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Not as good as it thinks it is or was cracked up to be, Prisoners nonetheless proves to be an involving, impressive and ultimately satisfying thriller. It’s worth being imprisoned inside a theater for 2½ hours. Yet sleazy storytelling-tricks weigh it down and a grimly enthusiastic desire t…
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Two men tortured by the same crime
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I’m loyal to Katniss Everdeen, so had to see the end of her story. Love can be painful and this movie was. Freighted with profound mournfulness, it’s simply too much and too long. Alas, The Hunger Games is ultimately high-toned YA, notwithstanding its often brilliant political grandstanding. Th…
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Love Hurts, Sweet Katniss
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Deaths in the family surround Casey Affleck’s New Englander, dragging him down and knocking him around in Manchester by the Sea. Kenneth Lonergan’s latest fractured-family film has been highly praised at film festivals and has Oscar buzz around it, especially for Affleck’s tortured performance….
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Before it all went to hell
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People want to love Les Miz and many have, including the Oscars and a fellow ViewGuider. Fair enough. Beloved is beloved, especially when a blockbuster movie doesn’t stint on production values or star power. Sometimes however, an ugly truth is hiding right in plain sight, or in plain earshot…
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Samantha Barks stands out in a crowd
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M. Night Shyamalan peaked with Signs. Wonderfully creepy and magnificently manipulative, it’s a self-consciously old-school scary movie. Even this non-horror fan enjoyed it. Mel Gibson’s Muted Max performance anchors writer-director Shyamalan’s achingly heavy story. Leading a great cast…
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Charismatically great acting: Gibson ...
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Enron’s rise and fall gets reprised in this dolorous documentary. Unfortunately there’s little new here for those who followed the debacle when it went down. Worse, the narrative is marred by a blanket sense of sanctimonious disgust and the testimony of at least one disgraced antagonist, convic… |
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Charismatic, disorienting and brooding, Animal Kingdom presents the truthy tale of an infamous crime family, including their murder of two Melbourne cops. The brooding gets a bit much by the third reel, weighing down what would otherwise be a great true-crime movie. The charisma comes from …
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Infamous crime family, charismatic movie
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Deeply, floridly Italian, Malèna is a sumptuous WWII find, a Sicilian movie extraordinaire and a devastating depiction of Italian machismo reacting to the hottest signorina since Sophia Loren. Monica Belluci plays the title character, a gorgeous war bride living in a small Sicilian town, bro…
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where Malèna went, the town followed
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Blood begets blood as a Bangkok blood feud drives waves of retribution in artistic director Nicholas Winding Refn’s crime thriller Only God Forgives. Think Drive crossed with Bronson, set in Asia. If that doesn’t mean anything to you, imagine Ryan Gosling in a savagely violent, brooding…
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Makes the Wicked Witch seem nurturing
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Tye Sheridan continues his JLaw moviestar ascent as yet another grievously put-upon Southern boy in Joe. Nicolas Cage delivers one of his best roles in years as Joe: classic Cage, peccadilloes galore, heavily armed. Textbook movie drama ensues. A wastrel man is made better by protecting an u…
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Portrait of Tye Sheridan as a young man
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