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Body of Lies
Good 83 Points 2008

Given the dismal state of Islamist terror movies, this surprisingly evenhanded thriller tops the heap, though its disjointed plot comes together slowly and Leonardo DiCaprio’s CIA character lacks charisma. Fortunately he’s flanked by two great actors, the estimable Russell Crowe and the slickly …

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Elegy
Great 66 Points 2008

Ben Kingsley gets in much deeper than planned after seducing a much younger Penélope Cruz in Elegy. Isabel Coixet’s movie comes by its sexual fixations via pedigree: Phillip Roth’s novel The Dying Animal. Think of it as Portnoy’s Complaint, the When I’m 64 rendition – "Will you still nee…

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WikChip Video Ben Kingsley seduces Penélope Cruz
The Wrecking Crew
Great 83 Points 2008

Fans of the Beach Boys, Glen Campbell, the Mamas & the Papas, Sonny & Cher or Nancy Sinatra should seek out this documentary about the unsung musicians who made their music for them. The Wrecking Crew wasn’t an official name for the group. These independent studio players didn’t have an officia…

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WikChip Video Carol Kaye stars on Good Vibrations.
Cloverfield
Really Great 125 Points 2008

Big fun on the big screen, if your idea of fun runs to state-of-the-art SciFi fright fests. Worthy of its tremendous buzz, Cloverfield combines a War of the Worlds monster attack with Blair Witch Project immediacy. Put it this wa…

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Mad Money
Pretty Bad 66 Points 2008

Great concept, strong cast, crummy movie. I’m probably not part of this movie’s target market, though I loved Thelma & Louise. But I found Mad Money silly and boring. Even as an airplane movie, it barely passed the time.

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Zack and Miri M...
OK 78 Points 2008

As tedious as it is funny, though it is damn funny on occasion, this “romantic comedy” plumbs new depths in its hunt for laughs, plowing the nether regions of slacker society as it were. That it succeeds often enough to avoid complete disaster is a credit to kitsch auteur Kevin Smith, though thi…

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Forgetting Sara...
Perfect 108 Points 2008

Laff-a-minute comedy, perhaps the best one yet from golden producer Judd Apatow and his repertory players. Delightfully surprising from scene-to-scene, FSM mints three movie stars – two beauties and a charming beast: Mila Kunis, smolderingly beautiful, possesses the best voice since Kathleen T…

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WikChip Image 2 Beauties, Big Lunk & Charming Beast
Margot at the W...
Great 83 Points 2007

Nicole Kidman goes to her estranged sister’s wedding. Jennifer Jason Leigh, said brilliant and beautiful sister, is marrying Jack Black, a buffoon who spectacularly overestimates himself. Classic Jack Black.

Speaking of spectacular, Kidman’s Margot is a spectacularly successful fiction write…

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WikChip Image Who says you can't go home again?
The Band's Visit
Great 84 Points 2007

Relaxed and delightfully deadpan, with several LOL moments, The Band’s Visit works as a perfectly pleasant comedy and as a signpost for how Israelis and Arabs can live together as neighbors. The movie uses a classic fish-out-of-water situation to achieve more than a few moments of inspired comi…

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Reign Over Me
Good 84 Points 2007

Perfect music, emotionally loaded material and an attractive production can’t rescue this manipulative 9/11 movie’s cliche characters. Like outcasts from writer-director Mike Binder’s Mind of a Married Man show and an Adam Sandler arrested-development movie, they never go beyond their essentia…

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WikChip Image Aspirational Inspiration for the Movie