|
86%
|
Inside Man (2006)
|
"Inside Man is adult, contemporary, and completely relaxed."
|
Grady Hendrix
|
|
72%
|
Eight Below (2006)
|
"Eight Below runs two hours and would have benefited from losing 30 minutes of that -- all of it from Jerry's (Paul Walker) protracted quest. The other human actors are simply types."
|
Emily Yoffe
|
|
58%
|
Night Watch (Nochnoi Dozor) (2006)
|
"If Night Watch is energetic, it is also frenetic; if neatly plotted, it is also too open-ended, a set-up for the remaining two installments of a trilogy."
|
Stephen Metcalf
|
|
19%
|
Firewall (2006)
|
"Ford is definitely hacking his way through something in Firewall, but it's not a computer."
|
Dana Stevens
|
|
22%
|
The Pink Panther (2006)
|
"This movie leaves us with the stale whiff of fake nostalgia and something even more odoriferous: the smell of money."
|
Dana Stevens
|
|
85%
|
The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada (2006)
|
"For a movie about the policing of borders, couldn't this one have maintained a firmer one, between credulity and incredulity? Between seriousness and self-seriousness?"
|
Stephen Metcalf
|
|
90%
|
Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story (2005)
|
"Trying to enumerate everything that's good about this movie could prove as labyrinthine a task as Tristram's storytelling itself."
|
Dana Stevens
|
|
89%
|
Cache (Hidden) (2005)
|
"Any work of art that embarrasses us for inclining toward warmth or decency (or, God forbid, humor) ought to be distrusted. On the other hand, I have found myself unable to shake Caché."
|
Stephen Metcalf
|
|
32%
|
The Tenants (2006)
|
"There's something about the no-exit, zero-sum logic of the film's rivalry that makes this dingy, grim little indie hard to look away from."
|
Dana Stevens
|
|
72%
|
Bubble (2006)
|
"As the plot unfolded along the lines of a conventional melodrama, I couldn't help thinking: In addition to health care and a living wage, don't the working poor deserve makeup, wardrobe, decent lighting, and some heart-skipping drama?"
|
Stephen Metcalf
|
|
51%
|
Manderlay (2006)
|
"If Dogville offered up a ham-fisted critique of 'America' from a plane-phobic Dane who's never visited the place, Manderlay ups the arrogance ante by bonking us on the head with supposedly searing 'truths' ..."
|
Dana Stevens
|
|
17%
|
Underworld: Evolution (2006)
|
"I dare anyone to follow the plot, which manages, like some ill-baked meringue, to be both too light on the surface and too densely clotted underneath."
|
Stephen Metcalf
|
|
61%
|
The New World (2005)
|
"The New World isn't Terrence Malick's best, but it's guiding him in the right direction."
|
Dana Stevens
|
|
43%
|
Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World (2006)
|
"All this, to spoof a petty little Hollywood ego? Too inside."
|
Stephen Metcalf
|
|
——
|
Cirque du Soleil - Fire Within (2004)
|
|
Virginia Heffernan
|
|
88%
|
Mutual Appreciation (2006)
|
"You might think of Mutual Appreciation as an emo cover of Godard's Masculine/Feminine: a meditation on the crisscrossed subjectivities of boys and girls, their mutual comprehension or lack thereof."
|
Nathan Lee
|
|
77%
|
Match Point (2005)
|
"Match Point is a good movie -- a good, solid movie."
|
Stephen Metcalf
|
|
78%
|
Munich (2005)
|
"Munich is the most potent, the most vital, the best movie of the year."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
51%
|
The Producers (2005)
|
"The stage performances haven't been scaled down: Everything is pitched to the second balcony. And Mel Brooks' material -- especially the retro queeny stereotypes -- is excruciatingly dated."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
52%
|
The Family Stone (2005)
|
"There are cringe-worthy passages and an overly sentimental structure (everyone pairs up so very tidily), but the performances are delightful, and the picture comes together."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
84%
|
King Kong (2005)
|
"However jawdropping the big effects (there's a dinosaur stampede and some giant white worms who suck men into their squishy maws), they're tenderly elbowed aside by scenes of tender intimacy."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
35%
|
Memoirs of a Geisha (2005)
|
"It skips lightly over the surface of its rich material, more preoccupied with making pretty pictures than dipping below the surface so that you can experience the world through the eyes of its traumatized, yet increasingly savvy, heroine."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
76%
|
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe (2005)
|
"An entertaining, emotional, and surprisingly intimate movie."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
46%
|
Rent (2005)
|
"It's real -- and, on screen, it's really cringe-worthy. Not quite Phantom of the Opera cringe-worthy, but not as much fun to blow raspberries at, either."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
76%
|
Transamerica (2006)
|
"Felicity Huffman's face is what holds you in Duncan Tucker's delightful Transamerica."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
57%
|
Breakfast on Pluto (2005)
|
"You'll be singing along to the soundtrack of Neil Jordan's enchanting Breakfast on Pluto, which boasts the most felicitous use of wall-to-wall pop songs I've ever heard."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
87%
|
Brokeback Mountain (2005)
|
"Ang Lee's formalism is so extreme that it's often laughable, and the sex is depicted as a holy union: Gay love has never been so sacred."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
66%
|
Pride and Prejudice (2003)
|
|
David Edelstein
|
|
10%
|
Aeon Flux (2005)
|
"Folks, I'll never understand studios. Aeon Flux is not that terrible. It's certainly more fun than a lot of films that get lovingly showcased."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
88%
|
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005)
|
"It's always a treat to see what big-studio-franchise cash can produce in the way of top-flight British (and Irish) actors."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
50%
|
The Dying Gaul (2005)
|
"I'm not going to spell out the collateral damage, but I found the ending cheap, contrived, and genuinely disgusting."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
65%
|
Sarah Silverman: Jesus Is Magic (2005)
|
"Silverman's onstage persona might be limited, but it's endlessly resonant."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
85%
|
Pride and Prejudice (2005)
|
"A joy to behold."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
61%
|
Jarhead (2005)
|
"Jarhead feels detached, and the internal turmoil of its protagonist (played by Jake Gyllenhaal) lacks urgency -- even with first-person narration to fill in some of the gaps."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
83%
|
Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang (2005)
|
"Downey spins joyfully back and forth between farce and realism. Is there any leading man more fun to watch?"
|
David Edelstein
|
|
26%
|
The Legend of Zorro (2005)
|
"Zorro is misnamed, since it's less about the legend than what happens when the legend goes home and gets yelled at by his wife."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
61%
|
Shopgirl (2005)
|
"Shopgirl is sadly vacuous, with a sadly vacuous center."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
68%
|
North Country (2005)
|
"North Country is powerful and then some."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
28%
|
Elizabethtown (2005)
|
"Elizabethtown needed a raffish, Preston Sturges-esque ensemble to offset the corn."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
19%
|
Domino (2005)
|
"Manages the feat of literally spelling things out and being utterly incoherent."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
95%
|
Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005)
|
"Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit is a bloody delight on every level."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
94%
|
The Squid and the Whale (2005)
|
"You can look at The Squid and the Whale as the truest kind of artistic coming-of-age story: a cathartic piece of self-criticism."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
57%
|
The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio (2005)
|
"An honest tear-jerker."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
82%
|
Serenity (2005)
|
"I mean Serenity no disrespect when I say it's enjoyably junky."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
90%
|
Capote (2005)
|
"Hoffman goes beyond the surface mannerisms and diction. He disappears into Capote."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
93%
|
Duma (2005)
|
"I like it. Maybe not as much as those other pictures, but enough to bemoan a system in which family films have been so geared to kids (and their parents) with a kind of attention deficit disorder that it's inhospitable to a measured piece of storytelling."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
93%
|
No Direction Home: Bob Dylan (2005)
|
"To narrate selected details from this journey from the Iron Range to Greenwich Village to Rock Star Babylon, we get generous, attention-span respecting clips of Dylan performances and reminiscences from carefully selected talking heads."
|
David Yaffe
|
|
87%
|
A History of Violence (2005)
|
"An absolutely sensational piece of filmmaking."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
38%
|
Flightplan (2005)
|
"A more than decent thriller."
|
David Edelstein
|
|
83%
|
Tim Burton's Corpse Bride (2005)
|
"The movie is so Burtonesque that it verges on self-parody -- but it's fun and stunningly beautiful anyway."
|
David Edelstein
|
77%
29%
88%
85%
45%
40%
