Paul Schrodt
Tomatometer-approved critic
Movies reviews only
| Rating | T-Meter | Title | Year | Review |
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Brüno (2009) |
At the very least, Brüno signals that while politics lag behind, the culture are ready to move on. - Esquire Magazine
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| Posted Oct 19, 2018
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Sleepwalk With Me (2012) |
The narrative of the struggling comedian on the road is the one Sleepwalk with Me gets right. - Esquire Magazine
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| Posted Oct 18, 2018
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Spring Breakers (2012) |
The sheer indistinctiveness of the plot allows Korine to rub up against it in his own distinctive way, cake it in the grime and dreamy, elliptical asides he's known for. Along the way, the movie becomes something more than the sum of its very cheap parts. - Esquire Magazine
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| Posted Oct 18, 2018
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Mixed Nuts (1994) |
Even for a Christmas comedy, it's blasphemous -- delightfully so. - Esquire Magazine
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| Posted Oct 17, 2018
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Withnail and I (1987) |
Certainly the funniest and possibly the truest comedy about male friendship. - Esquire Magazine
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| Posted Oct 17, 2018
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The Last Stand (2013) |
The refusal to make fun of these kind of Old West tropes is, oddly, what makes The Last Stand most relevant of all. - Esquire Magazine
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| Posted Oct 17, 2018
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Hunger (2008) |
It's hard to say what's more visceral: Fassbender's embodiment of a whittling body that refuses to give out, or McQueen's extended shots of prison brutality and the mess of cleaning it up. - Esquire Magazine
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| Posted Oct 17, 2018
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Okja (2017) |
Okja has a heart and an original story that's about actual ideas. - Esquire Magazine
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| Posted Jul 21, 2017
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When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (2006) |
Spike Lee's political statement is one of humanism, and the result is his most potent work in years. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted May 21, 2015
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(undefined) |
Although I'm not sure two movie credits qualify Lucky McKee as a "master" of horror, the young director has managed to contribute by far the most compelling episode yet to Showtime's hit-or-miss series. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted May 21, 2015
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Cosmopolis (2012) |
It's effective for all the reasons, as propaganda, it's not: It's messy and goofy and unsettling. - Esquire Magazine
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| Posted Aug 21, 2012
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Good Neighbours (2010) |
The tone of the film is off-key from the beginning, a fact that's not helped by the presence of Speedman, onetime Felicity heartthrob. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Jul 28, 2011
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Jig (2011) |
The documentary Jig presents a world that approaches child pageantry in its self-contained weirdness. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Jun 15, 2011
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Beautiful Boy (2010) |
Its unmoored, oxygen-deprived atmosphere reflects the current mood of grief literature, inspired by Joan Didion's groundbreaking The Year of Magical Thinking. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Jun 03, 2011
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Spork (2010) |
Never feels authentically out-there because it still more or less toes the line of every teen comedy from Welcome to the Dollhouse to Mean Girls. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted May 27, 2011
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Hard Breakers (2010) |
The film might be the closest approximation to the gender inverse of an Apatow flick. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted May 19, 2011
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The Conspirator (2010) |
The Conspirator is an über-genre movie, a hybrid of two classic Hollywood modes--the historical reenactment and the courtroom drama--that tries to satisfy the demands of both. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Apr 14, 2011
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Trust (2010) |
Characters are less characters than placards in a revved-up PSA about the Gen Y horrors of teen rape. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Apr 04, 2011
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Mala Noche (1986) |
White and other critics have accused the director of "race and class indifference," but Van Sant's approach has always been personal and deeply confessional, if not outwardly political. - House Next Door
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| Posted Mar 04, 2011
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The Velvet Underground & Nico (1966) |
It would be hard to believe that Gus Van Sant hadn't seen The Velvet Underground and Nico, Andy Warhol's landmark recording of an hour-long performance by the band, before he made Last Days. - House Next Door
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| Posted Mar 04, 2011
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Putty Hill (2010) |
As with the nod to skating culture, Porterfield reclaims cheesy pop-culture detritus to illuminate his characters' need for escape. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Feb 17, 2011
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Dressed (2011) |
As movies about the fashion world go, Dressed isn't very fabulous. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Feb 03, 2011
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The Dilemma (2011) |
Ron Howard movies inspire that rare kind of allergic reaction: They're so unremarkable they're actually frustrating. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Jan 13, 2011
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Gulliver's Travels (2010) |
Marketed as a hip, modern adaptation of a classic, the movie feels more like a Christmastime TV special projected in 3D. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Dec 22, 2010
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Life as We Know It (2010) |
It's easy to become cynical about a certain brand of funny-sad familial comedies like Life as We Know It. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Oct 13, 2010
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Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole (2010) |
3D has jumped the shark. Again. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Sep 23, 2010
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Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo (2009) |
Throughout, the film circles around the sociological significance of the rodeo. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Sep 15, 2010
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Takers (2010) |
Remember when Paul Walker had a career, Matt Dillon had indie credibility, Jay Hernandez was just a cute face, and Chris Brown was an R&B singer without a rap sheet? - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Aug 26, 2010
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Lottery Ticket (2010) |
Essentially Trading Places by way of Next Friday, Lottery Ticket never rises above formula. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Aug 19, 2010
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Smash His Camera (2010) |
The film refuses to pass judgment on the controversial photog, letting him do his own thing. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Jul 30, 2010
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Extract (2009) |
Mike Judge doesn't sugarcoat his characters as anything more than slightly contemptible fratboys, a quality that makes his brand of comedy alternately liberating and frustrating. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Sep 03, 2009
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The September Issue (2009) |
For the past year or so, Wintour's been on the media warpath to win back her image, and Cutler seems happy to oblige. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Aug 27, 2009
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Road to Fame (2008) |
Full of enthusiasm but short on wit or self-awareness, Casi Divas is pretty weak as satire. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Aug 20, 2009
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Winged Creatures (2008) |
Less a movie than a sociology thesis. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Aug 04, 2009
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Eleven Minutes (2008) |
A movie for Project Runway obsessives only. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Feb 14, 2009
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The Love Guru (2008) |
Under a new name and equally aggressive ethnic branding, Austin Powers is alive again. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Jun 19, 2008
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Surfwise (2007) |
Surfwise tries to separate itself from the fray of political documentaries by not taking itself too seriously. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted May 09, 2008
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Refusenik (2007) |
Using title cards, interviews, and endless archival footage, Bialis is able to tie a very specific history to the course of 20th century upheaval. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted May 09, 2008
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The Red Balloon (1956) |
The story of a boy and his toy, The Red Balloon is widely praised for its narrative and visual "purity," but not enough is said about the movie's delightful manipulation. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Apr 26, 2008
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Jellyfish (2007) |
Jellyfish exists in a no man's land, adrift in vague, waterlogged abstractions on which the filmmakers can hang their characters' collective baggage. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Mar 25, 2008
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Fighting for Life (2008) |
Though it superficially deals with how military doctors work during a long and unpopular war, Terry Sanders's film more closely disentangles a specialized establishment in its own right. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Mar 07, 2008
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The Prince Contemplating His Soul (2005) |
As far as fable imports go, Bab'Aziz is a step up from the Disney-grade moralism of Milarepa, but it's even less memorable. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Feb 08, 2008
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Build a Ship, Sail to Sadness (2008) |
Build a Ship, Sail to Sadness is a movie every bit as cumbersome and trying as its title. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Feb 02, 2008
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Liberty Kid (2007) |
Unanswered questions about Derrick's kids and Spanish-speaking mother abound, and their all-too-infrequent interactions point to a hard-knuckled realism about post-9/11 New York that begs to be seen. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Jan 10, 2008
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Imaginary Witness: Hollywood and the Holocaust (2004) |
The most dispassionate account of the Holocaust in the last 20 years. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Dec 22, 2007
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Flakes (2007) |
One look at Aaron Stanford's chain-smoking, long-haired musician in a Hanes t-shirt and you know Flakes wants so badly to be hip. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Dec 17, 2007
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Naked Boys Singing (2007) |
Naked Boys Singing! is the biggest waste of d**k since Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger in Brokeback Mountain. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Oct 12, 2007
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My Name Is Alan, and I Paint Pictures (2007) |
True to its title, My Name Is Alan and I Paint Pictures sees the world through its subject's childlike eyes. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Sep 23, 2007
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The Jane Austen Book Club (2007) |
The Jane Austen Book Club is pitched as The First Wives Club for coffeehouse intellectuals. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Sep 16, 2007
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Milarepa: Magician, Murderer, Saint (2006) |
Myths are more popular in the movies than ever, but unlike the Christian extravaganza of The Chronicles of Narnia, Milarepa: Magician, Murderer, Saint won't be showing up on your kid's Netflix list. - Slant Magazine
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| Posted Sep 01, 2007
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