|
|
Raiders of the Lost Ark
(1981)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Raiders of the Lost Ark has the texture of a film bursting with influences, and Lucas and Spielberg have managed to get them in without strain.
Posted May 04, 2023
|
|
2.5/4
|
Memphis Belle
(1990)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
What's memorable about the film is the high degree of accuracy. There are a number of gaffes, due primarily to filmmaking compromises.
Posted Feb 08, 2019
|
|
3.5/4
|
Excalibur
(1981)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
There is no real difference between "Kagemusha" and "Excalibur" except for our inability to savor our heritage as much as the Japanese appreciate theirs.
Posted Feb 01, 2019
|
|
2/4
|
AC/DC: Rock Power
(2008)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Retitled from earlier release: "A true AC/DC fan knows the volume has to be cranked up enough so that the bass notes can separate your vertebrae..."
Posted Jan 24, 2019
|
|
3/4
|
The Final Countdown
(1980)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Best bad movie of the year. Best because it's carefully crafted, streamlined entertainment, bad because it's monumentally silly. We know it's awful, but we have fun anyway.
Posted Jan 23, 2019
|
|
4/4
|
Dunkirk
(2017)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
The pleasure in the storytelling arc is how elements move swiftly together. Nolan's biggest trick is the film starts out being epic and moves effortlessly to the intimate ....
Posted Jul 20, 2017
|
|
2/4
|
Pali Road
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
We get the Chinese exports that are huge blockbusters, but there's clearly a market for a slight, romantic mystery that in the United States would air on the Lifetime channel.
Posted Apr 29, 2016
|
|
2/4
|
Criminal
(2016)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Seems part of his brain is missing, waiting to be filled. They might as well named his character Tabula Rasa.
Posted Apr 14, 2016
|
|
3.5/4
|
The Jungle Book
(2016)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
The point where it breaks loose is when the movie shifts mood and tone in order to reprise the cheesy pop songs from the 1967 animated film. Way to renew copyright, Disney!
Posted Apr 13, 2016
|
|
3/4
|
13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi
(2016)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
What "13 Hours" does brilliantly is recreate the absolute chaos and stifling options of urban warfare in the third world, the best film to do so since "Black Hawk Down."
Posted Jan 22, 2016
|
|
1/4
|
In the Heart of the Sea
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
This tale, which should be expansive and grand, is hijacked by the demands of the 3D process, making it small and crowded, myopically claustrophobic and deeply murky.
Posted Dec 11, 2015
|
|
2/4
|
The Good Dinosaur
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
While I can certainly marvel at the realistic computerized water in a movie, I don't go to the movies to marvel at computerized water.
Posted Nov 30, 2015
|
|
3.5/4
|
The 33
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
One of the great things about "The 33" is the too-rare portrayal of South Americans as decent, hard-working people with loving families.
Posted Nov 13, 2015
|
|
2.5/4
|
Spectre
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
It ends with a button capper that is so musty and old-Bond that the audience simultaneously groaned and squealed with delight. Which pretty much sums up all Bond movies.
Posted Nov 10, 2015
|
|
1.5/4
|
Our Brand Is Crisis
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Joaquin de Almeida has a roiling core of self-loathing that's both amusing and terrifying - one we've seen too often, not in the theater, but at the ballot box.
Posted Nov 02, 2015
|
|
2/4
|
The Last Witch Hunter
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Does it work? Yes, mostly because of Diesel and Leslie, who clearly love this kind of loony fun.
Posted Oct 26, 2015
|
|
3.5/4
|
The Intern
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Skates almost entirely on the luminous strength of its two stars. DeNiro and Hathaway have an evident chemistry ... if a man had written the film, they'd wind up in the sack!
Posted Sep 26, 2015
|
|
3/4
|
Black Mass
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Johnny Depp has certainly played a number of odd characters over the year, but this is the first time in memory he's played a monster. And what a monster.
Posted Sep 24, 2015
|
|
1/4
|
We Are Your Friends
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
There is a howling deadness at the heart of "Friends" however; it lies in the charisma-challenged relationship of Zac Efron's Young DJ and Emily Ratajkowski's Hot Girlfriend.
Posted Aug 29, 2015
|
|
3/4
|
American Ultra
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
The inescapable conclusion is that this is essentially a Disney princess movie for tween girls, but made for adolescent boys with runaway testosterone.
Posted Aug 24, 2015
|
|
2/4
|
The Man From U.N.C.L.E.
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
"U.N.C.L.E." must have seemed tailor-made for Ritchie's peculiar talents. (I think I'm going to be using the word "peculiar" a lot when describing this film.)
Posted Aug 14, 2015
|
|
2.5/4
|
Ant-Man
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Just in time, the first time Ant-Man shrinks down to ant size, it's such a wonder of marvelous CGI magic that everyone in the theater wakes up like an alarm has gone off.
Posted Jul 18, 2015
|
|
1/4
|
The Gallows
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Praising "The Gallows" is rather like pointing out how wonderful the frosting decorations are on a turd.
Posted Jul 10, 2015
|
|
1.5/4
|
Me and Earl and the Dying Girl
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
The harsh reality of mortality interferes with the budding, golden lives of young people. Not just those who die, but those who have to experience the bummerness of it all.
Posted Jul 06, 2015
|
|
2/4
|
San Andreas
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Maybe if Giamatti and Johnson had switched roles, we'd have had a full course instead of eye candy for disaster buffs.
Posted May 29, 2015
|
|
2/4
|
Aloha
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
I've lost count of how many times Alec Baldwin enters a movie just at the point it desperately needs a comic lift.
Posted May 29, 2015
|
|
4/4
|
Tomorrowland
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
You can't escape the impression this was originally written as an animated film, mostly because things occasionally go all Wile E. Coyote on us.
Posted May 25, 2015
|
|
3/4
|
Avengers: Age of Ultron
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
The cast, OMG. There are more people crowded in here - either in major roles or in brilliant cameos (Andy Serkis, I'm looking at you) - than are at Walgreens' on prom night.
Posted May 01, 2015
|
|
3/4
|
The Age of Adaline
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
An elegant, reflective piece of work that may not appeal to everybody - but if you're out on your first movie date, it may be just the thing to get you to first base.
Posted Apr 26, 2015
|
|
3.5/4
|
The Divergent Series: Insurgent
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
After the tepid snore that was the last "Hunger Games" installment, "Insurgent" is muscular, brisk and imaginative - albeit on an emotive teenage level.
Posted Mar 23, 2015
|
|
1/4
|
Cinderella
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Most fairy tales on film contain either enough wit or verve or spectacle to engage an entire audience, but there is nothing here to engage the adult viewer. Nothing.
Posted Mar 15, 2015
|
|
.5/4
|
The Lazarus Effect
(2015)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Lovely Olivia Wilde gets so many extreme close-ups that you feel like her dermatologist. She winds up looking like those outer-space pictures of dead moons.
Posted Feb 28, 2015
|
|
1/4
|
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
A ridiculous, bloated, stumbling Baron Harkonnen of a movie; depressing, dull and flatulent with wasted angst. It don't got no bounce.
Posted Nov 23, 2014
|
|
3/4
|
The Theory of Everything
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
When the full force of the disease hits, Hawking is reduced to a twist-tie of a human being, sentenced to a life of gigantic thoughts and pathetic movements. He's pretzelled.
Posted Nov 21, 2014
|
|
3.5/4
|
Fury
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Charmingly old-school FDR-Democrat foxhole-buddy Americana: Citizens from all walks of life facing a common enemy and working together - a touchingly old-fashioned notion.)
Posted Oct 17, 2014
|
|
1.5/4
|
The Equalizer
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
A cheerful gut-punch slice of vigilante porn, and such a mortifying waste of talent that audiences gradually sink into a slough of despair over the state of cinema art.
Posted Sep 26, 2014
|
|
2/4
|
The November Man
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Paranoid anomie was just the thing in a post-Watergate world back in the '70s, and movies then reflected it. That makes this delightfully, unapologetically old-fashioned.
Posted Aug 29, 2014
|
|
2.5/4
|
Into the Storm
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Pretty much a "Twister" reboot, full of CGI sturm und drang (probably the only time that phrase is actually appropriate) albeit simultaneously more serious and less impactful.
Posted Aug 09, 2014
|
|
0/4
|
Cannonball Run II
(1984)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
The movie is a genuine cultural artifact, a relic given to us by a band of entertainers from long ago, who live in self-imposed exile in the dusty, neon hellhole of Las Vegas.
Posted Jul 26, 2014
|
|
1.5/4
|
And So It Goes
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
How you react to "And So It Goes" depends entirely on your appreciation of Diane Keaton. The movie is so Keaton-centric it might as well have been titled "La Di Da, La Di Da."
Posted Jul 25, 2014
|
|
3/4
|
Wish I Was Here
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Zach Braff's sophomore feature, is either wildly self-indulgent or genuine and heartfelt, and certainly both, and that's okay.
Posted Jul 19, 2014
|
|
3/4
|
Sex Tape
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Segal and Diaz deserve combat pay for some of the naked stuff they go through. (No, you're not going to see full frontal, or pubal or boobal. Plenty of backal however.)
Posted Jul 19, 2014
|
|
4/4
|
Ilo Ilo
(2013)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
This quiet little domestic drama from Singapore reminds us films can achieve near-impossible heights and depths of intimacy and empathy.
Posted Jun 28, 2014
|
|
3/4
|
Maleficent
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
It's interesting that Angelina Jolie can undergo four hours of professional Hollywood special effects makeup and wind up looking just like Grace Jones.
Posted May 30, 2014
|
|
3.5/4
|
The Hornet's Nest
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
It's worth pointing out that two dozen journalists have been killed in the line of duty on Afghanistan's front lines, bringing the war back home. And they can't shoot back.
Posted May 24, 2014
|
|
2/4
|
Million Dollar Arm
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
All the potential edges have been sanded off. And so, a quite remarkable true story, no matter how truthfully told, feels like a formulaic fable.
Posted May 16, 2014
|
|
2/4
|
Godzilla
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
The American nightmare that provides context and weight is the 9/11 attack, and the long shadow of that horror has permeated American films since.
Posted May 15, 2014
|
|
3/4
|
The Amazing Spider-Man 2
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
Looking back, it's apparent that the only two creations of cultural mythology created in the 1960s that matter are "Star Trek" and "Spider-Man."
Posted May 03, 2014
|
|
3.5/4
|
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
The movie has many quiet, insightful moments that lend gravity to the situation, as well as some clever fish-out-of-water character definition.
Posted Mar 31, 2014
|
|
1.5/4
|
Bad Words
(2014)
|
Burl Burlingame
|
It's just too damn amiable to be outrageous, and if it ain't outrageous, it's a swing-and-a-miss at the premise. Not good when playing in Pee Wee League.
Posted Mar 31, 2014
|
