It's a peculiar trick of human emotion that characters who embrace their flaws can become surprisingly endearing. For example, the grumpy nihilism of Greg House, or the charming debauchery of Tony Stark. Or Despicable Me's Gru, (voiced by Steve Carell), whose criminal ambitions know no bounds and whose accent knows no border. The latter sounds most...   ...READ REVIEW

"What's the most resilient parasite? An idea. A single idea from the human mind can build cities."

Or movies. The human mind in question is that of writer-director Christopher Nolan, who with Inception has made his most confident and compelling film yet, which is saying something. It is a movie about a single idea, and all ideas, and it has no less a goal than illustrating the mystery, majesty and might of the mind.

Inception's premise springs from this thoug...   ...READ REVIEW

Appealing and amusing portrait of a family, one that is slightly unorthodox on the surface but that has all the familiar strengths and weaknesses as most any. Julianne Moore and Annette Bening are Jules and Nicole, a lesbian couple who have been together for over twenty years. Nic is a doctor, Jules...isn't. Currently unemployed but thinking of starting up her own landscape architecture business, she has forgone a career to raise their children. They have two, a boy and a girl, each having carri...   ...READ REVIEW

I take no joy in this. I don't share in the inordinate amount of schadenfreude aimed at director M. Night Shyamalan, nor do I take any pleasure in noting the alarming downward spiral in the quality of his films. But whether one regards his last few efforts as an aberration of his talents, or an exposure of the lack of same, the fact remains: The Last Airbender is shockingly inept.

I have chosen my words carefully: it is not shocking that The Last Airbender is a bad film, it is s...   ...READ REVIEW

This film is part of ESPN's "30 for 30" series, wherein the network celebrated its 30-year anniversary by commissioning 30 sports documentaries by 30 different filmmakers, each with autonomous control over the subject they'd been given.

June 17, 1994 is, as the title indicates, about a single day. Apart from being a Friday, it was a day in which a number of diverse stories in the world of sports came together, each provoking wildly different emotions, and often bleedin...   ...READ REVIEW

In early 1992, Beauty and the Beast was nominated for a Best Picture award; the first animated film to have ever been so honored. That same year, Aladdin hit theaters and made over half a billion dollars worldwide. It is tempting to declare 1992 a banner year for both Walt Disney and animation in general, but that would be redundant: at the time there was no meaningful distinction between the two. It was understood, if not spoken, that we were experiencing the Golden Age of animate...   ...READ REVIEW