death and notably classical in its approach, from camera to mis en scene to performances" — Urban Cinefile Posted Apr 6, 2013
40%	Kon-Tiki (1950)	" Technically superb and made chronologically to capture the verity of men growing beards and scars and deep tans when spending over 100 days at sea" — Urban Cinefile Posted Apr 6, 2013
68%	Trance (2013)	" Creative filmmaking that elevates what could have been a pretentious thriller into an artistic, compelling and intriguing surprise" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 29, 2013
85%	Sleepwalk With Me (2012)	" Moments of comedy and drama are preserved, but even at 81 minutes the film seems a tad long" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 29, 2013
9%	The Host (2013)	" Hello there, all 15 and 16 year old girls, this one's for you, although you'll have to endure quite a bit of sci-fi hokum packed around the few delicious moments of two girls inside one body kissing two boys who have a crush with one or other of them" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 26, 2013
28%	G.I. Joe: Retaliation (2013)	" Channelling my inner 18 year old, the first word that hits my keyboard is - awesome! G.I. Joe is about big boys' toys and high calibre action. Tick and tick" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 24, 2013
82%	Rust and Bone (2012)	" This multi-layered film with its characters tossed like flotsam on fate's giant, unpredictable waves drenches us in the intimate details of characters" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 22, 2013
38%	Hyde Park on Hudson (2012)	" There is nothing stirring or sufficiently humorous to engage us; the fact that a serving US President is having secret affairs no longer shocks" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 22, 2013
69%	The Croods (2013)	" Kids will respond to the slapstick humour and the physicality of the action, and adults will find moments of insight and emotion" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 22, 2013
79%	Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai (2012)	" A cinematic work of art, presenting a world in which humanity is banished in favour of the rituals of an ever-warring people" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 15, 2013
98%	Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence In The House Of God (2012)	" With meticulous care and intricate detail, Silence In The House of God deconstructs the nature of the Catholic Church's systematic cover ups of pedophilia among their clergy, stretching back well into the past century" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 15, 2013
70%	The Loneliest Planet (2012)	" Although short stories usually make terrific source material for films, in this case the adaptation suggests that this is not one of those instances" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 15, 2013
15%	A Good Day To Die Hard (2013)	" It's a shame John McClane - one of cinema's iconic characters - has to go out with a whimper. His creators and handlers just didn't know how to close the book" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 15, 2013
96%	War Witch (2013)	" It is astonishing that film that contains such violence can have such a serene tone. The source of the serenity is the measured, calm narration by Komona (voice of Diane Umawahoro) that is the telling of her story to her unborn child" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 8, 2013
79%	A Late Quartet (2012)	" Cinema devoid of metaphor is usually rather dull, but Yaron Zilberman's excess of metaphor makes Performance less supple than it might have been" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 8, 2013
65%	Mama (2013)	" Haunting with its tragically melancholy story, Mama doesn't treat audiences as naïve fools. I am most impressed" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 8, 2013
75%	Goddess ()	" Three outstanding leads provide a deep talent pool for the film and they each deliver the film's best moments. " — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 8, 2013
93%	Barbara (2012)	" In short, the failures in storytelling detract from the film, despite its sensitivities, its subtleties and its final payoff of personal sacrifice. " — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 1, 2013
30%	Broken City (2013)	" Mark Wahlberg builds a credible and complex charaterisation as the flawed character whose route to redemption is paved with treachery. He's the best thing going for Broken City" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 1, 2013
60%	Oz the Great and Powerful (2013)	" The land of Oz is as fantastical, magical, colourful and enchantingly beautiful as CGI can make it" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 1, 2013
68%	Great Expectations (2013)	" Newell retains the core elements of the story and key characters as well as the authentic elements of the period, but still manages to make the film a fresh experience" — Urban Cinefile Posted Mar 1, 2013
85%	Side Effects (2013)	" Soderbergh is so adept at drawing us into his cinematic web we are not aware that we've been cocooned for later consumption " — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 25, 2013
38%	Save Your Legs ()	" It's a comedy that relies on its semi-serious premise, written by the actor Brendan Cowell who also stars, and it helps if you are a cricket tragic" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 22, 2013
63%	I Give It a Year (2013)	" Mazer's juvenile sense of humour simply isn't strong enough to give the film any balls" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 22, 2013
44%	The Paperboy (2012)	" A more catchy and meaningful title for The Paperboy might have been Swamp Fiction, a near-noir drama set in Lately and the nearby Florida swamps" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 22, 2013
45%	Beautiful Creatures (2013)	" With its Romeo and Juliet genesis, Beautiful Creatures promises a sweet new mortal & supernatural romance, but doesn't quite get there. Too much cheese in the recipe." — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 18, 2013
89%	Roman Polanski: A Film Memoir ()	" A fine example of how sympathetic interviewing techniques can result in a probing interview that carries insights and emotion" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 16, 2013
95%	The Imposter (2012)	" The Imposter has many lessons; for the rest of us, it reinforces the golden rule: never assume anything about anyone" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 16, 2013
93%	Amour (2012)	" My review is categorized as 'favourable' not because I enjoyed the film (that's not Michael Haneke's intent) but because I recognise what he is trying to say and that he says it with a unique cinematic voice" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 16, 2013
13%	Safe Haven (2013)	" Most of the film is also very nice as the slowly budding romance is observed to bloom with the tentative nature of a snail on dope. " — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 10, 2013
——	A Lonely Place for Dying (2012)	" Full of tense atmos and neatly balancing the thrilling hunt themes with some personal histories of two men pitted against each other, A Lonely Place for Dying is compelling and satisfying" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 8, 2013
47%	The Sweeney (2013)	" There's not much more we could ask for in a contempo police procedural - except maybe subtitles to overcome the heavy, dense cockney accents" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 8, 2013
64%	Anna Karenina (2012)	" Wright's edgy, bravura approach actually enhances the moral themes and the social context, illuminating the story in a fresh, contemporary light. This is cinema" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 8, 2013
95%	West of Memphis (2012)	" Together with the rich material comprising interviews with family and friends, the footage shot in the various court rooms and at the crime scene is riveting" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 8, 2013
89%	Lincoln (2012)	" A literally and metaphorically towering performance by Daniel Day Lewis as the 1.93cm Abraham Lincoln drives this historically riveting and personally impassioned ... riveting ... film" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 1, 2013
22%	Elles (2012)	" I can't tell what Elles has to say and I rather think the filmmakers don't either" — Urban Cinefile Posted Feb 1, 2013
92%	Silver Linings Playbook (2012)	" It starts to fray about halfway through as it shifts into a more conventional mode, taking on the usual trappings of the genre and making its way to a predictable resolution" — Urban Cinefile Posted Jan 26, 2013
88%	Django Unchained (2012)	" Exciting, entertaining, funny, dramatic and edgy, Django Unchained is also intelligent and sometimes touching, often bloody and yet - in the end - a romantic softie, too" — Urban Cinefile Posted Jan 18, 2013

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