|
26%
|
Punisher: War Zone (2008)
|
"...like a Seagal movie on crank, only with Friday the 13th bogeyman Jason Voorhees in the lead, provided Jason were smart enough to use guns and missiles"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
7%
|
Shutter (2008)
|
"...like a video copy of The Ring which has so degraded that all the good bits are no longer visible."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
26%
|
Drillbit Taylor (2008)
|
"Drillbit Taylor is pretty good in almost every aspect other than its lead performance."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
40%
|
Dao huo xian (City Without Mercy) (Flash Point) (Fuse) (The Signal) (2007)
|
"There's nothing that I dislike about FLASH POINT, but I do wish it could be even more than it is"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
9%
|
10,000 B.C. (2008)
|
"...the Yagahl speak English with an inflection that ranges from fake-African to fake-Russian, sometimes within the same sentence."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
52%
|
Penelope (2006)
|
"...an enjoyable piece of fluff, ably anchored by Ricci in a full 180 from the confident freak that was Wednesday Addams back in the day. Insecure people are going to love this movie"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
3%
|
Witless Protection (2008)
|
"Carner directs so poorly that even set-pieces which ought to be interesting -- a Keystone Kops bit staged on a pig farm here, an oh-so-careful fight in an antique room there -- are rendered amateurishly."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
80%
|
The Spiderwick Chronicles (2008)
|
"SPIDERWICK's great charm is that it feels exactly like the kind of adventure story you might have imagined at the bottom of the garden one day during childhood."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
67%
|
Build a Ship, Sail to Sadness (2008)
|
"Despite the apparent ugliness and sloppiness of the piece, there's a real gem of inspiration at the core, and the character of Vincent is wonderful."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
21%
|
The Eye (2008)
|
"...it doesn't suck. It's far from brilliant, but as weekend multiplex popcorn fare, it mostly gets the job done."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
2%
|
Meet the Spartans (2008)
|
"Perhaps the most oft-quoted line from 300 is "Tonight, we dine in hell!" Chowing down on a box of Butterfinger Minis during a screening of Meet the Spartans, you will truly understand what that line means."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
23%
|
Mad Money (2008)
|
"It's mediocre, but it's not obnoxiously so. I had an okay time. But I had also had five beers."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
69%
|
I Am Legend (2007)
|
"For about three quarters of its running time, I was thinking this could be one of the very best movies of the year."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
42%
|
The Golden Compass (2007)
|
"I feel about it roughly the same way I did about the book -- hard to get into until the armored bears show up, and then pretty awesome as long as the bears hang around."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
89%
|
The Savages (2007)
|
"The name of the movie is one of those insufferable cutesy puns...but don't let that deter you from a film that achieves the rare balance of being both hilarious and tragic."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
63%
|
Holly (2007)
|
"...it's easy to imagine how another director might have felt the need to switch to slo-mo and cue the violins."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
95%
|
No Country for Old Men (2007)
|
"People are calling it the best film of the year, and if it isn't, it's darn close."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
50%
|
30 Days of Night (2007)
|
"If the comic book had never existed, this would be pretty cool. As is, it's a slightly missed opportunity with enough fun parts that it doesn't feel like a total waste."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
78%
|
1408 (2007)
|
"...one of the most gleefully loony things you'll see this year."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
67%
|
Right at Your Door (2007)
|
"There's no levity at all to distract from the unrelenting horror, unless you consider the entire film to be a big sick joke"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
39%
|
Hot Rod (2007)
|
"...hands-down the funniest, laugh till you cry and your cheeks hurt comedy of the year"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
92%
|
The Cool School (2008)
|
"...a fun, jazzy look at L.A.'s first real wave of modern artists"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
86%
|
Flight of the Living Dead: Outbreak on a Plane (Plane Dead) (2007)
|
"The crowd loved it. If you have any affinity at all for the idea of zombies on a plane, you will too."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
84%
|
Rocket Science (2007)
|
"This may be the most realistic high school underdog comedy since Welcome to the Dollhouse, if you consider that a comedy."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
75%
|
Sunshine (2007)
|
"Lots of advance reviews have complained that the film falls apart at the end, which I don't buy at all."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
82%
|
Talk to Me (2007)
|
"Dare one suggest Oscar noms for both leads? With Ejiofor, and I have said this on many occasions before, it is only a matter of time."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
57%
|
Interview (2007)
|
"No surprise that Buscemi can carry off this kind of performance, but Miller holds up her end, and is a magnificent tease."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
——
|
Bajo Juárez: La ciudad devorando a sus hijas ()
|
"This is the real Hostel, apparently"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
——
|
Prison Town, USA ()
|
"...never boring for a second."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
75%
|
The Last Winter (2007)
|
"...a talky indie that suddenly turns into a slasher flick where the killer is in fact the invisible hand of Mother Nature"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
100%
|
Half Moon (Niwe Mung) (2007)
|
"While perhaps overlong, it has some good laughs (what exactly are "woman-sniffing dogs"?) and moments of odd beauty"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
——
|
Chasing Ghosts: Beyond the Arcade (2007)
|
"...some who see this film will laugh at its protagonists, others with them. A little of both feels about right"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
56%
|
Charlie Bartlett (2007)
|
"...while the movie's not as radical as it seems to think it is, it does keep you guessing how it will all resolve."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
90%
|
Trigger Man (2007)
|
"...follow-up to the killer bat movie The Roost is superior in almost every way, and cheaper, too!"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
——
|
Dead Daughters (2007)
|
"Russia apparently hasn't yet received the news that the "J-horror" films as a trend are over"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
62%
|
Joshua (Joshua: The Devil's Child) (2007)
|
"[W]hy is it so hard to make a scary flick about evil kids these days? The Omen remake was pretty hilarious, and Joshua is ridiculous, though they are apparently attempting to re-position it as a "black comedy""
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
81%
|
Great World of Sound (2007)
|
"[Kene Holliday's] performance here is one of the year's best."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
67%
|
Dynamite Warrior (2007)
|
"I know we've all thought to ourselves at some point that kung-fu movies could use a bunch of dynamite firecrackers"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
70%
|
Moliere (Moliere ou Le comedien malgre lui) (2007)
|
"Tirard adds just a touch of tragedy for the humor to fully resonate and summons the spirit of his inspiration perhaps more effectively than director John Madden rendered the Bard in heat."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
91%
|
Brand Upon the Brain! (2006)
|
"The casual viewer may well reject the experimentalism outright, but for those who seek more unique rewards, they're definitely here."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
75%
|
Pierrepoint - The Last Hangman (2007)
|
"Morbid Goths and reserved Anglophiles can at last find some common ground"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
——
|
Tajja (The War of Flower) (Tazza: The High Rollers) (2006)
|
"...a sort of demented Karate Kid of the cards"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
53%
|
Eagle vs. Shark (2007)
|
"If Napoleon Dynamite were a little older, had a libido and lived in New Zealand, he'd be Jarrod"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
50%
|
Bickford Shmeckler's Cool Ideas (2007)
|
"Director Scott Lew is not without his own cool ideas (having Reno 911's Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon play campus cops is genius), but his focus is all over the place"
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
83%
|
Paprika (2006)
|
"As Valentines to the power of cinema, big dreams and the inner child go, it doesn't get much more exhilarating than this."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
45%
|
Pirates of the Caribbean: At Worlds End (2007)
|
"...some of the most subversive cinematic experimentation you're likely to see in a "tentpole franchise" epic in this or any year."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
90%
|
Dixie Chicks: Shut Up and Sing (2006)
|
"Look, to be honest, I could watch 93 minutes of Natalie Maines doing housework. That she has fantastic vocal chops is a major bonus, and her disdain for Bush is merely icing atop a significantly layered cake."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
73%
|
Jet Li's Fearless (Huo Yuan Jia) (Legend of a Fighter) (2006)
|
"The Terminator flicks also favored world peace but didn't pause the action for nearly an hour to rub it in."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
70%
|
Heading South (2006)
|
"In the end, one gets the sense that Cantet and his cast and crew mainly wanted to get paid to make a movie on a beautiful Santo Domingo beach among beautiful people."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
|
73%
|
Conversations With Other Women (2006)
|
" The split-screen gimmick is just that, but you could do a lot worse than watching the two gifted lead actors gab."
|
Luke Y. Thompson
|
