It’s a good year for documentary films about sincere and dedicated heavy metal musicians from the frozen north, doggedly dedicated to their craft after decades of toil, despite a lack of commercial success. But unlike the surprise hit Anvil! The Story Of Anvil, the newly released Until The Light Takes Us, directed by Aaron Aites and Audrey Ewell, is no heartwarmer. It’s more horror movie than documentary, and the realization that these guys are still following their dreams may prompt some viewers to wonder what can be done to stop them. more ›

With nothing more than his fists and black trunks, Mike was able to, in his words, "win all the championships." With nothing more than Mike's stories filled with brutal honesty, a couple of HD cameras and footage of "Iron Mike" both in and out of the ring, Tyson has won over critics, festival committees (Regard Knockout Award winner at Cannes in 2008) and fans alike. more ›

How come people in movies don’t just call the police? Seriously. The police exist in this world specifically for occasions when bad people are trying to do bad stuff to you. CALL THEM. What if a character in a movie needed a pizza? NEEDED it. Like, if they didn’t get this fucking pizza, they were going to die. Would it be reasonable to assume that instead of calling Domino’s or Pizza Hut or any one of 1,000 local slice joints, the hero or heroine would instead embark on a city-wide frantic manhunt for the correct sauce, cheeses, dough, and toppings, all while evading those pizza-haters intent on their demise? No. It probably wouldn’t be reasonable to assume that such a scenario would occur, without groans and grumbles from the audience. So why do we put ourselves through the hassle, why do we let ourselves get sucked into convoluted twists and sub-plot after sub-plot when the solution to all the problems is just a phone call away? Probably, because getting there is more than half the fun. more ›

Submitted and Authored by Andrew Seely more ›

This is a difficult movie to market without a red-band trailer, due to the subject matter. more ›

Last night at Zune LA, located on Beverly, the eagerly anticipated documentary on Joy Division premiered to an audience that included co-founder and bassist Peter Hook. Hook kicked off the evening DJ'ing to everyone while they were served cocktails and appetizers prior to the film, and generously answered questions after the the film. more ›

Although critics have raved about Juno, including myself, I have occasionally heard that it made a few people gag, and I've definitely heard mixed responses to the decidedly twee soundtrack. (I love that word. Twee! ...Not related, sorry.) Chicago Sun-Times critic Jim DeRogatis's rant about both the movie and the soundtrack is already making the blog rounds and iliciting quite a few responses. more ›

I could write a movie review of Knocked Up -- and maybe I still will -- but it will just be a long list of hilarious moments (there's the part where he does this one thing... and then she says this other thing...) in a movie overflowing with hilarity. Trust me on this: you will walk out of the movie floating on fluffly pink cloud of funny-ness, and I don't want to spoil a second... more ›

I really, really, really liked Grindhouse for many reasons that I can probably only effectively communicate to you orally and/or non verbally. But this is the written word, so alas, I must force myself. Meanwhile, you will have to imagine my excited gesticulations. I do a lot of pointing, and thumbs up, and punching motions, karate kicks, Elvis arm moves, and touchdown dance type shit when I talk about Grindhouse. It’s that type of... more ›

If you’re a goat-raping, baby-eating, George W. Bush-hating heathen like me, Jesus Camp is the horror movie of the year, offering a snapshot of red-state America that's more terrifying than all the Japanese ghosts and blood-and-guts effects wizardry of Hollywood combined -- and it's all the scarier for being real. Watch as children are transformed into Soldiers of the Lord! Listen as they are taught unquestioning obedience! Scream in terror as George W. Bush... more ›

Last night we got the opportunity to see the latest effort (We use the term very loosely) from the group that call themselves Jackass, and it was everything it needed to be. This review doesn't require much in the way of in-depth plot or dialogue assessment, so we'll do our best to get the message across. If the thought of seeing naked little people, fat people, dumb people, and why-am-I-famous people doing things like electrocuting... more ›

So my first movie review for LAist turns out to be for a totally New York movie. That’s ironic, or something. Not that you know it’s set in New York, per se, because it’s mostly interior shots and they never really say where it is. But you’d kinda be able to guess after a while, because pretty much every character is like Woody Allen without the jokes: whiny, navel-gazing in a neurotic way (as opposed... more ›

Idiocracy is currently the best movie in America that no one's ever heard of. That doesn’t mean Idiocracy is great, but it certainly deserves better than the shabby treatment it's received from 20th Century Fox, which seems to have unceremoniously dumped the movie into unsuspecting theaters with a promotional budget approximating that of a typical Saturday night beer run. When it comes to screwing over Mike Judge, Fox has a tradition to uphold. Two... more ›

While a couple of movies are hardly enough to qualify as zeitgeist, there's something serendipitous about the back-to-back release of two films featuring teenage Latino protagonists growing up in East Los Angeles.* Wassup Rockers and Quinceañera both focus on teenagers defying familial and cultural expectations, but even though they were both shot on video and take a quasi-documentary approach towards their subjects, they achieve very different results.... more ›

One of the biggest box office hits of 2006 that you've probably never seen or even heard of is Krrish, an action-adventure/romance/sci-fi extravaganza courtesy of India, home of the world's most prolific film industry. Released in late June, Krrish was produced on a $10 million budget (lavish by Bollywood standards) and has grossed anywhere from $30 to $60 million dollars, depending on which figures you believe. The movie is actually sequel to the 2003... more ›

Any movie where Steve Carell plays a gay, suicidal professor who has proclaimed himself the world's #1 Proust scholar is okay by me. Actually, it's better than okay. Throw in Alan Arkin as a heroin-snorting grandfather (isn't it cool when old people do hard drugs?), Greg Kinnear as a would-be motivational speaker and Abigail Breslin as a little girl with dreams of child beauty pageant stardom, stuff them into a dilapidated Volkswagen bus along... more ›

"I wanted to believe. More than most I wanted to believe. I wanted there to be something more than this awfulness that surrounds us every day." This poignant statement of yearning and soul-gnawing dissatisfaction comes just before the climactic series of events in Lady in the Water, and it sums up why audiences flock to the films of M. Night Shyamalan: the hunger to connect to something beyond what we can see. If only... more ›

I love movies. I love clothes. And because I don't watch enough reality TV shows to have an unhealthy dose of schadenfreude in my life, I love stories about evil bosses who receive their comeuppance. So I was, of course, dying to see The Devil Wears Prada. I am a girl after all. My lady friends who were lucky enough to have attended advance screenings or rushed to the theater on opening weekend all... more ›

The show, dubbed "Henry's Film Corner," premieres December 4th. Rollins and his guests -celebs and "ordinary" people- will comment on and debate movies, showbiz and film culture. The pilot episode featured Rob Zombie, Rollin's mail carrier Raul and discussion about Akira Kurosawa. IFC marketers are promoting the series as "Ebert & Roeper" meet "Real Time with Bill Maher." more ›

LAist is smart enough to know not to believe the hype and marketing behind some of Hollywood's brand-new movies. Included in this weekend's stellar trifecta of new releases is the "action-packed" Alien vs. Predator, the "sweet and charming" The Princess Diaries 2 and the "awesome card game as a movie, movie" Yu-Gi-Oh! The Movie!. more ›