Archive RSS Feed: Baltimoresun Movies Reviews

Winning the battle, losing the 'War'

(B+) When it's really bubbling, Charlie Wilson's War brings Broadway fizz to D.C., Houston and Cairo cocktail parties. It keeps you curious and amused for 97 minutes. But like many a cocktail party, it has an upside and a downside. It might refresh you after ponderous events or "event films" - but still leave you longing for more long-lasting experiences. It stars Tom Hanks, almost back to loose, wisecracking form, as a sybaritic East Texas congressman who uses his connections and committee positions to wangle funding for the Afghan rebels during the Soviet invasion.

Read more : 21.12.2007 05:00:00

'Sweeney Todd' shows Burton, Depp at their cutting-edge best

(A-) The eyes have it in Tim Burton's Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, and they belong to Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter. Burton's ineluctably involving version of the Stephen Sondheim musical about the homicidal hair-trimmer of the title (Depp) - and the meat-pie-maker Mrs. Lovett (Carter) who comes up with the idea of using corpses as ingredients - plays each crucial action off the otherworldly orbs of his stars. The impact is hypnotic.

Read more : 21.12.2007 05:00:00

'The Dewey Cox Story' offers hard-rocking laughs

(A-) Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story has 20-20 hyperbole.

Read more : 21.12.2007 05:00:00

'Juno': A grating teen's coming-of-age tale

(C+) The deceptively smug teen comedy Juno uses an arsenal of hipper-than-hip verbiage to tell a teeny tiny story about a pregnant, middle-class teenage girl, Juno MacGuff (Ellen Page), and the upper-middle-class couple, Mark and Vanessa Loring (Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner), who agree to adopt her baby.

Read more : 21.12.2007 05:00:00

'National Treasure' fails by following same map

(C+) National Treasure: Book of Secrets is a strictly by-the-book sequel: It doesn't cheat series fans but it doesn't offer many thrills or surprises or lingering puzzles, either. The biggest mystery may be why it's subtitled "Book of Secrets" and not "Search for the Lost City of Gold."

Read more : 21.12.2007 05:00:00

Savoring 'The Savages'

Film offers a startling, touching look at a family's trying times

Pros and cons of 'The Great Debaters'

Even when 'The Great Debaters' seems formulaic, its actors exude strength

'The Water Horse' is almost the stuff of legends

(B-) The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep is one of the family-friendliest films of the year. That's a good thing. The problem is that even the youngest person in the family may find the story familiar. That's not so good.

Portrait of turbulent punk star

(B+) Julien Temple's tumultuous and moving Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten, views the Clash as the Beatles or the Rolling Stones of punk - and Strummer, their front man, songwriter and spiritual leader, as a Nowhere Man who turned himself into an Everyman from Everywhere.

'Missed Call' is disconnected

(F) Here's proof positive that awards season is over. In One Missed Call, French director Eric Vallette creates an American horror film based on a Japanese shocker.