Deadpool Movie Review

For all the hoopla surrounding Deadpool – strong box office receipts; excellent audience reception; and even positive critical consensus – it doesn’t take long to look past the surface to see that there’s not really much there apart from an admittedly entertaining comic book adaptation. Shouldn’t that be enough for a comic book superhero movie? We go for the entertainment, right? But nothing else?

This may be a case of people getting a little too excited just because the movie attempts to break ranks with the clichés of the genre. Instead of pleasant PG-13 action that’s short on bad language and long on mild violence, Deadpool sears up and down, there’s sex, and the violence (though cartoonish) very violent and full of blood. This ground has been trod before. Kick Ass got there first, although I think Deadpool does it better and with great moral clarity.

Woman in Gold Movie Review

I’m a big “West Wing” fan, so excuse me if you don’t know what I’m referring to when I say, “Crime. Boy, I don’t know.” That is a line from “Posse Comitatus,” the season 3 finale and the lynchpin moment when President Bartlett decides he’s going to take it to his opponent in the election. Woman in Gold is the Holocaust equivalent of that sentiment, an empty gesture at acknowledging something inexplicably awful.

Short Cut Movie Review: The Croods

A Short Cut Movie Review is normally less than 400 words, but in some cases may go slightly over. This is my attempt to keep writing about as many films as I see without getting bogged down with trying to find more to say. They are meant to be brief snapshots of my reaction to a movie without too much depth.

I can’t figure out how The Croods, an animated film from Dreamworks, was nominated for the Oscar for Animated Feature over a couple of other options that were demonstrably better movies.

Emma Stone voices Eep, a typical American teenager in most respects excepting the fact that she lives in prehistoric caveman days. She whines and complains about not being able to leave the cave at night, her family is a real drag, and she goes bonkers over some new shoes. Her dad, Grug (Nicolas Cage) is an excessive worrier. Ugga (Catherine Keener) is the mom who goes along to get alone. Cloris Leachman is Gran, the hanger-on in the family, and Clark Duke is the dim-witted son, Thunk.