19 Jun 2001

Incoherence Rules Summer Screens: "Swordfish," "Atlantis: The Lost Empire," and "Lara Croft, Tomb Raider"

By Mike Schulz

Halle Berry and Hugh Jackman in SwordfishSWORDFISH, ATLANTIS: THE LOST EMPIRE, and LARA CROFT, TOMB RAIDER

Within a four-day span, I sat through Swordfish, Atlantis: The Lost Empire, and Lara Croft, Tomb Raider, and have become convinced that they're all the same movie. True, one is a sleek action-thriller, one a Disney cartoon, and one inspired by a popular videogame, but consider:

12 Jun 2001

"Evolution" Could Have Used Some: Also, "The Animal"

By Mike Schulz

David Duchovny, Julianne Moore, Seann William Scott, and Orlando Jones in EvolutionEVOLUTION

The sci-fi comedy Evolution is like Ghostbusters without Bill Murray, which isn't surprising since both films were directed by Ivan Reitman, but it also means that it's like Ghostbusters without the big laughs. In that 1984 blockbuster, Murray delivered his lines with an italicized innuendo that made even his throwaway quips hilarious; without his presence, the film (and its underrated 1989 follow-up) would just have been a moderately pleasant, cheesy, overscaled, haphazardly paced affair. That's Evolution.

06 Jun 2001

"Moulin Rouge" Provokes Passionate Response: Also, "Pearl Harbor" and "What's the Worst That Could Happen?"

By Mike Schulz

Nicole Kidman and Ewan McGregor in Moulin RougeMOULIN ROUGE

I loved Baz Luhrmann's musical Moulin Rouge, but what I adore even more than the film itself are works like it - artistically divisive movies that give you no choice but to love or hate them.

29 May 2001

Summer 2001 Looks . . . Distressingly Familiar

By Mike Schulz

For the past five years, I've written an annual coming-attractions article, detailing 10 summer movies that I was most anticipating. With roughly 50 major relases scheduled for the next 12 weeks, does it say more about me, or the current state of Hollywood films, that this year I can only muster up proper enthusiasm for eight of them? Sure, everyone's curious about Pearl Harbor, and most are at least vaguely interested in seeing what Moulin Rouge is all about (both of which I'll analyze in the next issue of The Reader).

22 May 2001

"Shrek" Is For Kids: Also, "Angel Eyes" and "A Knight's Tale"

By Mike Schulz

ShrekSHREK

Let's face it: Kids are gonna love Shrek, Dreamworks' comedic, computer-animated fairy tale. They'll get a kick out of the loud, outsize characters and superb visuals, and they'll probably laugh a lot. No one under 12 will want to miss it.

As for the rest of us ... .

15 May 2001

Forget "The Mummy Returns"; "Memento" Spellbinds

By Mike Schulz

Guy Pearce and Carrie-Anne Moss in MementoMEMENTO

It has taken quite a while, and an especially long while here in the Quad Cities, but the first unequivocally great movie of 2001 has finally appeared: writer-director Christopher Nolan's crime thriller Memento. And its greatness is of a very particular kind - you want all of your friends to see it immediately, so you can share your excitement with them and work out passages of the film that you're almost sure you understood. (Getting to review works like Memento is the absolute best thing about being a published film critic.) Like The Truman Show, Memento is so clever, so smart, so full-to-brimming with detail and wit and filmmaking passion that it feels miraculous, and within its genre, it just might be a new classic.

08 May 2001

"The Tailor of Panama" Shows Its Seams: Also, "Town & Country"

By Mike Schulz

Geoffrey Rush and Pierce Brosnan in The Tailor of PanamaTHE TAILOR OF PANAMA

It's been a very long time since a movie was released in our area that wasn't abjectly stupid, so it's easy to get some initial enjoyment from John Boorman's The Tailor of Panama, an adaptation of John LeCarré's 1996 bestseller. It's partially a spy thriller, but unlike the James Bond installments or the recent smash Spy Kids, the goofiness is kept to a minimum. Beyond that, the plot is smartly established, the cast is promising, the locations are exotic, and director Boorman shows from the start that he's in a frisky, playful mood; this is easily his most lighthearted work since 1987's Hope & Glory. So with all this going for it, and considering the undisputed wretchedness of the year's cinematic output, I have to admit that I feel like an ungrateful jerk for finding The Tailor of Panama itself rather disappointing.

01 May 2001

Affronts to Good Cinema: "One Night at McCool's" and "Freddy Got Fingered"

By Mike Schulz

Liv Tyler in One Night at McCool'sONE NIGHT AT MCCOOL'S

One Night at McCool's, the noir-esque comedy by debuting director Harald Zwart, begins promisingly enough: Three men - a good-natured bartender (Matt Dillon), a snaky lawyer (Paul Reiser), and a hangdog detective (John Goodman) - visit three separate confessors (hit-man Michael Douglas, incredulous shrink Reba McEntire, and randy priest Richard Jenkins), each detailing their obsession with the mysterious, definitely dangerous Jewel (Liv Tyler), the beauty who ruined their lives. Physically, emotionally, financially, this trio of saps couldn't be more disparate, and we're initially curious to see how their stories connect, how Jewel wound up seducing them, and what, exactly, her intentions are.

24 Apr 2001

Spring (2001) Cleaning: Recent Releases and Oscar Holdovers

By Mike Schulz

ALONG CAME A SPIDER - Lee Tamahori's thriller doesn't feature a single scene that works on a realistic level; thank goodness we gave up looking for realism in Hollywood flicks ages ago. If you can shut off your brain and ignore every logical thought that enters it, this Kiss the Girls prequel can be enjoyed enormously on its own ridiculous terms, and Morgan Freeman's astonishing blend of dignity, authority, and concentration gives the film more weight than it deserves. He might be the best thing to ever happen to a silly action-thriller, and he leads a fine cast of snarky character actors - Monica Potter, Michael Wincott, Jay O. Sanders, Dylan Baker, and Michael Moriarty among them - who might or might not turn out to be creeps. The film is a miasma of thriller clichés, yes, but it's unerringly paced and a lot of fun nonetheless.

18 Apr 2001

Zellweger Shines (Again) in "Diary": "Bridget Jones's Diary," "Blow," and "Josie & the Pussycats"

By Mike Schulz

Renee Zellweger in Bridges Jones's DiaryBRIDGET JONES'S DIARY

A terrific leading character can atone for a lot of wrongs in a film, and there might be no better proof of that thesis than Bridget Jones's Diary, Sharon Maguire's adaptation of Helen Fielding's incredibly popular novel. Our heroine, a 32-year-old British woman who works a dead-end publishing job, is a completely realistic type we almost never see in movies: a chain-smoking, wine-slurping, slightly overweight, unsatisfied-in-relationships flirt who wants desperately to better herself but doesn't have the motivation or discipline to do so. Flawed as she is, she's intensely endearing, and as perfectly played by Renée Zellweger, she's a magically comic creation, even more wonderful than Zellweger's previous incarnations of Dorothy Boyd and Nurse Betty. That the moviemakers spend the film's running length putting her in one humiliating situation after another, and that she's trapped in a predictable love triangle between a cad and a sweetie, aren't to be held against her; Bridget Jones, and Zellweger herself, triumph over their circumstances, creating a totally enjoyable cinematic work, flaws and all.

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