The Onion Movie
The team behind The Onion, a popular satirical newspaper, are the writers of this movie parody. Essentially a scattershot collection of sketches, the “story” concerns a news anchor asked to compromise his journalistic integrity in order to please a corporate sponsor. There are a few genuine laughs, but the gags are mostly hit or miss.
Tropic Thunder
Film crew struggles to produce a big-budget war film. Starts out as a supremely inspired satire (those fake movie trailers are the funniest thing in the movie) and then kind of settles into a traditional action driven war movie. Not quite as biting as it thinks it is, but still humorous nonetheless.
The Third Man
Classic, film-noir mystery has American man going to meet his friend in post WWII Vienna. When he arrives he finds his friend, Harry Lime, has been killed in a traffic accident. But what really happened? Who killed him? Was it an accident? And who was Harry Lime? So begins one man’s odyssey to discover the […]
Never Back Down
If the ad execs from Abercrombie & Fitch watched The Karate Kid and Fight Club and then decided to make a movie, it probably would look something like this.
The History Boys
English high-school students seek to earn the scores needed to enroll in Oxford and Cambridge in writer Alan Bennett’s witty screen adaptation of his Tony award winning play. Ensemble film wisely features the talented original London cast, however the film’s moral confusion is unsettling.
District B13
Kinetically charged, action thriller from France filled with dizzying stunt sequences that were completed without the use of wires or computer generated effects. The stars David Belle and Cyril Raffaelli, both real stuntmen, join forces to do battle against a notorious gang leader who gets his hands on a nuclear warhead. If you love action […]
Pineapple Express
Buddy film from the writers of Superbad, which was light years ahead of this sloppy, unfocused mess of a movie. Most of the “humor” is derived from violent gags: getting shot in the stomach, having your ear shot off, getting slammed in the face with a coffee pot, etc. I know this is a stoner […]
Charlie Bartlett
Coming of age film about high school life is clearly influenced by Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. But while that film was light and funny, this comedy drama takes on teen suicide and drug abuse to make a film wildly uneven in tone.
Reservoir Dogs
Bloody doesn’t even begin to describe this landmark film about a jewelry heist gone wrong. The witty script is the real star here. Tarantino’s distinctive style: story told out of sequence, 70s soundtrack, pop culture references, excessive profanity and violent crime, would go on to influence many films of the 90s.
Ghostbusters
When great special effects meet brilliant writing you get this classic 80s comedy. Bill Murray is at the top of his game here with deadpan delivery so funny, it’s just barely upstaged by Mr. Stay Puft.