Suzanne Hanover/Columbia Pictures James Franco, Jonah Hill, Craig Robinson, Seth Rogen, Jay Baruchel and Danny McBride.
“This is the End” is a film that suffers from a serious identity crisis. On one hand, it’s a funny, winking look at celebrities coping with the apocalypse while on the other, it’s a comedy where the filmmakers threw ideas against a wall and used everything that stuck, smeared or stained.
With just a little more focus and restraint, this first-time directorial effort from Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, the writing team responsible for “Superbad” “Pineapple Express” and “The Green Hornet,” could have been a classic instead of just being unpredictably crass. More
“Superman IV: The Quest for Peace” is guilty not just of being an awful movie, but the fourth installment of the once-beloved franchise tramples any remaining audience goodwill after the uneven third edition.
At least you could see some connection to the superior initial two films, but everything about “Superman IV” is more reminiscent of a low-budget TV movie fortunate enough to have the movie cast intact. More
“Superman III” is the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde of the superhero franchise.
For the first hour, it’s a Joel Schumacher-level debacle that threatens to erase every shred of goodwill from the first two classic films, but the second hour finds a far more interesting direction that redeems it to a highly-flawed, yet entertaining adventure for the Man of Steel.
The biggest problem with the film is a lack of story focus and the reverence for the material that Director Richard Donner and story consultant Tom Mankiewicz brought to the first installment (and ¾ of the sequel).
Screenwriters David and Leslie Newman — no longer benefiting from Mankiewicz’s touch-up rewrites — go all-out with silly, campy sequences and can’t figure out if they’re making a superhero epic starring everyone’s favorite superhero or a Richard Pryor comedy.More
You’ve got to give Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson a lot of credit for their restraint in not routinely teaming up for lame buddy comedies after the massive success of “Wedding Crashers,” by far the biggest headlining hit of their careers.
“Wedding Crashers” was fresh, daring and became the 2000’s measuring stick of boys behaving badly comedy where people would say a subsequent film was just as funny as “Wedding Crashers.” Truthfully, none really captured that dynamic of bros gone wild until The Wolfpack descended on Vegas and made “The Hangover” every frat boy comedy’s inspiration post 2009 with its unpredictable, anything insane can happen approach.
And it’s in this new comedic landscape that Vaughn and Wilson reunite for “The Internship,” a comedy that while not as original or groundbreaking as their earlier effort, gets the most important aspect of the genre correct — it keeps you laughing consistently. More
Robert De Niro and Michelle Pfeiffer return to their mob roots in “The Family,” a comedy about a mafia family forced to relocate to Normandy, France under the witness protection program. Tommy Lee Jones co-stars in this film that’s directed and co-written by Luc Besson (“The Transporter“).
“The Family” comes to theaters Sept. 20. Typically, September is one of the year’s dead months for good movies, but I’m optimistic about this one. What do you think? Interested in checking it out?
Bonnie Osborne/CBS Films Aubrey Plaza (as Brandy) and Rachel Bilson (as Amber) star in CBS Films’ “THE TO DO LIST.”
Loosely inspired by the real-life adventures of first-time writer/director Maggie Carey, “The To Do List” is a heartfelt comedy about close friends and a special summer project. Set in 1993, valedictorian Brandy Klark (Aubrey Plaza) wants to shed her uptight image before college, so she assembles a to do list of all the “activities” she missed out on in high school. More
On Nov. 14, 2013, the Newseum, in partnership with Paramount Pictures, will open “Anchorman: The Exhibit,” featuring props, costumes and footage from the 2004 hit comedy “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy,” prior to the release of its highly anticipated sequel “Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues” from Paramount Pictures on Dec. 20.More
Barry Wetcher/ Summit Entertainment (From left) DAVE FRANCO, JESSE EISENBERG, ISLA FISHER and WOODY HARRELSON star in “NOW YOU SEE ME.”
“Now You See Me” is a cocktail of several beloved films with equal parts “Usual Suspects,” “Ocean’s Eleven,” “The Prestige” and “The Fugitive” resulting in a spellbinding caper that will keep you guessing right until the final act. More
“The Hangover” is the kind of brilliant comedy that will have you gasping, laughing so hard you’ll have tears in your eyes and rocking back in your chair from laughter. In other words, it’s flat out hilarious and it definitely needs to be on your very short list of films you must see this summer. More
Melinda Sue Gordon/Warner Bros. Pictures Alan (Zach Galifianakis), Phil (Bradley Cooper) and Stu (Ed Helms) in “The Hangover Part III.”
“The Hangover Part III” will be my 2013 example of why it’s better to just give the public what they need, not what they say they want.
In a summer that’s been filled thus far with largely underwhelming sequels, “The Hangover III” may be the most disappointing simply because it’s so uninspired and completely lacking the fun, spontaneous spirit of its predecessors. More
