Josh Tate

The Whitman brothers shop for dangerous pets in an Indian village | Photo courtesy of Fox Searchlight I'll lead this review by saying,"If only the DVD of The Darjeeling Limited were as rich and strange as the film, The Darjeeling Limited." The film is one of Wes Anderson's best tales of whimsy and familial dysfunction. Three brothers who've long since grown apart decide to travel across India on a sort of spiritual odyssey that...

Has anyone seen the cobra I just bought? | Photo courtesy of Fox Searchlight Wes Anderson doesn't have many casual fans. You either love the strange worlds of whimsy he creates or you find it all a bit precious and twee. Count me in the former camp and count The Darjeeling Limited as a return to form for Anderson after the ambitious but foggy The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. Next generation 3-D isn't...

Hope that video camera fires bullets, Mr. Secret Service! | Photo courtesy of Sony Pictures Mediocre political thriller Vantage Point topped the box office this weekend, grossing a solid $24M in its opening frame. It was the only new film to do significant business as hold-overs held the next five spots. Jumper dropped precipitously in its second weekend (-54%) but still managed to make $12.65M ($56.2M). Family picture The Spiderwick Chronicles showed considerably more...

Anton Yelchin and Kat Dennings moon over each other in the shithouse | Photo courtesy of MGM Charlie Bartlett is the hardest type of film to review because even though it misses, it doesn't miss by terribly much. After watching it and thinking about it for awhile, I kept returning to an Australian movie I saw last summer, Introducing the Dwights. Like Charlie Bartlett it was a film built on a curio of a...

Photo courtesy of Sony Pictures Hollywood's latest exercise in Rashômon-style storytelling is Vantage Point. As most of you no doubt realize because you've seen the trailer a quarter of a million times, Vantage Point deals with the attempted assassination of the President from a multitude of perspectives. As the movie's tagline says, "8 Strangers. 8 Points of View. 1 Truth." Critics have been flaming it with Variety's Justin Chang providing some choice barbs. I...

Photo courtesy of New Line Cinema If you think you know what Be Kind Rewind is all about, you're probably mistaken. The film's advertising would lead you to believe that it's a raucous comedy about two losers forced to re-make classic films on a zero budget to hilarious effect. While that's certainly a major plot point, it only exists to serve what I think is the film's subtext. Namely, Be Kind Rewind is a...

Photo courtesy of IMDB I'm usually the first to slag the large theater chains for their lack of creativity in programming. As such, I feel compelled to point out when they actually make a good decision. In this case, AMC is doing something so obviously cool that I can't believe it isn't done every year (maybe it will be going forward). This Saturday, several AMC theaters in the Southland will be hosting a marathon...

Photo courtesy of Universal Wow! Most weeks I'm happy if there are a couple of new DVDs worth picking up. Today, I count at least eight that would be solid editions to any library. American Gangster may not have been the great film that many were expecting, but it was still solid studio fare. I'll say the same for Michael Clayton even though it inexplicably got better critical attention. Has Ang Lee ever made...

Photo courtesy of 20th Century Fox While not the record-breaker that Cloverfield and Hannah Montana proved to be, Jumper debuted to a winning $31.7M over the long President's Day weekend. The Spiderwick Chronicles finished second with $24.4M followed by fellow newcomer Step Up 2 the Streets with $21.5M. The rancid Fool's Gold surprised by holding onto fourth with $15M ($43.9M). Clearly, Valentine's couples preferred it to the weekend's other new romantic comedy, Definitely, Maybe...

Photo courtesy of 20th Century Fox The term B-movie has to many persons the connotation of a movie of substandard quality. Traditionally, it meant a low-budget movie with lesser stars meant primarily to entertain. Now an appropriate definition would probably be a genre film that has little to no serious artistic intent: entertainment, not enlightenment.* Doug Liman's Jumper is a B-movie.** I certainly wasn't enlightened by the time it was over. What would you...