Colin Covert Movie Reviews & Previews

Critics » Colin Covert

Colin Covert

Agrees with the Tomatometer 76% of the time.

Publications:: Chicago Tribune , Minneapolis Star Tribune

Total Reviews:: 1941

Listing Of All Reviews & Articles

Showing 51 - 100 of 1941

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Rating	T-Meter	Title \| Year	Add Date
2.5/4	82%	Like Someone in Love (2013)	" I came away from it as if I had spent an evening contemplating a handsome abstract canvas. I can't explain it to you, exactly, but I found it soothing." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Mar 14, 2013
3/4	93%	Lore (2013)	" It's a harrowing walk through the heart of darkness." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Mar 14, 2013
	67%	Stoker (2013)	" Refracted through Park's graceful filmmaking style, "Stoker" is mysterious, demanding, sometimes baffling and richly rewarding." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Mar 14, 2013
	37%	The Incredible Burt Wonderstone (2013)	" After 100 minutes of "Burt Wonderstone's" scant laughs and missed opportunities, you wish it would just vanish down a trapdoor." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Mar 14, 2013
	59%	Oz the Great and Powerful (2013)	" Relax, my pretties. "Oz the Great and Powerful" is a lollapalooza of funhouse thrills and visually sumptuous filmmaking." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Mar 7, 2013
3.5/4	92%	No (2013)	" It's a funny look at the way the media warp public opinion, and a curiously hopeful one." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Mar 7, 2013
2.5/4	60%	John Dies at the End (2013)	" How can a single movie contain all this awesome craziness?" — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Mar 7, 2013
2.5/4	63%	The Monk (2013)	" If only director Dominik Moll (who has clearly studied his Luis Buñuel) had not staged this bitter psychological horror story at half speed." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Mar 7, 2013
1.5/4	30%	Emperor (2013)	" "Emperor" starts slowly and peters out from there." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Mar 7, 2013
3.5/4	95%	West of Memphis (2012)	" A true-crime story that begins with a notorious murder case and grows into a chilling indictment of the American justice system." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Mar 7, 2013
3/4	27%	21 And Over (2013)	" Here is a youth comedy that is leering, offensive, politically incorrect, at times even disgusting, and yet not a bummer." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 28, 2013
3/4	89%	A Place at the Table (2013)	" A well-reported and devastating look at hunger in rural America." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 28, 2013
2/4	52%	Jack the Giant Slayer (2013)	" It feels like a film made by a committee, for a demographic rather than an audience. It's a tale full of sound and fury (and flying bodies) signifying nothing." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 28, 2013
	92%	The Gatekeepers (2013)	" "The Gatekeepers" is a triumph of storytelling, a revealing view into the intricate shadow worlds of international espionage." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 28, 2013
3/4	58%	Snitch (2013)	" In "Snitch," Dwayne Johnson delivers a strong, disciplined performance as an ordinary civilian trapped in a Kafkaesque corner of the legal system." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 21, 2013
2/4	88%	Yossi (2013)	" The film's pacing sputters as Fox drags Yossi through dreary scenes of self-denying repression." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 21, 2013
	87%	Happy People: A Year in the Taiga (2013)	" If you want a taste of life as it must have been for the Voyageurs of old, this documentary is a good place to start." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 15, 2013
3/4	91%	The Last Gladiators (2013)	" The opening sections of this film play like a greatest-hits clip collection, but when Gibney delves deeper into Nilan's personality, it's a magnetic portrait of a rinkside Raging Bull." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 15, 2013
3/4	46%	Beautiful Creatures (2013)	" While it's never quite as spellbinding as its witchcraft-themed story line promises, "Beautiful Creatures" is a welcome addition to the ranks of paranormal teen romance." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 13, 2013
1.5/4	13%	Safe Haven (2013)	" The Nicholas Sparks universe finally gets the crime thriller it deserves, an erratic amalgam of mush and mystery, with an 11th-hour dose of supernatural visitation." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 13, 2013
1.5/4	15%	A Good Day To Die Hard (2013)	" If Harvard Business School wants to do a case study on how to debase a once-respected brand, they needn't look any further than the Die Hard movies." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 13, 2013
0/4	20%	Identity Thief (2013)	" At best it's perversely interesting as a major misstep for both stars." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 7, 2013
4/4	89%	Consuming Spirits (2012)	" "Consuming Spirits" puts a hook in you and doesn't let you off. A hook the size of a crowbar." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 7, 2013
3.5/4	98%	56 Up (2013)	" Watching "56 Up" gives you the wonderful feeling of seeing a sociological experiment blossom into something novelistically rich and humane." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 7, 2013
4/4	85%	Side Effects (2013)	" The film keeps viewers emotionally invested yet intellectually off-balance, suffusing even the most ostensibly straightforward scenes with a sense of free-floating anxiety." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 7, 2013
1/4	47%	Bullet to the Head (2013)	" The Geritol action genre lumbers on in the lackluster "Bullet to the Head," starring Sylvester Stallone, or at least a beef jerky replica." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Feb 1, 2013
2.5/4	37%	Stand Up Guys (2013)	" I can't argue that performers the stature of Pacino, Walken and Arkin don't deserve better material, yet it's so nice to have them onscreen together I'm in no mood to quibble." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 31, 2013
2/4	80%	Warm Bodies (2013)	" "Warm Bodies" is surely the zombie love story of the season." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 31, 2013
3.5/4	98%	Beware Of Mr. Baker (2012)	" "Beware of Mr. Baker" argues that when an artist consistently delivers amazement, broken beaks and busted relationships are a fair price to pay." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 24, 2013
3/4	80%	Only The Young (2012)	" If you think one summer in the lives of three skate punks in a sunny Southern California Podunk wouldn't make a fresh, engaging documentary, "Only the Young" is here to prove you wrong." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 24, 2013
4/4	93%	Amour (2012)	" Each actor draws on a lifetime's worth of experience, performing with grace and rare, uncompromising realism." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 17, 2013
2/4	30%	Broken City (2013)	" "Broken City" is a fractured movie." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 17, 2013
2.5/4	88%	Tchoupitoulas (2012)	" The city's seedy charm has not often been captured so atmospherically." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 17, 2013
3/4	71%	The Seventh Continent (Der Siebente Kontinent) (1989)	" A Kafkaesque nightmare scenario of dread and ambiguity rooted in the aimlessness of contemporary life." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 17, 2013
3/4	59%	The Last Stand (2013)	" An unpretentious, invigorating action flick that's extra-enjoyable whenever Arnold Schwarzenegger is on the screen demonstrating his flair for self-parody." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 17, 2013
1.5/4	32%	Gangster Squad (2013)	" Despite a cast of gifted actors, lush 1940s production design and suave costumes, it's bereft of inspiration, plowing familiar terrain past the point of tedium to impatience." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 11, 2013
4/4	93%	Zero Dark Thirty (2013)	" A timely and important reminder of the agonizing human price of zealotry." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 10, 2013
4/4	92%	Silver Linings Playbook (2012)	" Silver Linings Playbook tells us that happily-ever-after may depend on finding people who coexist with our lunacy, not ones who can lead us out of it. In any case, it's crazy good." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 4, 2013
4/4	81%	The Impossible (2012)	" Bayona uses pummeling subjective camera work and sound design to plunge viewers into the visceral terror of a universe gone mad." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Jan 3, 2013
4/4	69%	Les Misérables (2012)	" The piercing sincerity of this stupendous, heart-wrenching epic would move even the most jaded cynic. See it and weep." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Dec 24, 2012
3.5/4	88%	Django Unchained (2012)	" [Tarantino] knows how to use our movie-conditioned anticipation against us. Watching his movie is like playing chess with a wiseguy friend who's always four moves ahead." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Dec 24, 2012
3/4	82%	De rouille et d'os (Rust and Bone) (2012)	" An effective and moving drama about the strength of the human spirit and the will to survive." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Dec 20, 2012
3/4	52%	This is 40 (2012)	" "This Is 40" is a bull's-eye zeitgeist comedy, a movie in which everyone acts like real people but funnier." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Dec 20, 2012
3.5/4	96%	Monsters, Inc. 3D (2012)	" Its reassuring message is more relevant than ever." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Dec 18, 2012
3/4	38%	Hyde Park on Hudson (2012)	" Casting Murray as FDR may feel like a gamble or a stunt at first, but after a few minutes the rightness of the choice is inarguable." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Dec 13, 2012
1.5/4	65%	The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012)	" "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" is not the worst film of the year, but it may be the most disappointing." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Dec 13, 2012
2/4	4%	Playing for Keeps (2012)	" "Playing for Keeps" is a perfectly pleasant romantic comedy completely lacking in novelty. This will leave many viewers unengaged, but may not be a disadvantage for its core audience." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Dec 6, 2012
4/4	96%	Chasing Ice (2012)	" "Chasing Ice" is a grand adventure, a visual amazement and a powerful warning." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Dec 6, 2012
3/4	67%	Barrymore (2012)	" Mr. Plummer stumbles beautifully, poignantly and often, leering and searching through a haze of memory or, with concern edged with panic, calling for 'a line, a line' much as Richard III calls for a horse." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Dec 6, 2012
3/4	68%	Wuthering Heights (2012)	" Arnold drastically pares back dialogue and exposition, telling the classic tale of passion and revenge with probing, harshly sensual camera work and a minimum of sentimentality." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Dec 6, 2012
4/4	95%	Sister (2012)	" French-born director and co-screenwriter Ursula Meier balances the scenario's bleak, wrenching aspects with a stirring confidence in the redemptive power of love." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 29, 2012
2/4	63%	Hitchcock (2012)	" They could have subtitled it "Dial M for Muddle."" — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 29, 2012
4/4	88%	Life of Pi (2012)	" Ang Lee's thrillingly audacious film transforms this inconceivable premise into visual poetry, high adventure and sheer enchantment." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 20, 2012
3/4	87%	Somewhere Between (2012)	" Documentarian Linda Goldstein Knowlton follows four teenage adoptees as they sort through the sensitive cultural and personal issues that arise from their dual identities." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 15, 2012
2.5/4	79%	The Other Son (2012)	" A humane but emotionally anemic message movie whose dramatic craft doesn't live up to its good intentions." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 15, 2012
3/4	89%	A Royal Affair (2012)	" The film moves along crisply, looks great and stimulates the brain (I am a sucker for torrid romances propelled by quotes from Rousseau and Voltaire.)" — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 15, 2012
4/4	89%	Lincoln (2012)	" Day-Lewis' voice is thin and reedy, which jibes with historical accounts but subverts our expectations. His attitude makes listeners lean in, and so do we, magnetized by his kindly reserve." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 15, 2012
2/4	48%	The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2 (2012)	" "Breaking Dawn, Part 2" doesn't end the series on an especially strong note, but it ends it. Let's count our blessings." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 15, 2012
3/4	79%	A Late Quartet (2012)	" An auspicious feature debut for a director whose sensitivity to emotional harmonies is as rewarding as his reverence for timeless, transcendent music." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 8, 2012
1/4	68%	This Must Be The Place (2012)	" With its overbearing eccentricity, rib-nudging irony and confusion of tones, everything in the film is either underdeveloped or overstated." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 8, 2012
3/4	95%	Side by Side (2012)	" A trim, informative 99-minute primer on celluloid film, which to many viewers has a warmth and feel as soothing as buttered popcorn, and the brave new world of digital cinema." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 8, 2012
3/4	81%	Escape Fire: The Fight to Rescue American Healthcare (2012)	" This swiftly paced documentary assembles expert talking heads and real-world patients and practitioners to discuss defusing the ticking time bomb of American health care costs." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 8, 2012
4/4	100%	The Misfits (1961)	" Gable is a tender, stoic hand at the end of the line, and Montgomery Clift, Eli Wallach and Thelma Ritter add pungent support." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 8, 2012
4/4	92%	Skyfall (2012)	" Some of it is terrific. And some of it is spectacular." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 7, 2012
3.5/4	94%	The Sessions (2012)	" This is a crowd-pleaser of the finest sort." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 1, 2012
4/4	78%	Flight (2012)	" The film tackles serious issues of addiction, legal intrigue and personal responsibility, with Denzel Washington in top form as a heroic yet morally compromised protagonist." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 1, 2012
3.5/4	86%	Wreck-it Ralph (2012)	" Think "Tron" with belly laughs. Or "Night at the Museum" with any laughs." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 1, 2012
1/4	70%	The Loneliest Planet (2012)	" Why expend more energy on the film than its makers did?" — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 1, 2012
	98%	Brooklyn Castle (2012)	" Castle is suspenseful, funny and, particularly in its depiction of the challenging home lives of some of the kids, moving." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Nov 1, 2012
3/4	88%	The Other Dream Team (2012)	" Here's a twist on the plucky underdog sports movie. The Other Dream Team adds rock 'n' roll and eastern European history to the rah-rah mix." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 26, 2012
3/4	90%	Keep the Lights On (2012)	" The cast, uniformly excellent, draws us into a vibrant, energetic Manhattan where commitments are forged and broken through sheer chance and those seeking permanence must continually resist temptation and ennui." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 25, 2012
3/4	53%	Simon and the Oaks (2012)	" [A] lush, handsomely crafted middlebrow epic ..." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 25, 2012
2/4	33%	Chasing Mavericks (2012)	" Nothing special; decent enough considering the circumstances." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 25, 2012
3.5/4	84%	Smashed (2012)	" It conveys a rare depth of understanding and compassion for its protagonist." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 25, 2012
1.5/4	67%	Cloud Atlas (2012)	" Three directors, plus six story lines, times five centuries equals one grandly conceived, impressively mounted megaflop." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 25, 2012
0.5/4	12%	Alex Cross (2012)	" From its cliché opening -- an irrelevant gun battle and chase -- to its derivative climax, this is a film with decades of dust on it." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 18, 2012
3/4	68%	Step Up To The Plate (2012)	" Foodies will drink in the beauty of the meal preparation and the stunning architecture of the modernist restaurant." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 13, 2012
2/4	39%	Here Comes the Boom (2012)	" Weak humor and vanilla plotting have replaced legitimate drama, pathos, and character development." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 13, 2012
4/4	82%	Seven Psychopaths (2012)	" A movie that leaves you stumbling out of the theater in a state of giddy, elated vertigo." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 11, 2012
0.5/4	44%	The Paperboy (2012)	" "The Paperboy" suggests something Tennessee Williams might have come up with, if he didn't know how to string together a plot." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 11, 2012
3.5/4	96%	Argo (2012)	" An impressive mix of serious suspense filmmaking and ironic, mood-lightening humor. And it has the added distinction of being mostly true, based on a declassified CIA operation." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 11, 2012
4/4	87%	Frankenweenie (2012)	" The story brims with self-parody, social satire, horror, nostalgia, wit and emotional insight, with Burton keeping all the plates spinning." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 4, 2012
1.5/4	54%	V/H/S (2012)	" This anthology of "found footage" horror featurettes is predictably hit-and-miss." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 4, 2012
3/4	32%	The Oranges (2012)	" When it's funny, it's laugh-out-loud funny, yet when the situation calls for groans of vicarious embarrassment, it provides them in spades." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 4, 2012
0.5/4	35%	Butter (2012)	" This film is dumb, blunt-instrument parody." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 4, 2012
1/4	21%	Taken 2 (2012)	" Why an actor of Neeson's ability would play this character once, let alone twice, is a mystery for the ages." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Oct 4, 2012
1.5/4	32%	Won't Back Down (2012)	" "Won't Back Down" is to school reform what "Reefer Madness" is to drug policy." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 27, 2012
3.5/4	85%	The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012)	" Stephen Chbosky's script is insightful about the exhilaration of soul-piercing first love, and the misery of being swept into a relationship with someone who's forceful, determined and utterly wrong for you." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 27, 2012
	89%	El Velador (2012)	" An eerie look at the human cost of Mexico's drug wars. Filmmaker Natalia Almada turns her lens on a narco-cemetery in Culiacan, the capital of crime-ridden Sinaloa." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 27, 2012
3.5/4	93%	Looper (2012)	" Johnson wears his new maturity with confidence, delivering a tense, twisty story with an unexpected emotional wallop." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 27, 2012
3/4	93%	Wild Horse, Wild Ride (2012)	" You can't help feel you're watching a special kind of love story." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 20, 2012
1.5/4	67%	Hellbound? (2012)	" First, one man's dogma is another's heresy. Second, some people are inclined to offer the final word on matters of which they have no firsthand knowledge." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 20, 2012
2.5/4	42%	Little White Lies (2012)	" The script is banal, but the acting company and the locations are easy on the eyes." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 20, 2012
3/4	85%	End of Watch (2012)	" Ayer brings a rough, aggressive energy to the picture, staying within the broad outlines of the buddy-cop formula but investing the characters with no-bull authenticity." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 20, 2012
3.5/4	51%	Trouble with the Curve (2012)	" "Trouble With the Curve" is an absolute home run, the total package of charming romantic comedy, poignant family drama and superb acting." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 20, 2012
3.5/4	86%	The Master (2012)	" Anderson's audacious films defy facile interpretation. Having seen it just once, I'm not sure I grasp it." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 20, 2012
3/4	85%	Sleepwalk With Me (2012)	" Birbiglia's pleasingly nasal delivery and agreeable presence holds it together." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 13, 2012
1/4	25%	Why Stop Now (2012)	" First-time directors Phil Dorling and Ron Nyswaner can't find a coherent emotional tone, and the actors' energetic contortions can't keep the sinking story afloat." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 6, 2012
1/4	56%	For a Good Time, Call... (2012)	" The film is a wobbly attempt to follow in the stilettos of "Bridesmaids," but its tissue-sharp punch lines and undernourished characters fall woefully short." — Minneapolis Star Tribune Posted Sep 6, 2012

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