Authors

Los Angeles Alternative

Rating Title | Year Quote Author
67%

Lunacy (2006)

"Lunacy lacks the teeth to be truly audacious. Yet its leisurely pacing and silly send-ups of psychosexual perversions make it an amusing enough gothic comedy."

Jay Antani

46%

Edmond (2005)

"Mamet's script may not be entirely convincing as either satire or social commentary, but in Macy's hands, poor, pathetic Edmond's story finds its shocking, darkly funny resonance."

Jay Antani

86%

Quinceañera (Echo Park, L.A.) (2006)

"In the end, what keeps Quinceañera so engaging are the wonderfully sweet, unselfconscious performances from Emily Rios and Jesse Garcia"

Jay Antani

54%

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006)

"takes all that was so charming about the first Pirates...and amps it up to the wattage of a Looney Tunes cartoon"

Jay Antani

85%

La Moustache (2005)

"an awfully rickety, hollow exercise in style over substance"

Jay Antani

82%

The China Syndrome (1979)

"Crackling drama about TV reporter (Jane Fonda) investigating a coverup at a faulty nuclear reactor, and pressing upon conflicted technician played by the first-rate Jack Lemmon to go public with the story."

Jay Antani

36%

A View to a Kill (1985)

"The aging Roger Moore rehashes his somewhat foppish Bond in this sad '80s installment with Grace Jones as a vampish villainess. Awful, and an embarrassment to the Bond mystique."

Jay Antani

12%

Ma Mere,(Meine Mutter),(My Mother) (2005)

"...a dispirited affair and often feels like a parody - a decidedly self-serious one - of one of Bertolucci or Pasolini's boundary-pushing offerings from the '70s"

Jay Antani

100%

Harper (The Moving Target) (1966)

Jay Antani

66%

O Homem Que Copiava (The Man Who Copied) (2005)

"utterly fresh and appealing from start to finish"

Jay Antani

82%

Kontroll (2005)

"a gleeful demonstration of Antal's flair for the medium"

Jay Antani

43%

Palindromes (2004)

"Take away the subversive hilarity of his movies, and [Solondz] could well be the cinematic equivalent of the Unabomber."

Jay Antani

81%

Oldboy (2005)

"Oldboy is a true-to-form sendup of grittier, more lurid manga fare. This is good news for die-hard fans of the form and teeth-gritting torture for those who are not."

Jay Antani

100%

The Lavender Hill Mob (1951)

"Fun, perfectly realized Ealing Studios outing"

Jay Antani

91%

The Killing Fields (1984)

"One of the most potent politically-charged dramas ever made, managing to honor both the epic and the intimate aspects of its drama. One of the top films of the '80s."

Jay Antani

59%

Steamboy (2005)

" In spite of...obvious and unfortunate flaws, if you're going to see Steamboy do so on the big screen so as to be reminded of the marvels of hand-drawn animation"

Jay Antani

63%

Mail Order Wife (2005)

"a simple-minded circle jerk about exploitation, peopled by characters without the least bit of originality, vitality or appeal"

Jay Antani

89%

Machuca (2004)

"Wood's story-world details are rendered beautifully, but without a framework to hang them on"

Jay Antani

95%

The Crowd ()

"my favorite silent film: poetically told with dazzling direction"

Jay Antani

42%

A Love Song for Bobby Long (2004)

"Gabel has potentially challenging material on her hands but her treatment of it feels too hygienic, mistaking tastefulness for subtlety "

Jay Antani

87%

Duel in the Sun (1946)

"Lurid, stupid fun"

Jay Antani

77%

Mighty Aphrodite (1995)

Jay Antani

88%

Bugsy (1991)

"Gloss, but well put-together gloss"

Jay Antani

100%

Day for Night (1973)

Jay Antani

95%

Mad Max (1979)

Jay Antani

100%

The Invisible Man (1933)

"Terrific entry in the James Whale horror canon"

Jay Antani

67%

The Hobbit (1978)

"Drab, boring but with an oddly moody tone"

Jay Antani

88%

The Woodsman (2004)

"Bacon's Walter is a searing creation...breaking through the The Woodsman's well-behaved exterior to reveal something of the...untrodden depths churning at its heart."

Jay Antani

67%

Ladyhawke (1985)

Jay Antani

95%

The Return (Vozvrashcheniye) (2003)

"an absorbing psychological drama and coming-of-age story in the guise of a road movie"

Jay Antani

67%

Gulliver's Travels (1939)

"Cheesy but well-drawn"

Jay Antani

84%

Slacker (1991)

"A landmark by an American master"

Jay Antani

78%

George Lucas in Love (2000)

"Overhyped bit of semi-witty movie geek fluff"

Jay Antani

86%

Janghwa, Hongryeon (A Tale of Two Sisters) (2003)

"a delirious mélange of styles that absorbs us for two solid hours"

Jay Antani

88%

House of Flying Daggers (2004)

"a tedious...excuse for this director to indulge his fetish for digitalized blood and daggers and...immaculately composed nature shots"

Jay Antani

78%

Overnight (2004)

"Overnight always holds our interest, not so much as a documentary as an episode of a junky reality TV show. "

Jay Antani

38%

Happy Hour (2004)

"Happy Hour is strictly college-level compost, content with its mediocrity, if not wholly unaware of it."

Jay Antani

14%

It's All About Love (2004)

"while watching it you might be hit with the urge to grab the Danish writer-director by the collar and shout 'No, it's all about story!'"

Jay Antani

92%

Tarnation (2004)

"Caouette's movie succeeds because of its cinematic showmanship, injecting the personal documentary form with an urgently expressive avant-gardism."

Jay Antani

94%

Lost in La Mancha (2003)

"entertaining without always being compelling"

Jay Antani

85%

Bend It Like Beckham (2003)

"its irresistible charms and performances are what linger and make Beckham a popcorn, er, samosa flick worth savoring."

Jay Antani

85%

Spider (2002)

"Cronenberg pieces together a compelling portrait of madness, but one which lacks the poignancy to be a rich, moving character study."

Jay Antani

52%

Down and Out With the Dolls (2003)

"an assuredly made, unexpectedly poignant and hilarious feel-good flick, pitched somewhere between the goofy campiness of John Waters and the good-heartedness of Cameron Crowe"

Jay Antani

14%

The Young Unknowns (2000)

"[an] eloquent, damning case against American culture and family"

Jay Antani

71%

Confidence (2003)

"While it sometimes fails to live up to its title, Confidence ultimately, wins us over-in short, it dazzlingly does what all good cons are supposed to do. "

Jay Antani

96%

Raising Victor Vargas (2003)

"ultimately, it lacks the backbone, the thematic heft, to be anything beyond a sweet redemption story"

Jay Antani

38%

Hotel (2003)

"it's through its anarchic, try-anything chutzpah that this bizarrely erotic satire succeeds and entertains"

Jay Antani

94%

American Splendor (2003)

"It gets the mood right, but never slows enough to explore its rich, existential landscape--the cynical, ultimately humanist, musings at the heart of Pekar's comic manifestos."

Jay Antani

60%

Madame Satã (2002)

"Ainouz' script and style seem unwilling to explore below the surface. He embraces the story's physical details...without revealing much of his subject's soul."

Jay Antani

46%

The Other Side of the Bed (El Otro Lado de la Cama) (2003)

"it's impossible for me to completely dismiss a movie that features not one but two Spanish women....The rest of [this] sex romp/romantic comedy...can't be so summarily praised"

Jay Antani

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