28 Dec 2014

Into the Weeds: "Into the Woods" and "The Homesman"

By Mike Schulz

Emily Blunt and James Corden in Into the WoodsINTO THE WOODS

"Do you know what you wish? Are you certain what you wish is what you want?" - lyrics from Into the Woods

10 Aug 2014

Brain, Brain, Go Away: "The Hundred-Foot Journey," "Into the Storm," "Step Up: All in," and "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles"

By Mike Schulz

Om Puri, Manish Dayal, and Helen Mirren in The Hundred-Foot JourneyFriday, August 8, 10 a.m.-ish: I'm at The Hundred-Foot Journey, and five minutes into this lighthearted foodie dramedy, I'm already regretting my decision to only have yogurt for breakfast. With director Lasse Hallström's camera slavering over the creation of steaming, succulent pots and grills of Indian cuisine, all of it enhanced by spices and oils whose aromas are practically wafting off the screen, this is not the movie to see if you're hungry. Considering screenwriter Steven Knight's T-shirt-ready dialogue - which features such pithy bromides as "Life has its own flavor," "We cook to make ghosts," and the grammatically vexing "Food is memories" - it's not really the movie to see if your brain is hungry, either.

03 Mar 2013

Fee-Fi-Fo-Fumble: "Jack the Giant Slayer," "Phantom," "21 & Over," and "The Last Exorcism Part II"

By Mike Schulz

Nicholas Hoult in Jack the Giant SlayerJACK THE GIANT SLAYER

It happened to Hansel and Gretel. It happened to Red Riding Hood. It happened to Snow White. (It happened to a couple of Snow Whites, actually.) And now it's Jack, of "... and the beanstalk" fame, who's getting a pricey, kitschy, effects-filled makeover, serving as protagonist for director Bryan Singer's Jack the Giant Slayer. At the rate this trend is going, I can hardly wait for the inevitable big-budget updating of The Pied Piper with Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Marion Cotillard, and Harvey Fierstein taking on the role of a lifetime in The Frog King.

27 Feb 2011

Iowa Not-So-Stubborn: "Cedar Rapids," "Hall Pass," and "Drive Angry"

By Mike Schulz

Isiah Whitlock Jr., John C. Reilly, Anne Heche, and Ed Helms in Cedar RapidsCEDAR RAPIDS

Prior my Saturday screening of Cedar Rapids, I'd seen 18 2011 releases, and my favorite of the mostly-slash-wildly underwhelming bunch - by a considerable margin - was Justin Bieber: Never Say Never. It's tempting, then, to want to overpraise director Miguel Arteta's raunchy yet genial comedy simply for being, you know, good.

11 Apr 2010

'Til Death Threats Do Us Part: "Date Night" and "Letters to God"

By Mike Schulz

Tina Fey and Steve Carell in Date NightDATE NIGHT

Playing husband and wife in the marital action comedy Date Night, Steve Carell and Tina Fey partner each other with such skillful ease, and radiate such genuine affection for one another, that my issues with the film have come to feel insignificant, and even a little petty. I had a not-bad time at director Shawn Levy's latest. But reflecting on the experience, I've found it awfully difficult to wipe the grin from my face; surrounded by an exceptional cast of second bananas, Carell and Fey are so genial and inventive together that it's easy to ignore the dully synthetic, determinedly formulaic Hollywood product they're appearing in.

12 Jul 2000

Moose and Squalls: "The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle" and "The Perfect Storm"

By Mike Schulz

Rene Russo, Jason Alexander, Robert De Niro, Rocky, and Bullwinkle in The Adventures of Rocky & BullwinkleTHE ADVENTURES OF ROCKY & BULLWINKLE

One of the happier surprises of last summer was the release of South Park: Bigger, Longer, & Uncut, a marvelously written musical comedy that transcended its source material and shot off into a madcap animated universe all its own, raising the bar for all future TV-show-turned-feature-film projects. And while it would be great to report that the film version of The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle approached South Park's level of cinematic exuberance, the filmmakers are facing an uphill battle: The animated series this one is based on is already such a whirligig of action, cliffhangers, and verbal and visual puns that raising the ante on it as a movie seems kinda pointless. (Clever and funny though it often is, the South Park TV series has nothing on the brilliance of the original R & B series.)

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