Jan 09 2007
Keiran was supposed to start this, but he never came back to finish his post. I’m tired of waiting since it was a million years ago that he started writing it. 
This is the list from Friends where you pick five celebrities you can sleep with if you had the chance and it doesn’t count as cheating. 
Go!
Jan 09 2007
Casino Royale
Directed: Martin Campbell
Daniel Craig is the new James Bond. They are going back to the beginning and showing how he became a 007 agent, but in current times.
I grew up on Roger Moore as James Bond. Even though I thought the movies were cool, and I loved the theme songs to For Your Eyes Only and A View to a Kill (cheesy 80′s!), I never understood why any of the women in the movies found Roger Moore attractive. It could be because as I got older, he was becoming ancient on screen, but even looking back to when he started James Bond, I don’t get it. When Timothy Dalton became Bond, I was even more confused since he was boring and stupid. I thought Pierce Bronson was a good choice, but he’s still too bland for me.
Recently, I have been watching all the old James Bond movies and saw that Sean Connery used to actually be attractive. Amazing! I still rolled my eyes at the women swooning over him. He seemed a little too full of himself and forced himself on most of the women. Scandalous!
Now, watching Daniel Craig, a man who isn’t conventionally handsome but damn sexy, I can completely buy any of the women in the movie falling for him. While I was rooting for Clive Owen or Ewan McGregor to get the next Bond role, I’m very happy with the current choice, especially when he is in his little swim trunks or naked during a torture scene. Yum! Oh sorry, should you not be saying “Yum!” during a torture scene? Well, they shouldn’t have had him naked then.
Beyond him being sexy, I thoroughly enjoyed it as an action movie. The bad guy wasn’t laughable like they have been in the recent Bond flicks. I did miss the gadgets, but the action scenes were thrilling and amazing to watch. The long foot-chase scene near the beginning of the movie featured a base jumping bad guy that was extremely impressive.
My only complaint about the movie was it seemed to end in two places, yet continued on for a bit longer. After the bad guy was caught, I was wondering why we were still watching the movie, so it made me suspect something was up. Then when I was sure it was over, there was still a bit more of Bond getting his revenge.
Bond fell in love in this movie, which is different from almost all other Bond movies, but his heart was broken. It was a nice set up to show why he just goes through one woman after another, which I am guessing he’ll start up again after this one. Well, I guess he’ll start it for the first time since this movie seems to be starting the entire franchise over from scratch. I don’t mind it, since it desperately needed it. I didn’t fall asleep during this one like I did in the last two or three Bond movies.
Grade: A-
Jan 07 2007
Since there always seems to be new and returning shows, I thought I’d start to list them here on a weekly basis rather than every few months. Schedules seem to change too much to post them too much in advance.
Returning Shows
Surreal Life: Fame Games
Channel: VH-1
Time: 9 ET/PT
Premieres: Sunday, January 7
It’s an “all-star” edition of the series where previous participants come back trying to win a $100,000 prize. Those returning: Verne Troyer (Mini Me), Ron Jeremy, Joanie Laurer (Chyna Doll), Sandy Denton (Pepa), Brigitte Nielsen, Vanilla Ice, Robin Leach, Emmanuel Lewis, Andrea Lowell, C.C. Deville.
The Apprentice
Channel: NBC
Time: 9:30 ET/PT
Premieres: Sunday, January 7
Donald Trump moves the show to Southern California for the sixth season with new boardroom advisors–his kids, Ivanka and Donald Jr. There is also an added twist for the 18 hopefuls–the winners get to spend the week in the mansion while the losers get to sleep in the backyard with tents, outdoor showers and port-a-potties.
The L Word
Channel: SHO
Time: 10 ET/PT
Premieres: Sunday, January 7
The lesbian series returns for a fourth season. Bette is trying to stop Tina from taking Angelica away from her. Cybill Shepherd and Marlee Matlin join the cast this season.
The Janice Dickinson Modeling Agency
Channel: OXY
Time: 10 ET/PT
Premieres: Wednesday, January 10
Janice Dickinson returns for a second season of yelling at models and those that work for her while saying she is helping them.
Nashville Star
Channel: USA
Time: 10 ET/PT
Premieres: Thursday, January 11
Jewel is the new host along with country-rapper Cowboy Troy to narrow down 10 contestants to one winner in this country-singing contest.
New Shows
Grease: You’re the One That I Want
Channel: NBC
Time: 8 ET/PT
Premieres: Sunday, January 7
A nine-week competition that will whittle down a group of unknowns to find the perfect Danny Zuko and Sandy Olsson to perform in an upcoming Broadway production of Grease. There will be three judges, but the audience will be the final vote to pick the winners.
Lincoln Heights
Channel: ABC Family
Time: 7 ET/PT
Premieres: Monday, January 8
A police officer wants to improve the inner-city neighborhood he grew up in, so he moves his family there. Then he needs to balance his good deeds with keeping his family safe from what the area has turned into.
Gay, Straight or Taken
Channel: Lifetime
Time: 8 ET/PT
Premieres: Monday, January 8
A dating show where a girl must pick the straight guy from three where one is straight, one is gay and one is taken. If she guesses correctly, she wins a dream vacation for her pick. If she guesses incorrectly, then the single guy gets the trip without her.
I Love New York
Channel: VH1
Time: 9 ET/PT
Premieres: Monday, January 8
New York was twice rejected on Flavor of Love, but she grabbed enough attention to her her own show where 20 bachelors will be vying for her affections.
Armed & Famous
Channel: CBS
Time: 8 ET/PT
Premieres: Wednesday, January 10
Celebrities join the police academy, but I’m not sure why. Those working the night shift in Munice, Indiana: Erik Estrada, LaToya Jackson, Jack Osbourne, Jason “Wee-Man” Acuna (pro skateboarder), and Trish Stratus (WWE champion wrestler).
Sources: TV Guide, AOL, Entertainment Weekly
Jan 06 2007
Nationwide Releases
Freedom Writers
Directed: Richard LaGravenese
Based on the true story of a first-time teacher that listens to her students that hate each other because of their different races and teaches them to write about their lives.
RT Score: 64%
RT Consensus: Freedom Writers is a frank, formulaic entry in the inspirational inner-city teacher genre, with an energetic Hilary Swank leading the appealing cast of unknowns.
A movie you’ve seen plenty of times before, but never mind.
– Phil Villarreal
Arizona Daily Star
In the hands of writer-director Richard LaGravenese, Freedom Writers turns out to be a superb piece of mainstream entertainment.
– Scott Foundas
L.A. Weekly
Erin herself is so unbelievably saintly — and her fellow teachers so snivellingly evil — that she’s impossible to believe as anything more than an inspiration-bot.
– Josh Bell
Las Vegas Weekly
Takes to screen w/gritted teeth & edgy determination to teach something worthwhile. Strong performances & tear jerking message barrel through its sometimes rickety structure.
– Ross Anthony
Hollywood Report Card
Although Freedom Writers is the latest in a long line of saint-saves-students stories, it takes the bold approach of being earnest, honest and unafraid to be called naive. As a result, it’s extremely affecting.
– John Anderson
Variety
Happily N’Ever After
Directed: Paul J. Bolger
An evil stepmother decides that fairy tales shouldn’t have happily ever after endings, so she makes one have an unhappy ending instead.
RT Score: 5%
RT Consensus: Happily N’Ever After has none of the moxy, edge, or postmodern wit of the other fairy-tales-gone-haywire CG movie it so blatantly rips off.
The press notes boast that the total production time was only 15 months, ‘unheard of for a first-class computer animated movie.’ Maybe there’s a reason why that’s unheard-of.
– Gregory Kirschling
Entertainment Weekly
Problem is, it’s criminally short on ideas, and unwilling to take risks — the characters keep talking about fairy tales gone ‘edgy,’ but there’s never anything significant at stake here.
– Tasha Robinson
Onion AV Club
The film is so self aware and pseudo hip that it’s incredibly annoying. It uses every cutesy “hey look at me” film class 101 trick, including bad narration from Freddie Prinze Jr.
– Michelle Alexandria
Eclipse Magazine
Not counting derivative, obnoxious, poorly animated, and woefully unfunny, what Happily is most of all is dull.
– David Cornelius
eFilmCritic.com
Ella’s so blindly devoted to the Prince, and so convinced that he’s the one to save the day, that she seems just another swooning groupie rather than a worthy heroine.
– Steven D. Greydanus
Christianity Today
Code Name: The Cleaner
Directed: Les Mayfield
Cedric the Entertainer is a janitor that gets amnesia at the same time he wakes up next to a dead FBI agent. He thinks he must be special ops while he tries to figure out what happened.
RT Score: 4%
RT Consensus: The affable Cedric is wasted in Code Name: The Cleaner, a limp action/comedy flick which juggles between lame, worn-out jokes and cheesy kung-fu sequences.
Musty jokes about snooty English butlers might be forgivable, but not when other highlights include Cedric spanking an old lady in an elevator (she likes it) or a janitor who raps about mopping up doodie.
– Scott Tobias
Onion AV Club
If Cedric The Entertainer keeps making movies like this, The Honeymooners and Johnson Family Vacation, he may really have to work as a janitor.
– Willie Waffle
WaffleMovies.com
…I humbly submit that Cedric the Entertainer be required to give up the “Entertainer” portion of his nom de plume until he actually starts entertaining us.
– Pete Vonder Haar
Film Threat
Nicollette Sheridan, playing a femme fatale, is all hard body and desperate cheekbones; you just want to give the poor woman a malted, and some acting lessons.
– Stephen Whitty
Newark Star-Ledger
How do films this stale and generic continue to get made, let alone with topflight talent? Cedric has been stealing scenes from bigger names for nearly a decade; he deserves better than a few amusingly-improvised minutes at the end of his own movie.
– Elizabeth Weitzman
New York Daily News
The story keeps stopping dead to deliver product placement for Jake’s favorite brands of junk food. There must be a better way to work Skittles into the script than to have Jake keep saying things like, ‘I love Skittles.’
– Kyle Smith
New York Post
Limited Releases
Thr3e
Directed: Robby Henson
A Saw-like pyscho called Riddle Killer taunts his victims with puzzles and riddles that usually lead to their death.
RT Score: 9%
RT Consensus: Thr3e is a shoddily made, thrill-free thriller that isn’t half as good as the several movies it borrows from (Adaptation, Saw, Se7en).
Perfect for that good Christian family who’s aching to see a neutered, unoriginal crime thriller that clumsily coughs up its ‘spiritual’ theme only in the last line.
– Jason Ferguson
Orlando Weekly
This is one of the most confusing, horribly written movies I’ve ever seen, and I’m the king of watching bad movies… and liking them.
– Thom Koschwanez
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
it’s awfully familiar, right up to the ending, which bogarts the ending of another recent thrill-kill movie but, in fairness, I won’t reveal that flick’s identity.
– Chris Hewitt (St. Paul)
St. Paul Pioneer Press
Ultimately aimed at a Christian audience looking for genre entertainment with a certain sense of propriety, the film tries to serve two masters and doesn’t quite deliver for either.
– Maitland McDonagh
TV Guide’s Movie Guide
A tame variation on the usual serial-killer art direction and a hilarious number of A-Team-style explosions in which no one is killed. it’s offensively dull.
– M.E. Russell
Oregonian
Jan 06 2007
Marci’s birthday was on Tuesday, but we celebrated it last night. It had three parts.
Part 1 – Drinks! – Olive or Twist Martini Bar
Marci wanted to attend one of 94.7′s live Cuervo Cocktail Mix with DJs from Area 54 spinning.
It was super windy last night, but we made it to the bar. It was pretty cool in the Pearl District. It had low comfy couches lining the entire bar with round tables. It was pretty small, but didn’t seem crowded. Our waitress sucked, but the bar back guy saw she was ignoring us and helped us out. He was awesome and so was the bartender who informed Chuck that they just had all new servers and they sucked.
I had a Hazelnut Chocolate Martini and a margarita. Marci had Blood Orange Kamikaze and a margarita. Jer had a dry martini, Spicy Peach, margarita, Blood Orange Kamikaze, and Marionberry Cosmo. Go jer! Chuck and Tawny showed up a little later and I believe they both had the Spicy Peach drink.
Even though the cocktail mix is on fro 6-7pm, it went on until 8pm. We were enjoying it so we stayed closer to 8pm.
No Keiran and Lynz so I called them. I could barely hear Keiran but I heard he wasn’t feeling well so they weren’t coming. Jer called Lynz and tried to convince her to ditch Keiran. That didn’t seem to go well since she didn’t show up. Marci decided to try to entice them out with taking pictures of her boobs and sending them to Keiran.
Part 2 – Food! – Salvador Molly’s
Marci wanted to check out the pirate food place since she had heard us talk about it before.
We seemed to show up right after the dinner rush so it was awesome and not packed like the other times we have gone. We got to pick where we sat and we sat in the corner. The waitress could tell a few of us were already toasted so she decided we needed more than one drink menu, so we ended up with six drink menus at the table for five people. I know I was actually sober. I think Chuck was too, even though by the end of the meal, I don’t think he was.
We ordered a pitcher of margaritas, which I had a glass for, but only drank half since it was a mix and too sweet. I think Chuck ended up having half the picther to himself throughout dinner. Marci had a Walking Zombie drink that had three different kinds of rum in it. Chuck had a dirty spicy martini. Tawny had a fuzzy butt (it was like a fuzzy navel, but when she ordered it, she had no idea, she just liked the name). Jer had Fire & Ice, which was a bunch of rum stuff with 160 proof rum on top so they could light it on fire.
We ordered Cheesy Poofs and oysters for appetizers. Marci does not like oysters, so she did not have any. I had mild while everyone else had hellfire. They were huge. I had to cut mine in half to eat it. Jer swallowed his first, then chucked it back up so he could chew it, then swallowed again. Chuck has video of this on his camera. I hope it caught the sound since it was an awesome sound he made. I didn’t try the hellfire oyster, but Jer had one of both. I didn’t like the mild. It had no flavor. Blah! Cheesy poofs were good so we ordered more of those.
Then food time! I had Surfer’s Taco plate, which was pork soft tacos. They were super yum. Chuck had ribs. Marci had artichoke tamale. I forget what Tawny had. Jer had some pasta dish that was medium spicy and after the hellfire oysters, he wished he said mild.
Our cool waitress was leaving so we had cool waiter to take over. He found out it was Marci’s birthday so she got free bread pudding. w00t. We all had a little bit except Jer who does not like bread pudding. It was yummy.
We sent Keiran more pictures trying to entice him to come out. One was of Chuck’s hairy man boobs.
Another was of Jer’s tummy trying to look like a butt.
We did not get a response from those pictures. 
We thought he might have thrown his phone after seeing the hairy man boobs.
Then it was off to dancing. Chuck and Tawny went on ahead, but we had to drop drunk Jer off at home. He was talking about playing AV while he was trashed. He was in the back seat of the car singing along to Duran Duran on my stereo. He was also yelling and flipping off people that were walking across the street (not in front of us but crossing an intersection the same time we were going the same direction) and yelling at buses and cars. Good thing the windows were up and the windows were fogged up still so no one saw or heard him besides me and Marci. it’s a good thing he was inside the car cuz he might have chased a bus like he did on my 25th birthday.
Then, while driving down Belmont, he wanted me to just drop him off at Horse Brass pub and he’d find his way home. Marci told him to stop or she was going to pee her pants. Then Jer said he didn’t think he was going to be able to play WOW when he got home. Too drunk! So Jer enjoyed Marci’s birthday party.
Part 3 – Dancing! – Fez Ballroom
The usuals were at the club except Napoleon. it’s a guy that looks like Napoleon Dynamite, but older. Same hair though. We were sad he wasn’t there. Chicken leg dancer was there. I believe that it was Courtney Love that ran into me while dancing once. There was also bisexual desperate guy. We have watched him the last three times we are dancing. He hits on everyone constantly. When he tried to hit on me and Marci, we were not amused. Then he went back to hitting on a couple, flirting with the girl. Then he turned around, saw another couple dancing and grabbed a guy’s butt. weeee!
Tawny and Chuck lasted almost two hours before they were too full from food to really dance. Marci and I lasted until 2am. Then we were just too tired to do anything else.
Awesome music last night, like always. Here is what I remember being played:
Living on Video by Trans-X (Marci’s request!)
Strangelove by Depeche Mode
Christine by Siouxsie and the Banshees
She Bop by Cyndi Lauper
Burning Up by Madonna
Xanadu (!!!)
Barracuda by Heart
20th Century Boy by T. Rex
Dare by Gorillaz
P.Y.T. by Michael Jackson
Sexyback by Justin Timberlake
some Journey song
People Who Died by Jim Carroll Band
Beat on the Brat by the Ramones
and lots of other stuff I can’t remember…
Jan 03 2007
Nationwide Releases
Black Christmas
Directed: Glen Morgan
Fifteen years after killing his family on Christmas, a guy decides the sorority girls living in his old house must meet the same fate.
RT Score: 16%
The sorority girls are so interchangeable, and so uninteresting, that I got to wishing that Morgan and all those who tred the lucrative horror remake market would take the time to create a bonafide heroine whose survival we could cheer.
– Chuck Wilson
L.A. Weekly
Let’s be clear: The new Black Christmas isn’t in any way scary, realistic or well acted, but Morgan, who cocreated the Final Destination series, knows how to stage an elaborate kill for laughs.
– Luke Y. Thompson
E! Online
The remake neither pays perceptive tribute to the original nor updates it in anything but hackneyed form.
– Desson Thomson
Washington Post
Unfortunately for those hoping for shower scenes and other R-rated shenanigans, there’s only one and it’s pretty lame.
– Daniel M. Kimmel
Worcester Telegram & Gazette
Creativity is a stranger to this sick excuse for entertainment, which pounds a ridiculous back story into a butchered rehash that includes incest, cannibalism, eyeball gouging and impossibly dumb plot contrivances.
– Peter Howell
Toronto Star
Limited Releases
Pan’s Labyrinth
Directed: Guillermo Del Toro
In 1944 Spain, where a young girl’s father does unspeakable things due to a fascist regime, and she retreats into a fairy tale world.
RT Score: 99%
RT Consensus: Pan’s Labyrinth is Alice in Wonderland for grown-ups, with the horrors of both reality and fantasy blended together into an extraordinary, spellbinding fable.
Pan’s Labyrinth, horrific and heartfelt in the way it sees the trauma of war through the eyes of a little girl, is some kind of great movie.
– Peter Travers
Rolling Stone
A filmmaker blossoming into true greatness… Pan’s Labyrinth is a film of breathtaking emotional, thematic and visual depth.
– Devin Faraci
CHUD
it’s not only one of the great fantasy pictures but one of the great end-of-childhood elegies.
– Stephanie Zacharek
Salon.com
Pan succeeds both as a spectacular special-effects fantasy and as a psychological drama, with superb actors.
– Michael Wilmington
Chicago Tribune
Though not for the squeamish or fans of Fascism, this morbidly bewitching fantasy is an enchanting, escapist fairy tale, even if one designed strictly with adults in mind.
– Kam Williams
BlackFilm.com
Notes on a Scandal
Directed: Richard Eyre
Cate Blanchett is an art teacher that starts an affair with a student. Judi Dench is an older teacher at the same school that starts a friendship with her, and enjoys the power she has over her about her secret.
RT Score: 84%
RT Consensus: In this sharp psychological thriller, Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett give fierce, memorable performances as two schoolteachers locked in a battle of wits.
If you want to see explosive acting, just watch Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett ignite in this film version of Zoe Heller’s 2003 novel.
– Peter Travers
Rolling Stone
Rises above its modern-day thriller roots due to its superlative script and three amazing actors who can properly do this story justice.
– Edward Douglas
ComingSoon.net
Its sleazy, low-down content guarantees few, if any awards, but it also provides a far more entertaining film.
– Jeffrey M. Anderson
Combustible Celluloid
In order to propel circumstances to a conclusion, Notes on a Scandal relies upon a contrivance so ugly and obvious that it’s impossible to ignore.
– James Berardinelli
ReelViews
You’ll want to take a shower after Notes on a Scandal, but You’ll be glad you got dirty.
– Ty Burr
Boston Globe
Children of Men
Directed: Alfonso Cuaron
In the near future, women are infertile and the youngest person on Earth died at age 18. Clive Owen becomes an activist at the request of his ex-wife Julianne Moore, the leader of an underground group.
RT Score: 93%
RT Consensus: Children of Men works on every level: as a violent chase thriller, a fantastical cautionary tale, and a sophisticated human drama about societies struggling to live.
A second viewing, which Children of Men richly rewards, deepens our understanding.
– Peter Travers
Rolling Stone
Children of Men is a heartbreaking, bullet-strewn valentine to what keeps us human.
– Keith Phipps
Onion AV Club
Children of Men leaves too many questions unanswered, yet it has a stunning visceral impact. You can forgive a lot in the face of filmmaking this dazzling.
– David Ansen
Newsweek
Children of Men is worth seeing, if for no other reason than the gorgeous vision of the end of the world Cuarón has crafted and, as mentioned earlier, some of the most unreal single-take action sequences ever committed to screen.
– Mark Bell
Film Threat
Bloated adaptation of P.D. James’s thoughtful, compact novel.
– Joe Morgenstern
Wall Street Journal
Miss Potter
Directed: Chris Noonan
Renee Zellweger is Beatrix Potter, who becomes famous while working closely with her publisher, Ewan McGregor. They fall in love, but their relationship is forbidden since she is rich and he’s a tradesman.
RT Score: 77%
RT Consensus: A charming biopic with that maintains its sweetness even in sadder moments.
Miss Potter is not a motion picture for cynics. If you walk into this film expecting the grit of reality or a complex portrait of literary artistry at work, it’s your own damn fault.
– Brian Orndorf
OhmyNews.com
Zellweger’s playfulness works well opposite the winning McGregor, and I suppose for some people, she’s the first person you’d call when you need a plucky heroine.
– Glenn Whipp
Los Angeles Daily News
Rather like its subject’s books–pretty to look at, sweet without being syrupy and cute without being cloying, but rather thin.
– Frank Swietek
One Guy’s Opinion
The charm of this picture is the way it captures the world of manners of turn-of-20th century London with captivating performances by Zellweger and McGregor.
– Tony Medley
tonymedley.com
The film is a guaranteed tearjerker, but more than that, an uplifting tribute to a single woman’s quest for independence that would surely make Bridget Jones blush.
– Stella Papamichael
BBC
Factory Girl
Directed: George Hickenlooper
The rise and fall of 60′s It girl Edie Sedgwick when she became Andy Warhol’s muse.
RT Score: 40%
Miller is undeniably engaging. That s probably not enough to save the movie from obscurity, but it should, at the very least, guarantee bigger and better things for its star.
– Wade Major
Boxoffice Magazine
Sienna Miller captures much of Edie s physical manner and some of her voice (though she s nowhere near deep enough), but there s nothing she can do with material that requires her to mope and pout for the bulk of her screen time.
– David Ehrenstein
L.A. Weekly
Director George Hickenlooper captures the energy and ultra-irony of Warhol’s scene, but his attempts to give the film a conventional biopic arc end up wallowing in dime-store psychology.
– Sheri Linden
Hollywood Reporter
Though Sedgwick embodied everything that glittered and grated about the era’s counterculture, director George Hickenlooper evinces no deep interest in the time and place, resulting in a film that feels removed from its source.
– Robert Koehler
Variety
A brisk, superficial treatment of the tragic supernova life of Edie Sedgwick, Factory Girl disappoints as both biography and drama.
– Kevin Crust
Los Angeles Times
The Dead Girl
Directed: Karen Moncrieff
Brittany Murphy ends up dead and the mystery surrounding her death and what leads up to it is slowly pieced together through seemingly unrelated stories.
RT Score: 68%
RT Consensus: This dark thriller boasts a fresh approach, but it can still get bogged down by its heavy subject matter.
This is unsettling and completely riveting at the same time. it’s like six degrees of separation for the terminally broken.
– Cherryl Dawson and Leigh Ann Palone
TheMovieChicks.com
A well crafted five part ensemble drama of the toughest sort. Tight dialog, first rate acting and searing images make their statement on the tragedy of runaway abduction.
– Ron Wilkinson
Monsters and Critics
If you’re weary of crime stories that follow the conventional path on the way to a generically inevitable conclusion, The Dead Girl is a title you might want to throw a red circle around.
– Scott Weinberg
Cinematical
I don’t remember when I’ve seen a movie with as many exceptional female performances as those in ‘The Dead Girl.’
– Betty Jo Tucker
ReelTalk Movie Reviews
The chief problem with The Dead Girl, as with most current multipart films, is that the truncated stories don’t give actors much room to develop a part. they’re on-screen for such a short time that they act furiously from the get-go.
– Jim Ridley
Village Voice
Fast Track
Directed: Jesse Peretz
Zach Braff has a rivalry going on with Jason Bateman at work, especially since Jason Bateman used to date Zach’s wife, Amanda Peet.
RT Score: 50%
A half-baked comedy torn between sincere emotion and over-the-top outrageousness.
Click for Full Review
– Peter Debruge
VARIETY
When it works (which is at least half of the time), this antic romp has the off-the-wall, go-for-broke zaniness of that other great modern screwball comedy, David O. Russell’s Flirting with Disaster.
Click for Full Review
– Scott Foundas
L.A. WEEKLY
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer
Directed: Tom Tykwer
In 18th century France, a young orphan has an impressive sense of smell. He goes to work for a perfumer to make the perfect scent, which he finds when he takes the essence of young women by murdering them.
RT Score: 63%
RT Consensus: Perfume is what you’d expect from a Tom Twyker-directed movie glamorizing a serial killer: a kinetic visual feast, with a dark antihero that’s impossible to feel sympathy for.
Perfume misses some of the subtler base notes of Süskind’s creepier, more self-aware original, but Whishaw and Tykwer blend the movie into something quite heady in its own bottle.
– Lisa Schwarzbaum
Entertainment Weekly
This tale of a brilliant sociopath is disturbing and often uncomfortable to watch. And it’s also magical filmmaking.
– Rich Cline
Shadows on the Wall
The film’s spectacle, along with its wicked sense of humor, turns out to be the main source of its appeal.
– Ethan Alter
Premiere Magazine
Smells of something a few steps down from Aqua Velva.
– Chris Cabin
filmcritic.com
As much as it’s in many ways a visual pleasure, tonally, the movie is a mess.
– Carina Chocano
Los Angeles Times
