It’s easy to point out what’s wrong with “My Life in Ruins,” but I don’t feel good about it. The movie clearly has its heart in the right place, which makes sense considering screenwriter Mike Reiss wrote some of the most heartfelt “Simpsons” episodes ever. The problem is that his script paints with such a broad brush that it’s hard to get emotionally involved in a story that bears little resemblance to reality – which in itself is not unforgivable, but doesn’t work here – and goes out of its way to manufacture conflict. The story is set in Greece,…
Author: David Medsker
“The Hurt Locker” is a war movie in the same sense that “Sideways” is a movie about wine, which is to say, it’s not. It uses the Iraq War as a backdrop to profile the life of a career soldier and extreme thrill junkie, but it is a character study first and war movie second. And, in a unique twist, it doesn’t victimize the soldiers the way other, lesser war movies love to do. “Home of the Brave,” we’re looking in your direction. The movie begins in Baghdad with Bravo Company losing the leader of its bomb disposal unit a…
“Up” is an odd bird, and that’s not just because one of the movie’s co-stars is an odd bird. It’s the first Pixar movie that could possibly happen in the human world, as opposed to the fish world, rat world or insect world. Its story is pretty simple by Pixar standards, but it plunges emotional depths that the studio has not explored since, well, “Up” director Pete Docter’s last effort, “Monsters, Inc.” By Pixar standards, it’s a massive departure on a number of levels, but it also shows just how much smarter – and more courageous – they are about…
If a Pixar movie has either made you cry or brought you to the edge of tears, odds are Pete Docter was involved. All of Pixar’s directors are mindful of making family-friendly entertainment, but Docter is all about the heart, and his latest effort “Up” raises the ante tenfold. Bullz-Eye caught up with Docter to ask him about the darkest days in Pixar’s history, the risks that come with making a 78-year-old the lead in your movie, and how he feels about the work that his fellow animators are producing. Surprise! He’s somewhat disappointed. Also, don’t miss Bullz-Eye’s interview with…
When Warner Brothers announced that they were going to make a “Batman” movie modeled after the Dark Knight series of the comic, the fan boys roared with approval. Then they announced that Michael Keaton would be Bruce Wayne, and Tim Burton, who only had two movie credits to his name at the time (“Pee Wee’s Big Adventure,” “Beetlejuice”) would direct. The Comic Book Guys were appalled. Advance buzz was troublesome, with other studios wondering if Warners was about to make “Superman 5.” Warner Brothers, meanwhile, breathed comfortably. In fact, they didn’t even bother to screen the movie. They knew they…
Much ado – about nothing, if you ask us – has been made about “Angels & Demons,” Dan Brown’s prequel to his worldwide smash “The Da Vinci Code,” on the grounds that the book is, like its predecessor, a full-on assault on Christianity. The truth is that the only assault the moviegoers will experience while watching the movie is the one on their gag reflex. This is a gruesome PG-13 movie, like “Da Vinci” with Jigsaw as the villain. Fortunately, the movie’s brisk pacing allows them to gloss over the movie’s shortcomings before the audience catches on. Fans of the…
What has gone largely forgotten in the years since Joel and Ethan Coen cemented their reputations as a creative force that’s both quirky and financially reliable is that the movie that started it all was very much a make-or-break moment for the two. Fresh off three box office bombs – with their most recent, 1994’s “The Hudsucker Proxy,” being of the Hiroshima variety, bringing in not quite a tenth of its $30 million budget – the Coens needed a hit, badly. What better way to reverse your fortunes, then, than to write a pitch-black comedy about a tragically ill-conceived ransom…
“Sixteen Candles” and “The Breakfast Club” may get more attention, but “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” is John Hughes’ finest hour. His trademarks are all here: the humor, the drama, the so-hip-it-hurts pop soundtrack, but this time Hughes elevates everything with the most spectacular editing that any Hughes movie has ever seen. Along with being a big love letter to the great city of Chicago, “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” as Ben Stein astutely observes in the bonus material, is a testament to man’s need to be free, and that is why it has endured as a comedy classic. Matthew Broderick is…
It pains me that “Ghosts of Girlfriends Past” is a New Line movie. This is The House That Freddy Built, for crying out loud. If you had come to them in 1988 with a script called “Ghosts of Girlfriends Past,” they would have said, “Sweet, dead girlfriends terrorizing the lovers who spurned them from beyond the grave! Get Wes Craven on the phone.” In the hands of today’s New Line, however, “Ghosts” is a rather pedestrian rom-com whose parts are far better than the sum. Granted, the old New Line dabbled in the pedestrian as well (three words: “Drop Dead…
It’s not every day that a soap opera regular – and sci-fi guest star – turns in her soft focus lighting for a chance to hang with all-around superdude Jack Bauer, but actress Annie Wersching did exactly that when she signed on to play the tough but vulnerable FBI Agent Renee Walker on this season of Fox’s terror drama “24.” Bullz-Eye caught up with Wersching to talk about the show’s placement in our Spring 2009 TV Power Rankings, Kiefer Sutherland’s masochistic side, the pros and cons of wearing one outfit for an entire season, and her love for the Cardinals.…