Reviews

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  Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans

  The joke's on someone in Werner Herzog's awkwardly titled Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans. Possibly Abel Ferrara who, exploding in fury when he learned that the German conquistador was planning to remake his 1992 career movie, opined...

  By J. Hoberman

  Tuesday, November 17

  The joke's on someone in Werner Herzog's awkwardly titled Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans. Possibly Abel Ferrara who, exploding in fury... More >>
• 
  The Sun

  The most perverse installment of Aleksandr Sokurov's dictator cycle, The Sun follows the Russian director's meditations on Hitler (Moloch, 1999) and Lenin (Taurus, 2000) with a curiously upbeat portrait of Japan's last divine...

  By J. Hoberman

  Tuesday, November 17

  The most perverse installment of Aleksandr Sokurov's dictator cycle, The Sun follows the Russian director's meditations on Hitler (Moloch, 1999)... More >>
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  MOMA Brings Tim Burton's Outsider Art In

  What will five months of feting by MOMA do to Tim Burton's perversely blockbusting outsider art? Probably nothing. Intensely devoted to a scissorhandful of pop-surrealist obsessions, Burton has, with few exceptions, been making the same semi-autobiographical...

  By Rob Nelson

  Tuesday, November 17

  What will five months of feting by MOMA do to Tim Burton's perversely blockbusting outsider art? Probably nothing. Intensely devoted to a... More >>
• 
  The Twilight Saga: New Moon

  Bella: I’m coming.
  Edward: I don’t want you to.
  —The Twilight Saga: New Moon

  Worry not for the purity of your tween girls, global mothers. Where Catherine Hardwicke’s lively, irreverent take on the first...

  By Ella Taylor

  Tuesday, November 17

  Bella: I’m coming. Edward: I don’t want you to.—The Twilight Saga: New Moon Worry not for the purity of your tween girls,... More >>
• 
  Red Cliff

  Abridged for American consumption

  John Woo spent a decade navigating the big-studio minefield—longer than most foreign auteurs last in Hollywood before throwing in the towel. Beginning in earnest with an above-average Jean-Claude Van Damme programmer (Hard Target), Woo...

  By Scott Foundas

  Tuesday, November 17

  John Woo spent a decade navigating the big-studio minefield—longer than most foreign auteurs last in Hollywood before throwing in the... More >>
• 
  Broken Embraces

  "Everything's already happened to me," admits Harry Caine, the blind, middle-aged filmmaker in Broken Embraces. "All that's left is to enjoy life." ¡Sí! His own sights set low these days in his latest movie, reformed bad...

  By Rob Nelson

  Tuesday, November 17

  "Everything's already happened to me," admits Harry Caine, the blind, middle-aged filmmaker in Broken Embraces. "All that's left is to enjoy... More >>
• 
  Liv Ullmann Retro at BAM

  With her large, if rare, grin and high forehead, Liv Ullmann was always the least dreamy of the axiomatic New Wave–era actresses—she was no one's Anna Karina or Monica Vitti—and the most discomfitingly fierce. If any movie star has...

  By Michael Atkinson

  Tuesday, November 17

  With her large, if rare, grin and high forehead, Liv Ullmann was always the least dreamy of the axiomatic New Wave–era actresses—she... More >>
• 
  Mammoth

  English, Tagalog, and Thai are spoken in Swedish writer-director Lukas Moodysson's Mammoth, but he communicates only in the idiom of Crash and Babel: the Esperanto of feel-bad humanism. Moodysson's first two features, Show Me...

  By Melissa Anderson

  Tuesday, November 17

  English, Tagalog, and Thai are spoken in Swedish writer-director Lukas Moodysson's Mammoth, but he communicates only in the idiom of Crash and... More >>
• 
  Fix

  You wouldn't guess this by reading the film histories of the period, but, back in the day, most of us who were young and sentient scornfully dismissed the bogus counterculture costume dramas (like Easy Rider) that supposedly gave voice to our...

  By David Chute

  Tuesday, November 17

  You wouldn't guess this by reading the film histories of the period, but, back in the day, most of us who were young and sentient scornfully... More >>
• 
  Defamation

  Jewish Israeli director Yoav Shamir's cheerfully incendiary documentary about the modern face of anti-Semitism begins with Shamir (Checkpoint) blundering, Michael Moore–style, through the New York offices of the Anti-Defamation League, where...

  By Scott Foundas

  Tuesday, November 17

  Jewish Israeli director Yoav Shamir's cheerfully incendiary documentary about the modern face of anti-Semitism begins with Shamir (Checkpoint)... More >>
• 
  The War on Kids

  Cevin Soling's lively documentary lays out in hair-raising detail the authoritarian underpinnings of America's child-centered culture, in which a pervasive climate of fear distorts perception of the dangers posed by and to children. Marshalling an...

  By Ella Taylor

  Tuesday, November 17

  Cevin Soling's lively documentary lays out in hair-raising detail the authoritarian underpinnings of America's child-centered culture, in which a... More >>
• 
  The Blind Side

  Another poor, massive, uneducated African-American teenager lumbers onto screens this month, two weeks after Precious and obviously timed as a pre-Thanksgiving-dinner lesson in the Golden Rule. But unlike the howling rage of Claireece Precious...

  By Melissa Anderson

  Tuesday, November 17

  Another poor, massive, uneducated African-American teenager lumbers onto screens this month, two weeks after Precious and obviously timed as a... More >>
• 
  The Missing Person

  John Rosow is a P.I., hired off a cold-call to trail a man. It turns out he's distinctly bad at his job—once he's got his mark in sight, he starts slamming martinis and, tall and unsteady, makes a conspicuous tail. Rosow—played by Michael...

  By Nick Pinkerton

  Tuesday, November 17

  John Rosow is a P.I., hired off a cold-call to trail a man. It turns out he's distinctly bad at his job—once he's got his mark in sight, he... More >>
• 
  Staten Island

  Featuring Ethan Hawke, looking nothing like a septic-tank cleaner

  Native son James DeMonaco overlaps three Staten Island stories, set amid strip-mall Italian joints, tasteless suburban manors, and ship graveyards: Vincent D'Onofrio plays Parmie, a stuffy-voiced, moon-faced mama's-boy mobster wearing Elizabeth Taylor...

  By Nick Pinkerton

  Tuesday, November 17

  Native son James DeMonaco overlaps three Staten Island stories, set amid strip-mall Italian joints, tasteless suburban manors, and ship... More >>
• My Dear Enemy

  Tapping into a palpable strain of economic anxiety, My Dear Enemy turns the money quest of two hard-luck Seoul residents into a dryly comic modern odyssey. With its opening discussion of a land deal setting the tone of financial disquiet, Lee...

  By Andrew Schenker

  Tuesday, November 17

  Tapping into a palpable strain of economic anxiety, My Dear Enemy turns the money quest of two hard-luck Seoul residents into a dryly comic... More >>
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