|
95%
|
The Hunt (2013)
|
"... a movie of uncommon power about the evil that well-meaning people commit when given license by what they perceive as atrocity."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
74%
|
The Grandmaster (2013)
|
"...closer in tone to an art movie, an exercise in pure cinema, than it is a chopsocky extravaganza"
|
Philip Martin
|
|
51%
|
Scatter My Ashes At Bergdorf's (2013)
|
"...works both as a large format infommercial for the store and a Rorschach for those of us with our noses pressed against those windows, watching the elaborate working displays of decorator David Hoey. Are we amused or envious? "
|
Philip Martin
|
|
98%
|
Blackfish (2013)
|
"We have traditionally taken license to do as we will with our fellow creatures, whether that means slaughtering them for food or dressing them up for Halloween. Perhaps only a God created in our image could sanction ... the ways we exploit the vulnerable."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
86%
|
The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceausescu (2011)
|
"...an odd and absorbing film that comes perilously close to fulfilling the promise of its cheeky title ("
|
Philip Martin
|
|
40%
|
Only God Forgives (2013)
|
"I don't think it's bad. I think it's dull, and a product of an imagination that is very much pleased with itself. "
|
Philip Martin
|
|
64%
|
Tiger Eyes (2013)
|
"...scants the rich emotional potential in favor of After School Special cliches"
|
Philip Martin
|
|
82%
|
Dirty Wars (2013)
|
"... though I have certain qualms about the way Scahill is presented in the film ... I cannot imagine that a more compelling film could have been made without his character carrying this dramatic payload."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
17%
|
Roadie (1980)
|
"None of this is to argue that this is a great - or even very good - film but it is enjoyable on any number of levels. I'm just happy to have confirmation that I didn't just dream the whole thing. "
|
Philip Martin
|
|
89%
|
The Angels' Share (2013)
|
"...a low key and rather marvelous, sweet-natured heist movie"
|
Philip Martin
|
|
93%
|
Ain't In It For My Health: A Film About Levon Helm (2013)
|
"And of all the figures - Bob Dylan, Gram Parsons, et al. - who smuggled those sepia-toned seeds into rock 'n' roll, Helm, was arguably the most authentic. "
|
Philip Martin
|
|
50%
|
At Any Price (2013)
|
"...feels like a great American tragedy, like East of Eden or Death of a Salesman. There's ... a fidelity to the way things actually work themselves out in the real world, in compromise and half-measures and moral doubt."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
55%
|
The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2013)
|
" Despite some promising moments, it never quite coheres into a convincing story. It's worth seeing... but it ultimately feels like a missed opportunity - like a pedant groping for a profundity beyond his moral ken."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
13%
|
Hello Herman (2012)
|
"... a messy, blunt movie that manages to push a lot of buttons. Surely one of them does something."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
98%
|
Before Midnight (2013)
|
"...in the surprising third act, the film comes together as a plausible horror show of how good intentions and real affection can give way to vicious, realistic psychic combat. ("
|
Philip Martin
|
|
84%
|
This Is the End (2013)
|
"...a very savvy send up of the way we perceive celebrities as vapid and self-involved ciphers who are so often flattered and coddled that they come to accept applause as their due. "
|
Philip Martin
|
|
65%
|
The Heat (2013)
|
"But it's heartbreaking to watch McCarthy and Bullock work so hard to such little profit ... This is a movie that doesn't once do the unexpected thing. "
|
Philip Martin
|
|
42%
|
Red 2 (2013)
|
"About the best - and maybe the worst - that can be about RED 2 is that it is an exceedingly safe pick."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
84%
|
Fill the Void (2013)
|
"Burshstein has managed a small miracle with his gentle film ... . A movie about matters of faith that manages to be neither condescending nor smug ... a surprisingly accessible and satisfying experience."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
54%
|
Lovelace (2013)
|
"...the film is all surface, despite some hard work from an overqualified cast that unfortunately seems not to have been given a key note to tune to."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
89%
|
A Place at the Table (2013)
|
"presents us with the counter-intuitive idea that while Americans may be among the world's most obese people ... there is a surprisingly large segment of our population - nearly 50 million people - who are "food insecure""
|
Philip Martin
|
|
73%
|
Lee Daniels' The Butler (2013)
|
"The film is, in the conventional and lamentable 21st-century Hollywood mode, so overt and obvious that at times it feels like a parody of historical drama."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
65%
|
Turbo (2013)
|
"The buildup to the inevitable big race is a lot more fun than the climax itself."
|
Dan Lybarger
|
|
69%
|
The Wolverine (2013)
|
"Much of the reason Wolverine has become everyone's favorite Canadian mutant is because, despite his origins in the Marvel Universe, he doesn't act much like a superhero."
|
Dan Lybarger
|
|
20%
|
I Do (2013)
|
"The parade of increasingly traumatic events results in some glum goings-on, so viewers need to hold on to the film's brighter moments."
|
Karen Martin
|
|
93%
|
No (2013)
|
"... like Mad Men, it's a period piece set in the world of advertising and it pays a distracting (and sometimes humorous) amount of attention to period details."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
0%
|
Hating Breitbart (2012)
|
"... as far as this film is concerned Andrew Breitbart was a great American, a nearly mythical figure like Daniel Boone. (Who, as members of my generation will remember, also "fought for America, to make all Americans free.") "
|
Philip Martin
|
|
93%
|
Room 237 (2013)
|
"...all about the work of criticism - finding fresh avenues of delight."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
43%
|
28 Hotel Rooms (2012)
|
"... one of the movie's points is that when you are cocooned with your lover, intoxicated and infatuated, you don't care much about the rest of the world"
|
Philip Martin
|
|
64%
|
Anna Karenina (2012)
|
"Maybe Wright and Stoppard have not given us a great Anna Karenina. .. this movie is too derivative and flashy for that, but they have connected the romantic and philosophical poles...The heart wants what it wants, and will destroy itself to have it."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
88%
|
Starlet (2012)
|
"...has a sunny SoCal vibe that belies its tawdry milieu"
|
Philip Martin
|
|
84%
|
The Flat (2012)
|
"It's a mesmerizing detective story ...with an oddly uplifting ending that suggests a commonality of the human spirit that supersedes ideology."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
80%
|
The Other Son (2012)
|
"Somehow Levy - and her actors - avoid sentimentality and trite homilies. The Other Son explores the age-old nature vs. nurture divide, and ends up as refutation of ignorance and hate."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
52%
|
This is 40 (2012)
|
"...a collection of demos, obviously inessential but interesting to the cultists."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
34%
|
Deadfall (2012)
|
"An excellent cast and an admirable refusal to give in to its audience's pleas for relief from its blue-gray bleakness aren't enough to raise Stefan Ruzowitsky's Deadfall above your run-of-the-mill snowbelt-set nihilistic noir."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
37%
|
Hyde Park on Hudson (2012)
|
"...you certainly could do worse than enjoy a fanciful little film about a gentle president, his supposedly homely lover and two twittish English people appalled by hot dogs. I just wish they'd gone ahead and changed the names."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
81%
|
The Impossible (2012)
|
"... a terrific horror movie, one that genuinely grips and shocks its audience and forces empathy with the would-be victims. "
|
Philip Martin
|
|
51%
|
Promised Land (2013)
|
"... Van Sant's eye and sense of poetry no doubt elevate what's essentially an updated Frank Capra story ..."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
63%
|
Hitchcock (2012)
|
"... a slight, forgettable movie. Sometimes that's enough."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
93%
|
Zero Dark Thirty (2013)
|
"...a somber, black-winged benediction for what we might count as a lost decade."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
82%
|
De rouille et d'os (Rust and Bone) (2012)
|
"...while all the admittedly well-wrought details engage us on an intellectual level and keep us watching, the film doesn't linger in the imagination the way truly great cinema does"
|
Philip Martin
|
|
38%
|
Stand Up Guys (2013)
|
"It's hardly great, but it's refreshingly old school."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
75%
|
Murph: The Protector (2013)
|
"... a documentary with the limited but entirely honorable mission of commemorating the life and sacrifice of Navy Lt. Michael P. Murphy, a Navy SEAL who died in a firefight in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan in June 2005."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
93%
|
The Gatekeepers (2013)
|
"...a riveting and sobering documentary about Shin Bet that raises important if unanswerable questions about the morality of state-sanctioned violence in the name of internal security. "
|
Philip Martin
|
|
96%
|
War Witch (2013)
|
"... driven by a remarkably natural, unaffected performance by Mwanza. And Nguyen, despite relying a little too heavily on the initial voice-over for exposition, is a confident and sensitive intelligence behind the camera."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
44%
|
On the Road (2012)
|
"If our On the Road is a barely coherent tightrope act - a fizzy word drunk stand-up speed-rapped by an aspiring poet posing as a dumb saint prole - then it's tough to take this pretty version, populated by Gap models in retro Americana fashions."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
30%
|
Emperor (2013)
|
" ...probably the most disappointing 2013 film I've seen so far."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
90%
|
Beyond The Hills (2013)
|
"Strikingly shot and punishingly long ..."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
79%
|
Ginger & Rosa (2013)
|
" ...probably Potter's most accessible movie to date, but the script is perhaps nothing special ..."
|
Philip Martin
|
|
55%
|
The Company You Keep (2013)
|
"Redford's direction feels tighter and and less ruminative than it has in years, and his acting is still marked by a kind of intelligent alertness. "
|
Philip Martin
|
