End of Summer Blahs: Premium Rush, The Apparition and Compliance

Well, it wasn't the greatest weekend for movies, that's for sure.

The best picture I saw was David Koepp's "Premium Rush," which won this week's cinematic lottery by simply not being terrible. It's a fast-paced, often amusing, but never better than pretty good thriller. It's fun - especially Michael Shannon's off-the-wall performance as the movie's heavy - but nothing to write home about.

I had stronger feelings about "Compliance," albeit not very good ones. The film, directed by Craig Zobel, was one of Sundance's more controversial selections this year. And I hate to have to describe it that way because that's clearly what the filmmakers are so desperately going for - to be the movie that divides people and gets them cranky.

Well, mission accomplished, but not in the way I'm supposing it's intended. The picture is a faux provocation. It's one of those films where you can almost just see the invisible hand of the director wagging his finger at you in scorn for sitting through the proceedings, which entail the humiliation of a young woman at the hands of a pretty sicko crank caller. And yet, I'm not the one who made the movie, am I? So there.

I'm not even going to go into "The Apparition." Let's just say the supernatural villain of the picture frequently appears as a large blob of mold. That enough for you?

Here are my reviews for Patch.

This coming week, I'll definitely catch "Lawless," but also several of these new releases - "The Tall Man," "For a Good Time, Call..." and "The Possession."

Next week is the first official week of the fall movie season. Thank God. This summer hasn't been the worst on record. In fact, very few of the major releases were outright terrible. But it's certainly been among the most bland.

There are a number of movies I'm very excited about this fall, including "The Master," "Django Unchained," "Amour," "Holy Motors," "Killing Them Softly," "Life of Pi," " Zero Dark Thirty" and "Promised Land." And I'm holding out hope that "Only God Forgives," "To the Wonder" and "Inside Llewyn Davis" get released this year.

Also, I'm going to follow up on Sight and Sound's 2012 poll with a list of my own. For some time, I've planned on putting together my own movie canon. So, at the end of this year, I'm going to compile what I believe to be the 1,000 movies that are required viewing. More on that later.

Baby, You're a Rich Man: 'Cosmopolis'

David Cronenberg's "Cosmopolis," which is based on the novel of the same name by Don DeLillo, is one of the year's most cerebral films and one of the director's strangest in a while. And although I liked the film and was compelled by it through and through, I don't believe it ranks with Cronenberg's great films of the past 15 years - namely, "Crash," "Spider," "A History of Violence," "Eastern Promises" and "A Dangerous Method."

There's a lot to praise in the picture, from it's bizarro mood, which is established early on and maintained throughout the proceedings, the solid performances from both Robert Pattinson and the supporting cast - especially Samantha Morton - and the smorgasbord of ideas at play. It's a good film from the director, but maybe not a great one.

I also caught up with "The Expendables 2," which is just as absurd as you're probably thinking it is. It's no more and no less than that. Yes, it's pretty bad. OK, it's occasionally amusing. But I wouldn't go as far as recommending it.

Here are my reviews for both films for Patch.

I also managed to finally catch "Celeste and Jesse Forever," which starts out a bit twee and ends in a different place than I would have expected. It's a nice little comedy and it has one of the most inappropriately funny jokes of recent memory.

This coming weekend, I'll see "Compliance," which I didn't get to last weekend as well as some of the weekend's new releases - perhaps, "Premium Rush" and "The Apparition."

'Bourne' Again

Hey, you only get a chance for a headline like that once in a blue moon, so sue me.

I enjoyed "The Bourne Legacy" a bit more than a majority of critics, whose cumulative reviews for the picture have placed it at a mediocre 53 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, if you pay attention to that sort of thing. I thought it was a decent entry in the series and an intense film.

I also had a soft spot for "Hope Springs," which follows Meryl Streep and Tommy Lee Jones as an aging couple who attend a marriage counseling program in Maine. It's a charming film that is, at first, funny before it veers off into more serious territory. On the whole, it was likeable.

My feelings were more mixed toward the weekend's other two new films - "The Campaign" and "Red Hook Summer." The first has a few sidesplitting moments, including one in which Zach Galifianakis hears some outrageous confessions at the dinner table with his family, but the film is, on the whole, a mixed bag. It doesn't really break any ground or tell us anything we don't already know about politics and its ending, which involves a complete about-face from both characters, is not earned. At least, in my humble opinion.

As is the case in most of Spike Lee's films, "Red Hook Summer" provides some serious stuff to chew on. But it's not among the director's best. For every riveting sequence, there's another with underwritten dialogue, overlong sermonizing (literally) during its church sequences and some amateurish acting. I'd almost recommend it because it's ballsier than most other films in cinemas right now, but the film is a mixed bag.

Here are my reviews for Patch.

This coming weekend, I'm getting all revved up for David Cronenberg's "Cosmopolis." I'll also catch up with "The Expendables 2" and, either this weekend or next, the controversial "Compliance."

This Week at the Movies: 'Total Recall' and '360'

The fact that I couldn't even make an attempt at a witty/smarmy headline should tell you everything you need to know. It wasn't the most inspiring weekend at the movies.

That's not to say that the selections I caught up with were that bad - just nothing to, pardon the expression, write home about.

"Total Recall" was a perfectly serviceable - but inspiration lacking - remake of the superior 1990 film by Paul Verhoeven, which was, in turn, based on a Philip K. Dick story. The new version has some decent action sequences and a helluva lot of chase scenes. But it's sort of unnecessary.

Fernando Meiralles's "360" is a bit better than his last outing - "Blindness" - but is still a far cry from his early work - "City of God" and "The Constant Gardener." It's one of those multiple character films in which stories occasionally intersect. That's fine for a setup, but the problem here is that there does not appear to be a unifying theme. Or, at least, a very weak one. The picture has some solid performances, but it's lacking a certain something.

Here are my reviews.

I'm still catching up on some of the films I missed in the theater this year. I recently saw "Peace, Love and Misunderstanding," which dabbles in cliche but is just charming enough. Then, there's "ATM," a micro-indie thriller that is compelling enough until it completely ceases to have any point whatsoever in its final moments. I'm not going to even get into "Detention," which aims to be a "Cabin in the Woods" and falls way short. No, seriously - way short.

This coming weekend, I'll be seeing Spike Lee's "Red Hook Summer," "The Bourne Legacy," "Hope Springs" and "The Campaign."

This Week at the Movies: 'Killer Joe,' 'Ruby Sparks' and 'The Watch'

William Friedkin's "Killer Joe" finds the director at his most wily in some time. It's a pretty lurid little picture with a solid performance by Matthew McConaughey and some decent supporting work from its cast, who portray some of the most lowdown degenerates I've seen in a movie in recent memory.
Needless to say, I liked it.

I also enjoyed "Ruby Sparks," Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris's "Little Miss Sunshine." I thought the duo's previous film was a bit overrated, so I enjoyed their sophomore picture a lot more. It's clever, funny and occasionally moving.

"The Watch" doubles as this week's obligatory raunch fest and obligatory alien invasion movie. It's actually not as bad as all that, but it's not exactly good either. There are a few laughs in the film, but not enough considering the talent involved.

Here are my three reviews for Patch.

I also saw Julie Delpy's "2 Days in New York," which is a follow-up to her surprise hit "2 Days in Paris." It's equally as funny and enjoyable. The film is lightweight, but in a good way. The same cannot be said for "30 Beats," which I managed to catch up with last week. For a film about a group of characters finding themselves in various sexual exploits during a hot New York summer day, it's pretty dry stuff.

This coming weekend, I'll most likely see a few of these selections: "Total Recall," "360" and "Celeste and Jesse Forever."

Batman Ends: 'The Dark Knight Rises'

Batman Ends. 'Batman Begins,' get it? Get it? Batman.... oh, never mind.

So, I thought Christopher Nolan's third chapter in his Batman trilogy was the weakest of the three, but I still thought it was better than your average summer movie. In essence, I liked it.

The cons for the film was its running length, which was not exactly necessary, as well as some dialogue being drowned out by Hans Zimmer's score. And while I thought Tom Hardy did a fine job as Bane, the fact that his face was obscured throughout the entire movie made his performance seem less a living and breathing sort of thing as, say, Heath Ledger's work as The Joker.

But I really enjoyed Anne Hathaway as jewel thief Selina Kyle - AKA Catwoman - and the picture's ending involved several clever plot twists. The supporting work, especially by Joseph Gordon Levitt, Gary Oldman and Michael Caine, was also solid,

All in all, it's a good movie - if not exactly a great one. Here's my review for Patch.

I also caught up with "Safety Not Guaranteed," which I enjoyed, but did not review. It's an offbeat indie film with some solid performances and clever writing. And it's got one nutty ending, let me tell you.

This coming weekend, I'll see "Killer Joe," "The Watch" and "Ruby Sparks."

Second Time Around: 'Alps' and 'Red Lights'

This weekend's selections were both follow-ups by directors to critically acclaimed breakout films. The other thing they have in common is that they both were disappointing.

I was a big fan of Giorgos Lanthimos's perverse and outrageous "Dogtooth," so much so that it landed in my top 20 of 2010. But "Alps," which is technically his third feature, but his first since his breakthrough film, did not live up to my expectations. It's certainly as strange as "Dogtooth," but less effective.

I also caught up with "Red Lights," the second film from Rodrigo Cortes, whose debut "Buried" left me with mixed feelings. His subject matter this time around is slightly more compelling and the performances in his sophomore feature are solid. The film culminates with one of those pull-the-rug-from-under-your-feet type of twists. In this case, it's an interesting one, but still a twist that causes the picture to sort-of fall apart under scrutiny.

Neither film was bad, but neither was exactly recommendable either. Here are my reviews.

This coming weekend, I'll obviously see "The Dark Knight Rises" as well as something else that has yet to be decided. Some potentials: "The Imposter," "Union Square" or "Easy Money."