|
|
21%
|
Fred Claus (2007) |
"
The exceptional cast -- Vaughn, Giamatti, Kathy Bates, Kevin Spacey, Rachel Weisz -- is an embarrassment of riches for a script this thin and this beholden to family-fare protocol, with its mushy-minded moral and slick sentimentality."
—
Village Voice
Posted Nov 6, 2007
|
|
|
100%
|
Sátántangó (Satan's Tango) (1994) |
"
Critics have rightfully hailed Tarr as one of filmdom's criminally undersung geniuses."
—
Village Voice
Posted Oct 5, 2007
|
|
|
99%
|
Metropolis (1927) |
"
Lang's impossibly vast skyscraper-ziggurats (inspired, it's said, by his first view of the Manhattan skyline) are the blueprint for nearly every science-fiction movie city of the past 30 years."
—
Village Voice
Posted Jul 17, 2007
|
|
|
86%
|
Shadow Company (2007) |
"
Shadow Company attempts to provide a balanced view of a potentially polarizing issue, interviewing historians, security firm heads, war journalists, and former contractors themselves (the Army declined)."
—
Village Voice
Posted Jul 5, 2007
|
|
|
85%
|
Jack Smith and the Destruction Of Atlantis (2006) |
"
Smith's own work, here montaged for easy digestion, is already too rich and sumptuous to require any further frosting."
—
Village Voice
Posted Apr 10, 2007
|
|
|
86%
|
Cobra Verde (Slave Coast) (1987) |
"
It's easy to understand why this was Herzog's final collaboration with the actor, but Kinski's performance nevertheless serves up a potent confusion of documentary and fiction that has long been an essential element of Herzog's filmmaking."
—
Village Voice
Posted Mar 20, 2007
|
|
|
78%
|
The GoodTimesKid (2005) |
"
Though the film never transcends its own neo-boho quirk, it concludes in a marvelous final shot: a long take set to Gang of Four, grungy and materialist in the Jacobs tradition."
—
Village Voice
Posted Jan 16, 2007
|
|
|
17%
|
La tigre e la neve (The Tiger and the Snow) (2006) |
"
Roberto Benigni here plays out a madcap tale of romantic obsession against the backdrop of the Iraq invasion. The results are neither profound nor funny."
—
L.A. Weekly
Posted Jan 4, 2007
|
|
|
58%
|
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (2006) |
"
A noble experiment in pushing the limits of cinema, but one too many sequences of ruffling silks and dreamy flower bouquets evoke little more than the ad-agency clichés of an elongated Chanel No. 5 commercial."
—
L.A. Weekly
Posted Jan 4, 2007
|
|
|
17%
|
La tigre e la neve (The Tiger and the Snow) (2006) |
"
Neither profound nor funny, but merely uncomfortable. A hubristic failure at risky humor, The Tiger and the Snow provides Benigni his own Michael Richards moment."
—
Village Voice
Posted Dec 28, 2006
|
|
|
58%
|
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (2006) |
"
It's a noble experiment in pushing the limits of cinema, but Tykwer never achieves true profundity."
—
Village Voice
Posted Dec 27, 2006
|
|
|
100%
|
My Dad Is 100 Years Old (2006) |
"
A micro-doc packing more intoxicating beauty and invigorating ideas into its 17 minutes than most other films do in 90 or more."
—
Village Voice
Posted Dec 5, 2006
|
|
|
89%
|
Bergman Island (Ingmar Bergman - 3 dokumentärer om film, teater, Fårö och livet av Marie Nyreröd) (2006) |
"
As little more than an extended interview, it remains hobbled by determinedly uninspired cinematography and a mundane televisual setup."
—
Village Voice
Posted Dec 5, 2006
|
|
|
95%
|
Cleo From 5 to 7 (Cléo de 5 à 7) (1961) |
"
Varda transforms the typical French cinema gamine into a complex, tragic figure: the girl who's all too good at playing plaything, forced to face the hollowness of her youth."
—
Village Voice
Posted Nov 21, 2006
|
|
|
60%
|
The Last Atomic Bomb (2006) |
"
The trauma is real, and the facts disturbing, but the doc doesn't have the chops to deliver what should be a more powerful statement."
—
Village Voice
Posted Nov 7, 2006
|
|
|
69%
|
The Wild Blue Yonder (2005) |
"
Though occasionally striking, the footage doesn't pack the evocative punch Herzog intends, and segments that should be lyrical mind trips only result in overstretched longueurs."
—
Village Voice
Posted Oct 24, 2006
|
|
|
——
|
Out of Place: Memories of Edward Said (2006) |
"
Though Out of Place uses quotations from Said's writings to frame its chapters, the result is less a picture of Said himself than of the environments that shaped him."
—
Village Voice
Posted Oct 11, 2006
|
|
|
100%
|
Edward Said: The Last Interview (2006) |
"
Though physically weakened and near the end of his life, his discourse is sharp and incisive, creating a remarkably compelling self-portrait."
—
Village Voice
Posted Oct 11, 2006
|
|
|
100%
|
Andy Warhol: A Documentary Film (2006) |
"
Burns argues for a cogitating, agitating Warhol: deep thinker, cultural barometer, and world changer."
—
Village Voice
Posted Aug 30, 2006
|
|
|
90%
|
Fratricide (Brudermord) (2006) |
"
Yilmaz Arslan's hard-edged story of Turks and Kurds on the mean streets of urban Germany veers between moments of sensitive humanism and horrifying brutality."
—
Village Voice
Posted Aug 22, 2006
|
|
|
75%
|
The Photographer, His Wife, Her Lover (2006) |
"
[Yule] reveals a struggle far more complicated, suggesting that the manic entanglement of human relationships can't always conform to the winner-loser narratives that the lawyer-driven court system demands."
—
Village Voice
Posted Jul 25, 2006
|
|
|
——
|
Twelve Disciples of Nelson Mandela (2005) |
"
Thomas Allen Harris's Twelve Disciples of Nelson Mandela takes on an intensely dramatic topic -- the struggle against apartheid -- yet paradoxically transforms its powerful source material into a stiff and sometimes awkward tutorial."
—
Village Voice
Posted Jul 7, 2006
|
|
|
69%
|
Room (2006) |
"
Kyle Henry's Room is one of those rare American indies that confidently and successfully propose their own narrative logic, drawing viewers into a mental puzzle that may not contain a single clear solution."
—
Village Voice
Posted Jun 27, 2006
|
|
|
57%
|
Drawing Restraint 9 (2005) |
"
An unsatisfying marriage of excessive production values with insipid cinematography and flat-footed editing."
—
Village Voice
Posted Mar 28, 2006
|
|
|
92%
|
Dave Chappelle's Block Party (2006) |
"
This picture remains faithful to the underlying affability of both Chappelle and Gondry, orchestrating a feel-good homestyle vibe that, while peppered with moments of sly political commentary, never harshes its own, slightly bittersweet mellow."
—
Village Voice
Posted Feb 28, 2006
|
|
|
73%
|
Who Gets to Call It Art? (2006) |
"
Surely a figure as crucial as Geldzahler deserves more incisive treatment."
—
Village Voice
Posted Jan 31, 2006
|
|
|
76%
|
Daai si gin (Breaking News) (2006) |
"
Well executed but ultimately unsatisfying ..."
—
Village Voice
Posted Jan 25, 2006
|
|
|
71%
|
Gay Sex in the 70s (2005) |
"
[The film] falls in line with the celebratory doc fare often found at gay film festivals: sub-TV production values, middling archival footage, and a hesitancy to separate history from nostalgia in the course of enshrining the first-person record."
—
Village Voice
Posted Nov 1, 2005
|
|
|
——
|
Time We Killed () |
"
The Time We Killed achieves a quiet power through rough-edged, handcrafted means."
—
Village Voice
Posted Oct 18, 2005
|
|
|
63%
|
Chain (2005) |
"
A dreamlike travelogue that transforms a mundane world into something strange and new."
—
Village Voice
Posted Sep 13, 2005
|
|
|
——
|
Mind Game (2004) |
"
A virtuoso narrative loop-the-loop that travels through a phantasmagoric catalog of animation styles."
—
Village Voice
Posted Aug 30, 2005
|
|
|
89%
|
William Eggleston in the Real World (2005) |
"
[A] subtle, elegant documentary."
—
Village Voice
Posted Aug 30, 2005
|
|
|
68%
|
Reel Paradise (2005) |
"
Unfortunately, what could have been a superficially amusing IFC reality series was stretched into a thin, overlong feature that follows the rocky integration of this very New York clan into a somewhat ruffled island society."
—
Village Voice
Posted Aug 16, 2005
|
|
|
——
|
Pound (1970) |
"
Part wacky comedy (with plenty of jailhouse humping), part existential allegory, Pound betrays its stage-play roots with too much actorly grandstanding but is peppered with ecstatic funk-powered freak-outs."
—
Village Voice
Posted Aug 16, 2005
|
|
—
|
——
|
No Picnic () |
"
Well shot in fat-grained monochrome 16mm (by experimental filmmaker Peter Hutton, who typically turns his lens toward expansive landscapes), No Picnic partakes of the shabby-chic downtown aesthetic that was once a New York cinematic mainstay."
—
Village Voice
Posted Aug 16, 2005
|
|
|
——
|
Lost, Lost, Lost (1976) |
"
A photographic Homer of his own odyssey, Mekas journeys -- like us all -- in irrevocable exile from his own past, attempting to reconstruct that invisible nation of youth to which he can never return."
—
Village Voice
Posted Aug 9, 2005
|
|
|
13%
|
Stealth (2005) |
"
If we're going to be fighting the war on terror in perpetuity, could we at least get better movies out of it?"
—
Village Voice
Posted Aug 2, 2005
|
|
|
67%
|
Edgar G. Ulmer - The Man Off-screen (2005) |
"
[A] well-wrought investigation of the often mysterious life of Edgar G. Ulmer."
—
Village Voice
Posted Jul 26, 2005
|
|
|
45%
|
Dark Water (2005) |
"
It fails to deliver the narrative thrill twists its origins would promise."
—
Village Voice
Posted Jul 12, 2005
|
|
|
83%
|
Rize (2005) |
"
Few of the interviews get much further than recording surface boasts and assertive self-definitions; LaChapelle connects all their stories with common threads of resisting gang culture, but at the expense of flattening out each person's character."
—
Village Voice
Posted Jun 21, 2005
|
|
|
80%
|
Cinderella Man (2005) |
"
Despite the tale's dusty pedigree, Ron Howard spins a ticket-worthy two-plus hours of movie-movie entertainment."
—
Village Voice
Posted May 31, 2005
|
|
|
55%
|
Lords of Dogtown (2005) |
"
Leaner and sharper than its fast-and-furious TV spots would let on."
—
Village Voice
Posted May 31, 2005
|
|
|
31%
|
The Longest Yard (2005) |
"
No uplifting populism here."
—
Village Voice
Posted May 31, 2005
|
|
|
80%
|
Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith 3D (2013) |
"
Anakin's defection from Jediism to Sithdom should provide the film's backbone, but neither the script nor Christensen delivers the needed nuance."
—
Village Voice
Posted May 13, 2005
|
|
|
38%
|
The Girl from Monday (2005) |
"
Streaky low-frame-rate DV, Dogme-style mundane interiors, and merely unembarrassing televisual performances add up to a monotonous, unenlightening experience."
—
Village Voice
Posted May 3, 2005
|
|
|
——
|
Flower Thief (2005) |
"
Taylor Mead traipses with elfin glee through a lost San Francisco of smoke-stuffed North Beach cafés, oceanside fairgrounds, and collapsed post-industrial ruins."
—
Village Voice
Posted Mar 17, 2005
|
|
|
33%
|
Conspiracy of Silence (2004) |
"
It's unclear whether this is an actual issue, or just something spicy to be cooked up in the potboiler."
—
Village Voice
Posted Nov 30, 2004
|
|
|
75%
|
Jesus, You Know (Jesus, Du weisst) (2003) |
"
[A] complex and deeply moving documentary of Catholics at prayer, who remarkably speak to the camera as they do to God."
—
Village Voice
Posted Nov 30, 2004
|
|
|
——
|
Muhammad: The Last Prophet (2004) |
"
Though noble in its intent to portray Islam as a peace-loving faith, the narrative flow remains compromised by its catechistic asides and displaced hero."
—
Village Voice
Posted Nov 16, 2004
|
87%
24%
91%
85%
45%
40%
