Capsule reviews of films playing in town

Babel (R, 142 minutes) Alejandro González Iñárritu (director of 21 Grams and Amores Perros) contributes another weighty ensemble piece. This complex, occasionally sluggish rumination on communication (or the lack thereof) in modern-day society takes place in three places at once. In Morocco, a couple (Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett) gets involved in a shooting crisis. […]

Capsule reviews of movies playing in town

Alpha Dog (R, 117 minutes) Mr. Sexy Back himself, Justin Timberlake, stars in this controversial crime drama based on the life of Jesse James Hollywood, a notorious drug dealer who became one of the youngest men ever on the FBI’s Most Wanted List. Hollywood is still on trial, so prosecutors wanted the film pulled from […]

Capsule reviews of films playing at Charlottesville theaters

Alpha Dog (R, 117 minutes) Mr. Sexy Back himself, Justin Timberlake stars in this controversial crime drama based on the life of Jesse James Hollywood, a notorious drug dealer who became one of the youngest men ever on the FBI’s Most Wanted List. Hollywood is still on trial, so prosecutors wanted the film pulled from […]

Capsule reviews of films playing in town

Apocalypto (R, 138 minutes) For the follow-up to his worldwide smash, The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson has chosen this dark adventure drama set in the fading days of the Mayan empire. The story centers around Jaguar Paw (Rudy Youngblood), a young man chosen for human sacrifice who flees the kingdom to avoid his […]

Capsule reviews of films playing in town

Apocalypto (R, 138 minutes) For the follow-up to his worldwide smash, The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson has chosen this dark adventure drama set in the fading days of the Mayan empire. The story centers around Jaguar Paw (Rudy Youngblood), a young man chosen for human sacrifice who flees the kingdom to avoid his […]

What’s playing?

Babel (R, 142 minutes) Alejandro González Iñárritu (director of 21 Grams and Amores Perros) contributes another weighty ensemble piece. This complex rumination on communication (or the lack thereof) in modern-day society takes place in three places at once. In Morrocco, a couple (Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett) gets involved in a shooting crisis. In California, […]

Film reviews

Using my infallible powers of precognition, I predict that 2007 will be a good year for magicians. And I\’m not talking about those faux-hip “street” magicians like David Blaine\-heir time is up. No, I\’m talking about the old-fashioned stage magician, the guy with the doves and the tuxedo. Late 2006 has already seen two tricky, turn-of-the-century magician yarns hit movie theaters (The Illusionist and The Prestige). Do I sense a trend akin to 1998\’s asteroid chic (which swept—and destroyed\-he world courtesy of Armageddon and Deep Impact)? Ask me again next spring, when models are pulling rabbits out of their Christian Dior top hats on the runways of Paris.

Film reviews

Catch a Fire (PG-13, 98 minutes) Aussie Phillipe Noyce (The Quiet American, Rabbit-Proof Fence, Patriot Games) directs this dark political thriller set in South Africa during the turbulent 1980s. Derek Luke (Antwone Fisher) portrays real-life hero Patrick Chamusso who was jailed and tortured after being wrongly suspected of sabotage at an oil refinery where he […]

Detail work

“God is in the details,” said German-born architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. (Or maybe it was Gustave Flaubert…Nobody’s really sure.) The point is that the true miracle of creation lies not in the grand, showy works, but in the seemingly inconsequential details.

Film reviews

Man of the YearPG-13, 115 minutesNow Playing at Carmike Cinema 6 It’s always a bit depressing when you can imagine the entire pitch meeting that proceeded the making of a particular Hollywood film. I’m fairly confident the brainstorming session for Man of the Year went something like this: “How about Robin Williams as a wacky […]