|
|
68%
|
Wuthering Heights (2012) |
"
If you can slow down your movie metabolism enough to acclimate to its world, Arnold's naturalistic retelling grasps an elemental truth about the novel."
—
Slate
Posted Oct 5, 2012
|
|
|
79%
|
The Deep Blue Sea (2012) |
"
[Weisz'] performance that transforms her from actress to movie star."
—
Slate
Posted Oct 1, 2012
|
|
|
93%
|
Looper (2012) |
"
Looper felt to me like a maddening near-miss ..."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 28, 2012
|
|
|
94%
|
Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel (2012) |
"
The movie is saved from feeling like a promotional puff piece by the legitimate fabulousness of Vreeland herself ..."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 22, 2012
|
|
|
86%
|
The Master (2012) |
"
I left the theater not entirely sure what The Master was about. I can't wait to get back and see it again."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 15, 2012
|
|
|
55%
|
Bachelorette (2012) |
"
A nasty little piece of work -- a phrase I use not with contempt but with grudging admiration."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 14, 2012
|
|
|
73%
|
Hello I Must Be Going (2012) |
"
I hope Hello, I Must Be Going will introduce many new viewers to Lynskey's charms, and that at least of a few of them will be casting directors."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 7, 2012
|
|
|
22%
|
The Words (2012) |
"
It would have been more fun if I'd brought something to throw at the screen."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 6, 2012
|
|
|
56%
|
For a Good Time, Call... (2012) |
"
It's the movie's affectionate portrait of female friendship, along with Miller and Graynor's loose, playful performances, that make this whole imperfect soufflé rise as high as it does."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 1, 2012
|
|
|
67%
|
Lawless (2012) |
"
There's something at the movie's heart that remains flimsy and inauthentic, a kid in his older brother's ill-fitting shoes."
—
Slate
Posted Aug 30, 2012
|
|
|
87%
|
Robot & Frank (2012) |
"
A rueful and funny reflection on aging, death, parenthood, and technology."
—
Slate
Posted Aug 17, 2012
|
|
|
89%
|
Compliance (2012) |
"
It's a deeply moral movie about the failure of morality, as grueling to watch as it is necessary."
—
Slate
Posted Aug 17, 2012
|
|
|
64%
|
Cosmopolis (2012) |
"
I took a strange pleasure in submitting to this movie's stilted but weirdly poetic rhythms. But I freely acknowledge that for others, enduring Cosmopolis may be less fun than a backseat prostate exam."
—
Slate
Posted Aug 16, 2012
|
|
|
58%
|
Red Hook Summer (2012) |
"
A movie that's alive and spontaneous and surprising is a rare enough thing to encounter-especially one that manages to address subjects as divisive and painful as inner-city black poverty without getting maudlin or preachy."
—
Slate
Posted Aug 10, 2012
|
|
|
56%
|
The Bourne Legacy (2012) |
"
The movie's last hour or so squanders these rich narrative possibilities in an incoherently plotted, generically action-packed anticlimax."
—
Slate
Posted Aug 10, 2012
|
|
|
31%
|
Total Recall (2012) |
"
This is a taut, serviceable sci-fi thriller with a couple of neat visual ideas, and if you're not familiar with either the Schwarzenegger version or the original story, the brain-bending twists alone will take you a reasonably long way."
—
Slate
Posted Aug 3, 2012
|
|
|
77%
|
Killer Joe (2012) |
"
Plot twists that might have played as clever onstage feel false on screen, and while the individual actors are all gifted (if in some cases miscast), they never really come together as an ensemble."
—
Slate
Posted Jul 27, 2012
|
|
|
79%
|
Ruby Sparks (2012) |
"
You find yourself wanting to go through Kazan's script with a red pen and indicate all the places where she could have let herself get darker, weirder, and braver."
—
Slate
Posted Jul 26, 2012
|
|
|
87%
|
The Dark Knight Rises (2012) |
"
At over two hours and forty minutes long, with repeated scenes of bone-crunching violence and a maddeningly unrelenting percussive score by Hans Zimmer, The Dark Knight Rises is something of an ordeal to sit through."
—
Slate
Posted Jul 18, 2012
|
|
|
86%
|
Easy Money (2012) |
"
Easy Money's big heist scene is the only action set piece so far this year that was so suspenseful I could feel my heartbeat in my ears."
—
Slate
Posted Jul 13, 2012
|
|
|
77%
|
Katy Perry: Part of Me (2012) |
"
We're left with zero sense of what she's really like as a granddaughter, sister, boss, or friend."
—
Slate
Posted Jul 6, 2012
|
|
|
73%
|
The Amazing Spider-Man (2012) |
"
This might be a fun summer blockbuster if only it even remotely needed to exist."
—
Slate
Posted Jul 3, 2012
|
|
|
78%
|
Take This Waltz (2012) |
"
This romantic drama, starring the always-extraordinary Michelle Williams as a restless married woman contemplating an affair with her neighbor, is chock-full of individual moments of great power and beauty, including visual beauty."
—
Slate
Posted Jul 2, 2012
|
|
|
80%
|
Magic Mike (2012) |
"
Half wish-fulfillment fantasy, half after-school special, Magic Mike is in many ways an unserious movie -- but like many of Soderbergh's slicker entertainments, it's not without its moments of substance."
—
Slate
Posted Jun 28, 2012
|
|
|
86%
|
Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012) |
"
Zeitlin's adoring gaze on the Bathtubbers' chaotic-yet-joyous way of life smacks of anthropological voyeurism: Rousseau's "noble savage" nonsense all over again, but with crawdads and zydeco."
—
Slate
Posted Jun 28, 2012
|
|
|
43%
|
To Rome with Love (2012) |
"
At times this multiple-plot meander through the glorious labyrinth of the Eternal City can feel aimless, even lazy. But in the film's best moments, that willingness to wander works to its advantage."
—
Slate
Posted Jun 24, 2012
|
|
|
78%
|
Brave (2012) |
"
I really hope that people will give this imaginative little fairy tale a chance, and I can't wait to show it to my 6-year-old daughter."
—
Slate
Posted Jun 21, 2012
|
|
|
83%
|
Your Sister's Sister (2012) |
"
A keenly observed romance whose apparent rough-edged naturalism masks a considerable degree of craft."
—
Slate
Posted Jun 17, 2012
|
|
|
41%
|
Rock of Ages (2012) |
"
Once you accept the utter and profound inconsequentiality of Rock of Ages, there's much to enjoy in it..."
—
Slate
Posted Jun 14, 2012
|
|
|
91%
|
Safety Not Guaranteed (2012) |
"
A slight, wistful comedy that, at least up to the ambitious but unsatisfying final scenes, combines sci-fi and rom-com to pleasing effect."
—
Slate
Posted Jun 8, 2012
|
|
|
74%
|
Prometheus (2012) |
"
Prometheus is more interested in piling on big questions than in answering them. It's deep without being particularly smart, although the dazzling design and special effects keep you from noticing that basic flaw until at least an hour in."
—
Slate
Posted Jun 7, 2012
|
|
|
81%
|
A Cat in Paris (2012) |
"
ections of A Cat in Paris feel draggy even at the abbreviated running time of 65 minutes. But in the best parts, the crisscrossing plot strands all pause for a moment, and we just get to watch and listen to what's going on in this stylishly imagined world."
—
Slate
Posted Jun 1, 2012
|
|
|
48%
|
Snow White and the Huntsman (2012) |
"
This over-crammed, disjointed, and lugubrious film is misconceived from the ground up."
—
Slate
Posted May 31, 2012
|
|
|
20%
|
Chernobyl Diaries (2012) |
"
You might actively root for their collective demise, if you could rouse yourself to care one way or the other. Go gallivanting in Chernobyl and you get what you pay for, nimrods."
—
Slate
Posted May 25, 2012
|
|
|
94%
|
Moonrise Kingdom (2012) |
"
A gorgeously shot, ingeniously crafted, über-Andersonian bonbon that, even in its most irritatingly whimsical moments, remains an effective deliverer of cinematic pleasure."
—
Slate
Posted May 24, 2012
|
|
|
34%
|
Battleship (2012) |
"
This is the kind of summer movie that softens your brain tissue without even providing the endocrine burst of pleasure that would make it all worthwhile."
—
Slate
Posted May 17, 2012
|
|
|
58%
|
The Dictator (2012) |
"
Most of The Dictator had me neither laughing nor shocked, but just staring at the screen in anxious is-that-all-there-is? silence."
—
Slate
Posted May 16, 2012
|
|
|
38%
|
Dark Shadows (2012) |
"
[Burton] and Depp, both avowed childhood fans of the original series, seem to be in their element and having a grand old time."
—
Slate
Posted May 10, 2012
|
|
|
94%
|
First Position (2012) |
"
First Position is an unabashedly inspirational portrait of what even very young people can accomplish with discipline and dedication."
—
Slate
Posted May 4, 2012
|
|
|
93%
|
Marvel's The Avengers (2012) |
"
Its primary purpose is not to explore or subvert the superhero movie, but to lay the groundwork for more of them."
—
Slate
Posted May 3, 2012
|
|
|
90%
|
Bernie (2012) |
"
Much more than a macabre true-crime tale: It's a story of thwarted love, not between two people, but between a man and a whole town."
—
Slate
Posted Apr 27, 2012
|
|
|
64%
|
The Five-Year Engagement (2012) |
"
It's too bad The Five-Year Engagement's overlong, conventional last third squanders the goodwill built up in that sharply observed middle section."
—
Slate
Posted Apr 26, 2012
|
|
|
95%
|
Marley (2012) |
"
Chronologically organized and voiceover-free, the movie is a 145-minute patchwork of old concert footage and talking-head interviews -- lots and lots of them -- from people who knew, loved, and worked with the reggae giant."
—
Slate
Posted Apr 19, 2012
|
|
|
97%
|
Monsieur Lazhar (2012) |
"
Fellag, an Algerian comedian and humor writer, anchors the film as the ineffable Bachir, a man who's so private that even the third-act revelation of his back story doesn't fully explain his motivations to us (nor would we want it to)."
—
Slate
Posted Apr 13, 2012
|
|
|
92%
|
The Cabin in the Woods (2012) |
"
I thoroughly enjoyed this movie's gory silliness, but I have the feeling it may be overpraised for infusing a modicum of wit into a genre that usually demonstrates so little."
—
Slate
Posted Apr 12, 2012
|
|
|
75%
|
Damsels in Distress (2012) |
"
Too ethereal to be a satire and too arch to be a psychologically recognizable character portrait, Damsels in Distress flits prettily by without ever finding anything to be about."
—
Slate
Posted Apr 6, 2012
|
|
|
88%
|
Titanic (2012) |
"
Cameron's three-hour disaster epic is a triumph of popular art -- of folk art, really."
—
Slate
Posted Apr 6, 2012
|
|
|
85%
|
The Hunger Games (2012) |
"
Director Gary Ross' adaptation, co-scripted by Collins herself, isn't quite as crackingly paced as the novel, but it will more than satisfy existing fans of the trilogy and likely create many new ones."
—
Slate
Posted Mar 22, 2012
|
|
|
44%
|
Casa de mi padre (2012) |
"
I regard Casa de Mi Padre as an interesting but failed experiment."
—
Slate
Posted Mar 16, 2012
|
|
|
85%
|
21 Jump Street (2012) |
"
21 Jump Street makes a virtue of low expectations, like an underachieving high school burnout coasting on his modest reserves of charm."
—
Slate
Posted Mar 15, 2012
|
|
|
67%
|
Friends With Kids (2012) |
"
Pleasant but overfamiliar."
—
Slate
Posted Mar 9, 2012
|
|
|
51%
|
John Carter (2012) |
"
This middle section, in which both Carter and the audience get a crash course in the politics, history, and theology of the Red Planet, is the movie at its most imaginative and most fun."
—
Slate
Posted Mar 8, 2012
|
|
|
99%
|
This Is Not a Film (2012) |
"
The triumph of This Is Not a Film is not only an artistic one -- the very existence of this movie is a gift. No wonder it came to us in a cake."
—
Slate
Posted Mar 2, 2012
|
|
|
59%
|
Wanderlust (2012) |
"
[The] shaggy but agreeable Wanderlust [is] worth the detour."
—
Slate
Posted Feb 26, 2012
|
|
|
87%
|
Bullhead (2012) |
"
I hope we'll be getting another chance to watch Matthias Schoenaerts' work in the near future -- as huge as he is in this role, I suspect there's plenty more to see."
—
Slate
Posted Feb 17, 2012
|
|
|
96%
|
Undefeated (2012) |
"
The ultimate praise given to sports movies is always, "Even if you don't care about sport X, you'll care about these characters," and that's certainly true of Undefeated (I don't, and I did)."
—
Slate
Posted Feb 16, 2012
|
|
|
82%
|
Return (2012) |
"
Finally someone has written a really good role for Linda Cardellini -- a big, prickly, demanding role that puts her onscreen in literally every scene -- and it's a thrill to watch her operating at full throttle."
—
Slate
Posted Feb 10, 2012
|
|
|
65%
|
The Woman in Black (2012) |
"
All I know is, when I had to walk down a dark hallway at home the night I came back from seeing it? Reader, I ran."
—
Slate
Posted Feb 2, 2012
|
|
|
56%
|
Albert Nobbs (2012) |
"
A movie that, like its title character, never quite dares to let itself discover what it really wants to be."
—
Slate
Posted Jan 30, 2012
|
|
|
79%
|
The Grey (2012) |
"
For all its macho standoffs and action set pieces and menacing off-screen howling, The Grey is at heart a simple moral fable about how true heroism consists in helping other human beings to live as long and die as well as they can."
—
Slate
Posted Jan 26, 2012
|
|
|
94%
|
Coriolanus (2011) |
"
The questions Coriolanus poses are so timeless and urgent they could be pullquotes from today's op-ed page."
—
Slate
Posted Jan 20, 2012
|
|
|
80%
|
Haywire (2012) |
"
Though Carano isn't without a certain glowering charisma, her flat line readings and apparent discomfort with dialogue-heavy exchanges make her seem like a refugee from a different, schlockier movie..."
—
Slate
Posted Jan 20, 2012
|
|
|
51%
|
Contraband (2012) |
"
If you enjoy watching Mark Wahlberg do that action-movie thing he does, you could do worse than to spend your next plane ride watching Contraband."
—
Slate
Posted Jan 12, 2012
|
|
|
52%
|
The Iron Lady (2012) |
"
If it weren't for Streep, The Iron Lady would be unwatchable."
—
Slate
Posted Dec 31, 2011
|
|
|
99%
|
A Separation (2011) |
"
Asghar Farhadi's A Separation serves as a quiet reminder of how good it's possible for movies to be."
—
Slate
Posted Dec 31, 2011
|
|
|
77%
|
War Horse (2011) |
"
Tthe images have what I can only describe as a wonderful texture. They also have intense color: deep gemlike greens and reds, with black shadows out of an old master painting."
—
Slate
Posted Dec 31, 2011
|
|
|
75%
|
The Adventures of Tintin (2011) |
"
Even if this hyperactive movie isn't your cup of tea, there's much to admire on-screen, including Spielberg's astonishing attention to visual detail and John Williams' jaunty score."
—
Slate
Posted Dec 21, 2011
|
|
|
86%
|
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011) |
"
Even Fincher's elegantly gruesome style can't turn this Swedish noir into the meditation on evil and corruption that it fancies itself to be."
—
Slate
Posted Dec 20, 2011
|
|
|
72%
|
Carnage (2011) |
"
Even as you admire the film's construction, it's hard to shake the thought that a lot of talent got thrown away on the wrong project."
—
Slate
Posted Dec 16, 2011
|
|
|
76%
|
We Need to Talk About Kevin (2012) |
"
Even in the film's weaker stretches, the fierce presence of Tilda Swinton made it impossible to tear my eyes away."
—
Slate
Posted Dec 9, 2011
|
|
|
83%
|
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) |
"
Even Alberto Iglesias' old-school symphonic score and Hoyte Van Hoytema's chiaroscuro cinematography aren't quite enough to provide cover for Tinker Tailor's rushed incoherence."
—
Slate
Posted Dec 8, 2011
|
|
|
80%
|
Shame (2011) |
"
This sleek-looking but curiously unfocused character study never quite gets down to the business of showing us who Brandon is, but boy, does Fassbender make him into a captivating enigma."
—
Slate
Posted Dec 1, 2011
|
|
|
98%
|
The Artist (2011) |
"
This slight but enormously likable picture seems destined to be an awards magnet: A holiday release with enough formal sophistication to appeal to cinephiles and enough old-fashioned showbiz bravado to win over a general audience."
—
Slate
Posted Dec 1, 2011
|
|
|
78%
|
A Dangerous Method (2011) |
"
It's a fiercely thoughtful film, a movie of ideas that understands how powerful ideas can be."
—
Slate
Posted Nov 25, 2011
|
|
|
96%
|
The Muppets (2011) |
"
Like Statler and Waldorf, older viewers may kvetch and cavil about the details, but when that red velvet curtain goes up, we wouldn't give up our balcony seats for the world."
—
Slate
Posted Nov 23, 2011
|
|
|
24%
|
Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1 (2011) |
"
By any normal standard, this is a terrible movie, with stilted dialogue and leaden pacing -- every 15 minutes or so, the action stops for a musical montage involving slow-motion handsomeness. But the Twilight saga stopped being normal a long time ago."
—
Slate
Posted Nov 18, 2011
|
|
|
89%
|
The Descendants (2011) |
"
It's such a disappointment that The Descendants -- Alexander Payne's first film after a seven-year hiatus following Sideways -- isn't a better movie than it is."
—
Slate
Posted Nov 17, 2011
|
|
|
77%
|
Melancholia (2011) |
"
There's something about the solemn, gloomy, often overwhelmingly powerful experience of watching Melancholia. I'll give it this much: This is a hard movie to forget."
—
Slate
Posted Nov 11, 2011
|
|
|
44%
|
J. Edgar (2011) |
"
Whether unintentionally or by design, the movie never really makes a case either for or against the troubled figure at its center."
—
Slate
Posted Nov 9, 2011
|
|
|
69%
|
A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas (2011) |
"
This third movie, a proudly unambitious buddy comedy, brings the franchise back to home turf, both geographically and thematically."
—
Slate
Posted Nov 4, 2011
|
|
|
69%
|
Tower Heist (2011) |
"
The most that can be said for Tower Heist, the new action comedy from Brett Ratner, is that it's a middlingly well-done evocation of the big-budget caper you remember with vague fondness from long-ago matinees at the mall."
—
Slate
Posted Nov 3, 2011
|
|
|
36%
|
In Time (2011) |
"
A movie so consistently flat-footed, with pauses between lines of dialogue so vast, that you begin to wonder if the whole thing might be a psychological experiment of some kind."
—
Slate
Posted Oct 28, 2011
|
|
|
47%
|
Anonymous (2011) |
"
What's disappointing about Anonymous is that it isn't dumb enough. Rather than plunging merrily ahead with its fanciful counternarrative, the movie keeps stopping to actually, seriously make its case -- to posit and explain and persuade."
—
Slate
Posted Oct 28, 2011
|
|
|
88%
|
Margin Call (2011) |
"
This may be the first post-2008 feature film to dramatize the crisis itself, rather than using it as a backdrop for an outraged harangue against the banks."
—
Slate
Posted Oct 21, 2011
|
|
—
|
——
|
Am Ende kommen Touristen (2007) |
—
Slate
Posted Oct 21, 2011
|
|
|
90%
|
Martha Marcy May Marlene (2011) |
"
It's one thing for a work of art to ambiguously reveal depths of emotion and meaning; it's something else again to dangle the promise of meaning that never arrives."
—
Slate
Posted Oct 20, 2011
|
|
|
81%
|
The Skin I Live In (2011) |
"
Though the story boils over with extreme acts of passion and vengeance, Almodóvar's examination of these two damaged people's troubled coexistence remains a cold (if impressively executed) formalist exercise."
—
Slate
Posted Oct 14, 2011
|
|
|
95%
|
Weekend (2011) |
"
If you've ever met someone who changed your life in the space of days, you'll relate to something in this movie."
—
Slate
Posted Oct 7, 2011
|
|
|
85%
|
The Ides of March (2011) |
"
Beware The Ides of March. This slick political thriller, the fourth directorial effort of the velvet-voiced heartthrob and aspiring auteur George Clooney, adds up to less than it appears to be at first glance, or even the first several glances. "
—
Slate
Posted Oct 6, 2011
|
|
|
23%
|
What's Your Number? (2011) |
"
For comedy connoisseurs it isn't news that Anna Faris is a largely untapped treasure. The melancholy question that lingers on the way out of the vulgar yet retrograde What's Your Number? is: Whither Anna?"
—
Slate
Posted Sep 30, 2011
|
|
|
93%
|
50/50 (2011) |
"
Scene by scene, 50/50 can be both amusing and moving, with the tightly wound Gordon-Levitt and the boundaryless Rogen forming an oddly complementary pair. But as a whole the movie never quite coheres."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 30, 2011
|
|
|
67%
|
Pearl Jam Twenty (2011) |
"
Crowe has assembled some top-drawer ephemera -- old show posters, home movies, and candid backstage footage -- but he overestimates his audience's patience for present-day talking-head interviews."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 23, 2011
|
|
|
95%
|
Moneyball (2011) |
"
It's to the director's credit, and Pitt's, that Moneyball is anything but bloodless -- in its own quiet, unspectacular way, this movie courses with life."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 22, 2011
|
|
|
17%
|
I Don't Know How She Does It (2011) |
"
I Don't Know How She Does It purports to be about the difficult choices of modern motherhood, but it's too prim and cautious a movie to dip a pedicured toe into the murky waters of real choice."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 16, 2011
|
|
|
93%
|
Drive (2011) |
"
Enters the viewer like a sharp unseen blade."
—
Slate
Posted Sep 15, 2011
|
|
|
53%
|
Brighton Rock (2011) |
"
All in all, this new Brighton Rock strikes me as a minor but effective exercise in neo-noir style."
—
Slate
Posted Aug 26, 2011
|
|
|
68%
|
Our Idiot Brother (2011) |
"
I can't quite account for why the whole of Our Idiot Brother seemed to me greater than the sum of its admittedly modest parts. Maybe it's just nice to see a comedy that's about something other than "Will these guys get laid?" or "Which one will she marry?""
—
Slate
Posted Aug 25, 2011
|
|
|
100%
|
The Interrupters (2011) |
"
The Interrupters, a documentary about an initiative to stop urban violence in Chicago, may be the most necessary film you'll see this year."
—
Slate
Posted Aug 19, 2011
|
|
|
92%
|
Senna (2011) |
"
Senna feels a touch too short to be fully realized -- but then again, so was Ayrton Senna's life."
—
Slate
Posted Aug 18, 2011
|
87%
22%
90%
