Kevin Jagernauth Movie Reviews & Previews

Critics » Kevin Jagernauth

Kevin Jagernauth

Agrees with the Tomatometer 77% of the time.

Publications:: PopMatters , The Playlist

Total Reviews:: 97

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Showing 1 - 50 of 97

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Rating	T-Meter	Title \| Year	Add Date
B	——	An American Promise (2013)	" ...what this documentary perhaps concludes is that the American Promise lies not in the endless opportunities the country offers, but in the pact parents make with their children, to support them in whatever opportunity they happen to seize." — The Playlist Posted Oct 5, 2013
C	8%	Runner Runner (2013)	" Runner Runner feels like a movie you've seen a hundred times on cable, and hearkens back to numerous, thoroughly average, mid-budgeted dramatic thrillers of the mid-'90s that will fill programming slots on late night forever." — The Playlist Posted Oct 4, 2013
D	60%	Mr. Nobody (2013)	" Both overblown and half-baked, too long and not edited enough, Mr. Nobody describes exactly the kind of audience it will likely get." — The Playlist Posted Sep 27, 2013
C-	50%	Thanks For Sharing (2013)	" An uneven, somewhat out-of-time dramedy, the film takes great pains to confirm that sex addiction is just like any other addiction, but isn't sure what to say beyond that." — The Playlist Posted Sep 20, 2013
D+	——	Felony ()	" Felony isn't a federal case of a bad film, but it's certainly a serious misdemeanor, one whose crime is running away from the challenge the story sets up, to settle on something cheap and conventional. " — The Playlist Posted Sep 17, 2013
B-	——	Therese (2013)	" Therese is almost voyeuristically distant from what's happening on screen, asking the audience to observe, but...the impact is more academic than sensual. " — The Playlist Posted Sep 17, 2013
b+	——	Supermensch: The Legend of Shep Gordon ()	" There is so much more to 'Supermensch' than simply sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll, which is what makes Mike Myers' directorial debut so involving, satisfying and even moving." — The Playlist Posted Sep 14, 2013
C+	67%	Hateship Loveship ()	" It's a tale of two women...coming of age, an observation on the scars left by loss, and an examination of a variety of characters who strive to live beyond the judgements and low expectations placed on them." — The Playlist Posted Sep 13, 2013
F	——	Third Person ()	" Third Person is an audacious failure, one that even its starry cast can't save. With a trite script, and an even more glib thematic undercurrent, Third Person is nothing short of an outright embarrassment." — The Playlist Posted Sep 13, 2013
c	70%	Fading Gigolo ()	" There are better pictures to be made out of the material but what we do get is a decent enough cinematic peck on the check." — The Playlist Posted Sep 10, 2013
C-	64%	August: Osage County (2013)	" August: Osage County is a film of big, wild gestures, plate smashing, screaming and tears, but not nuance, and it all has the effect of leaving one deadened, not moved. " — The Playlist Posted Sep 10, 2013
D	36%	Devil's Knot ()	" Devil's Knot is sadly a CliffsNotes version of this case...that completely misses the outrage, injustice and severe breadth of how much investigative and prosecutorial mistakes severely bungled this case from its very first moments." — The Playlist Posted Sep 9, 2013
B+	86%	Dom Hemingway (2014)	" Mixing two parts Irvine Welsh, one part Bronson, a few dashes of perversity, all wrapped in a blanket of excess, Jude Law takes that bundle, bites heartily into the role of Dom, chews it up, swallows and pisses it right back out with glee." — The Playlist Posted Sep 9, 2013
B+	95%	Enough Said (2013)	" ...Holofcener's Enough Said is another tremendously well crafted, intelligent dramedy about people, with complicated lives, who make bad decisions trying to do the right thing. " — The Playlist Posted Sep 9, 2013
A-	93%	The Double ()	" ...not only does The Double confirm Ayoade as one of the brightest rising talents behind the camera, it's completely his own and unlike anything you've seen in cinemas in quite some time." — The Playlist Posted Sep 9, 2013
C	73%	Can a Song Save Your Life? ()	" ...director John Carney is traveling over the same ground as he did with Once, though the results are far less potent...Can A Song Save Your Life? is a rhetorical question in the grand scheme of a film that offers little stakes." — The Playlist Posted Sep 8, 2013
B-	——	The Railway Man ()	" For all the assuredness behind the camera and in front of it, there's very little in way of edge or even, surprisingly, emotion." — The Playlist Posted Sep 8, 2013
B	89%	Dallas Buyers Club (2013)	" ...while the film might not drop the cumulative emotional anchor you may expect...it's a smartly entertaining tale, delivered with respect for its subject matter, but also wisely knows you can be fun and funny even in the arena of an AIDS drama." — The Playlist Posted Sep 7, 2013
D	89%	Bad Words (2014)	" Bad Words wants so desperately to be funny, there isn't much time left to make any logic out of the story. " — The Playlist Posted Sep 7, 2013
B	——	The Lunchbox ()	" By time credits roll on The Lunchbox, to call it at a rom-com trivializes what is a far more textured picture. " — The Playlist Posted Sep 7, 2013
B+	88%	Rush (2013)	" It's excitingly assembled and moves like a bullet, highly engaging and nerve-wracking when it needs to be and light on its feet elsewhere. " — The Playlist Posted Sep 6, 2013
C-	35%	The Fifth Estate (2013)	" ...The Fifth Estate focuses on what is ultimately a petty personal feud, while mostly missing the revolution that's still happening keystroke by keystroke on computer screens around the world." — The Playlist Posted Sep 6, 2013
B	71%	Money for Nothing: Inside the Federal Reserve (2013)	" ...while director Jim Bruce's film is thorough, and rich in context and detail...one can't help but think it's another small rock being throw into a big ocean that nothing can seemingly can stop, even though many are aware of what needs to be done." — The Playlist Posted Sep 5, 2013
B	89%	Koch (2013)	" Both as a portrait of a changing New York City and the man who was at the epicentre of that evolution for over a decade, Koch is a delight. " — The Playlist Posted Aug 28, 2013
B	80%	Glickman ()	" Marty Glickman was simply being the best Marty Glickman he could be. For many he wasn't just the best Marty Glickman he was simply: the best." — The Playlist Posted Aug 28, 2013
A	89%	The Trials Of Muhammad Ali (2013)	" The Ali of this documentary entered the ring a phenom first, but came-of-age outside of it and grew into a man, second. And that process was nothing short of both an evolution and revolution..." — The Playlist Posted Aug 22, 2013
D	8%	Savannah (2013)	" Savannah does attempt to tell the story of the friendship of those two accomplished men, but does so in a manner that is so astonishingly tone deaf, confused and narrowly focused..." — The Playlist Posted Aug 21, 2013
C-	47%	We're The Millers (2013)	" We're The Millers isn't really a bad movie, so much as its inoffensively and instantly forgettable. You will laugh here and there, but you probably won't laugh even more. " — The Playlist Posted Aug 6, 2013
B+	68%	Elysium (2013)	" Elysium [is] a brainy sci-fi effort that doesn't skimp on its blockbuster requirements, and delivers one of the most satisfying films of the summer." — The Playlist Posted Aug 1, 2013
C+	——	Bayou Maharajah: The Tragic Genius of James Booker ()	" ...despite the title of the doc, which conjures up a madcap, heartbreaking tale, the film is a mostly workmanlike biopic that unfortunately can never match the energy of the subject it's trying to capture" — The Playlist Posted Jul 30, 2013
C	53%	Wasteland (2013)	" Lethargic and not particularly invigorating or fresh, you can skip Wasteland and wait for the next Brit crime flick that will be following before long." — The Playlist Posted Jul 26, 2013
D	62%	Broken (2013)	" Broken simply can't get it together on any level, delivering a tedious drama, that for all the characters and over-emoting, doesn't have much to say. " — The Playlist Posted Jul 19, 2013
B-	67%	Downloaded (2013)	" Downloaded often misses bigger picture viewpoints, and mostly sticks with the standard narrative about Napster we all know (though with a bit more behind-the-scenes detail)." — The Playlist Posted Jul 5, 2013
C-	31%	The Lone Ranger (2013)	" ...the coin is spent on the action sequences, which don't get better than the spectacular train setpiece that opens the film...But in the middle? Maybe they should have done another rewrite..." — The Playlist Posted Jul 3, 2013
B	80%	Laurence Anyways (2013)	" Laurence Anyways contains a voice so pronounced, and so specific, that Dolan is going to be one to watch for years to come." — The Playlist Posted Jun 27, 2013
D	50%	White House Down (2013)	" White House Down is...delivered with all subtlety of a portrait of Thomas Jefferson getting a bullet right through the head." — The Playlist Posted Jun 27, 2013
C	64%	Unfinished Song (2013)	" A big broad arrow aiming at the bullseye of the mainstream, Unfinished Song hits its target, but whether that relatively low bar deserves to celebrated is up for debate." — The Playlist Posted Jun 20, 2013
C	84%	This Is the End (2013)	" This Is The End is a vanity project that hopes that audiences will enjoy hanging out with Seth and the gang as much as they like hanging out with each other." — The Playlist Posted May 31, 2013
B-	50%	Now You See Me (2013)	" ...Leterrier's film is a reminder that sometimes a good yarn can do enough heavy lifting on its own to provide thrills. Whether or not the illusion pays off will be up to you, but the trick itself may be intriguing enough." — The Playlist Posted May 30, 2013
C	38%	Grigris ()	" Grigris measures out its story in spacious doses, hoping to build into something of a morality tale, but there is little learned except that entering a criminal enterprise and trying to outsmart the criminals, probably isn't a great idea." — The Playlist Posted May 28, 2013
B	91%	The Great Beauty ()	" Just like Fellini's grand spectacles, La Grande Bellezza washes over you in series of scenes, visages, sensations and impressions, and although in this case it doesn't quite gel into a cohesive whole, it's nonetheless a journey worth taking..." — The Playlist Posted May 23, 2013
C	42%	As I Lay Dying (2013)	" Ultimately, As I Lay Dying is another Franco lark that is more of an experiment with form than a fully realized movie. " — The Playlist Posted May 20, 2013
D	44%	Wara no tate (Shield of Straw) ()	" The killer's final lines suggest a gleeful, pitch black perversity that the rest of Shield of Straw could have used, but instead it's a thoroughly below average genre flick that's empty on ideas and entertainment value." — The Playlist Posted May 20, 2013
C	67%	Blood Ties ()	" Blood Ties is a curious film where if you were to remove any of the crucial parts, it would splinter, yet put all together, it kind of works, in its own wildly uneven way. " — The Playlist Posted May 20, 2013
B	88%	Seduced And Abandoned ()	" ...the insider look at the industry is appealing, and Seduced And Abandoned is enjoyable but lightweight, and if anything, reaffirms that art doesn't come easy." — The Playlist Posted May 20, 2013
C	46%	Jimmy P. ()	" After the sprawling, messy but rich A Christmas Tale, Desplechin falls short with Jimmy P. The mind may cure the soul for Jimmy P., but Desplechin can't seem to find that quality in his own picture." — The Playlist Posted May 20, 2013
A	70%	Like Father, Like Son (2013)	" Evoking naturalistic performances from everyone involved, and with a welcome dose of humor, along with the requisite humanity he's known for, Kore-Eda Hirokazu's film is a touchingly low key, a wholly charming study of the evolution of parenthood. " — The Playlist Posted May 20, 2013
A	92%	Inside Llewyn Davis (2013)	" Inside Llewyn Davis isn't about someone trying to make it big, but someone just trying to make it, and the Coens celebrate the hard road that can inspire great art." — The Playlist Posted May 20, 2013
B	——	Miele ()	" Death, and the right to choose to die, will always inspire fierce debate and Miele doesn't try to solve that argument. Instead, it quietly emphasizes that there can be a grace to passing away, no matter the circumstance." — The Playlist Posted May 17, 2013

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