|
Eagle Eye (2008) PG-13 118min
2008-09-28 08:53:00 Eagle Eye (2008) Eagle Eye is the new product of Steven Spielberg’s Dreamworks studio, starring Shia LaBeouf, Michelle Monaghan, Rosario Dawson, Michael Chiklis and Billy Bob Thornton. The plot: Two unrelated people, a copy shop clerk Jerry Shaw (LaBeouf) and a young single mom Rachel Holloman (Monaghan) are thrown together by a phone call from a mysterious ...
In Bruges (2008) R 107min
2008-09-24 07:20:00 In Bruges (2008) In Bruges is Martin McDonagh’s (2006 Oscar winner for script for ”Six Shooter”) directorial debut, starring Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson and Ralph Fiennes. The plot: At Christmas time two Irish hit men are hiding after they did a job that didn’t go as planned - they are sent by their employer Harry to Bruges, Belgium, to lie low. There they ...
Review: Pineapple Express (2008) R 111min
2008-08-13 20:00:00 Pineapple Express (2008) After Seth Rogen and his buddy Evan Goldberg wrote the script for Superbad when they were 15 years old, they also were itching to write a script for an action movie, but with a twist. Nobody has done this before: if an action movie married a stoner comedy and they had a child, and that ...
Review of ?The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor? (2008) PG-13 112min
2008-08-04 00:39:00 The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor (2008) Brendan Fraser returns to movie theaters for another adventure as intrepid explorer Rick O’Connell. The plot: Rick and Eve O’Connell spend the fortune they earned in the past two adventures in after-war England in a huge mansion. Both of them pretend that they are quite happy with this lifestyle ...
Review: Wanted (2008) R 110min
2008-07-08 09:38:00 Wanted (2008) Russian director Timur Bekmambetov is already known to American audience by his films Night Watch: Nochnoy Dozor and Day Watch: Dnevnoy Dozor and the next part, Twilight Watch: Sumerechniy Dozor based on Sergei Lukyanenko’s bestselling book. That movie went out in limited release. Those who are old enough remember two dramatic movies he made about Soviet soldiers ...
Review: Running Scared (2006) R 122min
2008-06-27 08:20:00 Running Scared (2006) R 122min Fast-paced crime action thriller written and directed by Wayne Kramer (The Cooler). The plot: After a drug deal had gone bad, Joey Gazelle (Paul Walker - Fast and Furious, Into The Blue), a small-time mobster, is told by head-thug Tommy ‘Tombs’ Perello (Johnny Messner) to dispose of a snub nose stainless steel .38 gun ...
Review of ?Death at a Funeral? (2007) 90min
2008-05-13 06:47:00 From the animation and the music theme of the opening credits sequence you know you are watching a witty comedy that won director Frank Oz (famous for directing movies like Little Shop of Horrors, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Stepford Wives and giving his voice to Yoda in Star Wars and other characters from Muppets to Monsters ...
Review: The Brave One (2007) R 122min
2008-04-18 08:58:00 “The Brave One” is a drama directed by Neil Jordan and stars Jodie Foster and Terrence Howard. The plot: A New York woman, a radio show host Erica Bain (Jodie Foster), was brutally beaten and her fiancé, David (Naveen Andrews), killed when they took a walk in the park late at evening. She goes on killing ...
Enemy of the State (1998) R 140min
2008-04-15 06:37:00 Ridley Scott’s brother Tony directed this action flick starring Will Smith, Jon Voight, Gene Hackman, Lisa Bonet, Jack Black, Gabriel Byrne, and . He’s also known for producing series Numb3rs and The Company and films like Assassination of Jesse James by the coward Robert Ford and directing such movies as Tristan & Isolde, In Her Shoes, ...
The Black Dahlia (2006) R 121min
2008-04-02 08:33:00 A sophisticated film noir from the director of Scarface, The Untouchables, Casualties Of War, Mission: Impossible, Snake Eyes, Mission To Mars and Redacted - Brian De Palma. It’s based on James Ellroy’s Novel “The Black Dahlia” inspired by the real murder of Elizabeth Short. The plot: 1946. Hollywood. Two cops-partners, former boxers Dwight “Bucky” Bleichert (Josh ...
21 (2008) PG-13 123min
2008-03-29 08:05:00 The plot: (from IMDb) Inspired by the true story (based on “Bringing Down The House” book by Ben Mezrich) of how some of the very brightest young minds in the country took Vegas for millions, 21 stars Jim Sturgess as Ben Campbell, a brilliant M.I.T. student who desperately needs to pay his school tuition. ...
Basic Instinct (1992) UR 128min
2008-03-28 07:56:00 Just watched the original 1992 “Basic Instinct”, director’s cut. This was one of the most controversial and talked-about movies when it came out. Brought me back to the days when I saw it when I was in high-school. The plot: everyone saw it. The good: one of the most memorable movies of 20th century, at least in ...
Snakes On The Plane (2006) R 105min
2008-03-21 06:37:00 The plot: An FBI agent (Samuel L. Jackson) brings a murder witness on an airplane. During the flight, snakes come out out of everywhere. The good: ehm… nothing. The bad: you can tell you are going to see a bad movie from the opening sequence - the acting is going to be horrible. The plot is ...
The Bank Job (2008) R 1h 50min
2008-03-08 08:58:00 This is an excellent heist movie based on real events. Directed by Roger Donaldson (The World’s Fastest Indian, The Recruit, Thirteen Days, Dante’s Peak, Species etc.). Written by Dick Clement (Across the Universe, Flushed Away) and Ian La Frenais (also worked on the latter two movies). Starring Jason Statham. Lionsgate Films. The plot: Based on actual events of ...
The Wicker Man (2006) PG-13 102min
2008-03-07 21:51:00 This is a remake of 1973 British horror movie with the same title written and directed by Neil LaBute and starring Nicolas Cage. The plot: a motorcycle cop Edward Malus (Nicolas Cage), traumatized by the road-side death of the occupants of the car he had stopped, receives a letter from his ex-fiance Willow informing him that ...
Lady in the Water (2006) PG-13 110min
2008-02-20 19:50:00 M. Knight Shyamalan, the creator of “The Sixth Sense”, wrote, directed and starred in this fantasy movie based on the book he wrote for his own daughter. The plot: an apartment building superintendent Cleveland Heep (Paul Giamatti) rescues a woman from the swimming pool he maintains. She turns out to be not a regular woman, but a ...
The Appeal (Hardcover)
2008-02-04 14:04:00 The jury was ready.After forty-two hours of deliberations that followed seventy-one days of trial that included 530 hours of testimony from four dozen witnesses, and after a lifetime of sitting silently as the lawyers haggled and the judge lectured and the spectators watched like hawks for telltale signs, the jury was ready. Locked away in the jury room, secluded and secure, ten of them proudly signed their names to the verdict while the other two pouted in their corners, detached and miserable in their dissension. There were hugs and smiles and no small measure of self-congratulation because they had survived this little war and could now march proudly back into the arena with a decision they had rescued through sheer determination and the dogged pursuit of compromise. Their ordeal was over; their civic duty complete. They had served above and beyond. They were ready.The foreman knocked on the door and rustled Uncle Joe from his slumbers. Uncle Joe, the ancient bailiff, had guarded...
By: Book Stores
Rambo (2008) R 93min
2008-01-27 08:10:00 20 years since Rambo III Sylvester Stallone has revived Rambo. He wrote and directed this new action flick. I went to the theater with very low expectations because Rambo in Afghanistan was a major disappointment. The plot: John Rambo lives peacefully in a jungle in Thailand. When Christian aid-workers disappear amidst war in Burma, Rambo leads ...
Atonement: A Novel (Paperback)
2007-12-25 10:40:00 Ian McEwan's Booker Prize-nominated Atonement is his first novel since Amsterdam took home the prize in 1998. But while Amsterdam was a slim, sleek piece, Atonement is a more sturdy, more ambitious work, allowing McEwan more room to play, think, and experiment.We meet 13-year-old Briony Tallis in the summer of 1935, as she attempts to stage a production of her new drama "The Trials of Arabella" to welcome home her older, idolized brother Leon. But she soon discovers that her cousins, the glamorous Lola and the twin boys Jackson and Pierrot, aren't up to the task, and directorial ambitions are abandoned as more interesting prospects of preoccupation come onto the scene. The charlady's son, Robbie Turner, appears to be forcing Briony's sister Cecilia to strip in the fountain and sends her obscene letters; Leon has brought home a dim chocolate magnate keen for a war to promote his new "Army Ammo" chocolate bar; and upstairs, Briony's migraine-stricken mother Emily keeps tabs on th...
By: Book Stores
Book of the Dead (Kay Scarpetta, No. 15) (Hardcover)
2007-12-25 10:27:00 From Publishers WeeklyBestseller Cornwell's 15th novel to feature Dr. Kay Scarpetta (after 2005's Predator) delivers her trademark grisly crime scenes, but lacks the coherence and emotional resonance of earlier books. Soon after relocating to Charleston, S.C., to launch a private forensics lab, Scarpetta is asked to consult on the murder of U.S. tennis star Drew Martin, whose mutilated body was found in Rome. Contradictory evidence leaves Scarpetta, the Italian carabinieri and Scarpetta's lover, forensic psychologist Benton Wesley, stumped. But when she discovers unsettling connections between Martin's murder, the body of an unidentified South Carolina boy and her old nemesis, the maniacal psychiatrist Dr. Marilyn Self, Scarpetta encounters a killer as deadly as any she's ever faced. With her recent switch from first- to third-person narration, Cornwell loses what once made her series so compelling: a window into the mind of a strong, intelligent woman holding her own in a prof...
By: Book Stores
Awake (2007) R 84min
2007-12-03 08:09:00 This movie from the first seconds seemed to be a hospital drama ala “ER”. It began with a message: “Every year 3,000,000 anesthesias are performed. One in 700 people ends up awake during the surgery - a condition known as “anesthetic awareness” when patient is paralyzed but is still awake”. So it appeared that at ...
Double Cross (Alex Cross) (Hardcover)
2007-12-03 08:01:00 Just when Alex thought his life was calming down into a routine of patients and therapy sessions, he finds himself back in the game--this time to catch a criminal mastermind like no other. A spate of elaborate murders in Washington D.C. have the whole East Coast on edge. They are like nothing Alex Cross and his new girlfriend, Detective Brianna Stone, have ever seen. With each murder, the case becomes increasingly complex. There's only one thing Alex knows: the killer adores an audience. As victims are made into gruesome spectacles citywide, inducing a media hysteria, it becomes clear to Alex that the man he's after is a genius of terror--and he's after fame. The killer has the whole city by its strings--and he'll stop at nothing to become the most terrifying star that Washington D.C. has ever seen.
By: Book Stores
What were the biggest surprises, disappointments and thrillers in NASCAR of
2007-11-28 22:28:00 The biggest surprises came in all three series, first with the Truck Series Championship battle, this one was close just about all season long, no one driver ran away with it and amazing enough the championship came down to the final race, 29 points going in and one mistake (with a part), that’s a real championship battle. Congratulations to Ron Hornaday Jr and Kevin Harvick Inc., what a season.Of course, in Nextel Cup, one NASCAR writer wrote “The championship belongs to Jimmie Johnson, but the season belongs to Dale Earnhardt Jr.” and that sentence is right on, on big surprise was Dale Earnhardt Jr’s announcements, first leave DEI and then join Hendrick Motorsports (and I might add leaving without the #8 and Budweiser), that’s going to be a good combination and with that Hendrick Motorsports creating the most powerful racing teams with Johnson, Gordon, Mears and now Earnhardt Jr… all winnersThe Busch series seeing two championships, let’s be honest here, by the halfw...
No Country for Old Men (2007) R 122min
2007-11-25 09:04:00 Written and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen, this is the best chase movie ever! The plot: a hunter named Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin) walks on the aftermath of a drug deal gone bad in the middle of th desert somewhere in Texas and discovers suitcase with two million dollars. He tries to disappear with the money ...
Hitman (2007) R 100min
2007-11-23 10:29:00 The plot: The Hitman, Agent 47, the “creation” of the secret organization called “The Agency”, was sent to assassinate the [fictional] Russian president (Ulrich Thomsen - ehm, Danish actor) who was involved in trade of drugs, prostitution, arms trades etc. Instead, hitman kills the president’s double. Realizing he was set up he threatens his “organization” to get to ...
Deja Vu (2006) PG-13 128min
2007-11-11 10:21:00 Déjŕ Vu was directed by Tony Scott, producer and director of such films as The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Tristan and Isolde, In Her Shoes, Man on Fire, Big Time, Spy Game, Enemy of the State, True Romance, Top Gun and many many more including TV series NUMB3RS. Produced by Jerry ...
Michael Clayton (2007) R 119min
2007-10-16 21:53:00 An intelligent high-powered legal thriller, this is not a action film, so it's a departure from shaky camera of the Bourne films. Very realistic. The title is appropriate: a story of a man who's a great lawyer, not such a good friend, and an unsuccessful family man. There's a little of The Firm, Civic Action and Erin Brokovich - a crusade of individual against an evil corporation, but for the most part the focus of the movies is drama of human beings who just happen to be lawyers.
Good Night And Good Luck (2005) PG 93min
2007-10-13 06:22:00 Great film directed by George Clooney and starring himself and David Strathairn as CBS reporter Edward R. Morrow, who stood up to senator McCarthy, who was using fear to erode civil liberties, which makes it a very important movie of our time, when people who criticize the administration are accused of being unpatriotic and terrorist-huggers.
Eastern Promises (2007) R 100 min
2007-09-24 09:12:00 Finally someone had made an honest movie about modern mafia and human trafficking, Ukrainian mafia in London in this case. David Cronenberg, famous for directing “The History Of Violence”, directed this film and starred his favorite actor Viggo Mortensen once again in the main role. Technically, Viggo’s character is a supporting role, but his performance is ...
Fracture (2007) R 1:40
2007-09-23 02:04:00 One of my most favorite actors, and maybe the best actor of the 20th century, Sir Antony Hopkins is starring in this thriller - the primary reason why I wanted to see it. Hopkins plays an NTSB consultant, quite wealthy judging by his ride and his LA house with huge pool and garden, who finds out ...
The Last King Of Scotland (2006)
2007-09-05 10:08:00 *** May contain spoilers *** The plot: Nicholas Garrigan (James McAvoy), Scott, graduated from medical school and randomly picked Uganda to practice his skills. He arrived in the poor, but beautiful country just in time for Idi Amin (Forest Whitaker) to take over the country from deposed president Milton Obote after a military coup. To Nicholas it appeared ...
The Sentinel (2006)
2007-08-21 09:09:00 Michael Douglas is playing a Secret Service agent who was credited with saving president Raegan’s life, and the beautiful Kim Basinger is playing president’s wife. Michael Douglas (don’t remember the name of his character, Pete I think it was) is to protect the First lady. And they have an affair that probably began since before ...
Spook Country - William Gibson Novel
2007-08-08 15:14:00 Spook Country - William Gibson Novel Now that the present has caught up with William Gibson’s vision of the future, which made him the most influential science fiction writer of the past quarter century, he has started writing about a time–our time–in which everyday life feels like science fiction. With his previous novel, Pattern Recognition, the ...
By: Guidestobuy.com
Emraan Hashmi to move away from erotic thrillers
2007-07-02 08:58:00 “I’ve redefined the Emraan Hashmi brand because I was getting very repetitive with both my look and roles,” says Emraan Hashmi in between the many interviews he’s been giving in recent weeks. Emraan considers his latest film a milestone in his career. “I can safely say the role is very different because, for the first ...
By: Bollywood Zone
Shooter , Good Movie from Mark Walberg (director of ?Training Day?)
2007-06-27 00:00:00 Shooter , Good Movie from Mark Walberg (director of “Training Day”) A movie that would not have been out of place in the run of paranoid-political thrillers of the 1970s, Shooter works an entertaining variation on the assassination picture. Mark Wahlberg, carrying over good mojo from The Departed, slides neatly into the character of Bob ...
By: Guidestobuy.com
Duel: Spielberg?s First
2007-05-07 23:10:00 Next time you drive alone on a highway, you?re going to be on the lookout for the monster truck. A truck-trailer that is obsessed with cars and derives sick pleasure in trampling them. Duel, Spielberg?s one of the first, is a road movie with the touch of an evil. The suspense and dread he successfully creates in the movie is masterly. Watching young Steven Spielberg is like watching the making of a great director. It would have taken no genius to guess after watching Duel more than three... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
The Fantastic Following
2007-05-07 23:10:00 If you are a writer, you would relate to the protagonist of Following but not beyond a point. He?s interested in people to the extent that he follows them literally in the hope that he would gather material to write about. This brilliant concept is executed with style in Christopher Nolan?s 1998 classic Following. Nolan, better known for Memento, shot this movie with no budget. All his actors had regular jobs, hence shooting was only possible over the weekends and it took him about one year to... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
Rear Window
2007-05-07 23:10:00 Aren?t we all Peeping Toms? "He is a real Peeping Tom?sure he?s a snooper but aren?t we all?", said Alfred Hitchcock in an interview to renowned film critic and director Francios Truffaut about James Stuart, the protagonist of Rear Window James Stuart, a photographer breaks his legs while shooting and is recuperating in his apartment. To keep himself busy he uses his zoom lens and watches events unfolding in balconies across the street. He senses something fishy going on in one of the flats... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
After The Vanishing Act
2007-05-07 23:10:00 Can I ever forget the nights we've spent discussing Tarkovsky, Bunuel, Ray, Polanski, Hitchcock, Kubrick and god knows whom. But I lost him to the world, he could hardly relate to. Finally my dear friend Anu is back after his "The Vanishing" act. Here's his mail: Bikas, There are few films which haunt the imagination..A Clockwork Orange, Solaris, the recent Babel..I hadthe good fortune of viewing a great French suspensefilm called "The Vanishing" which falls in thatcategory. Its directed by a... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
Audition for a wife in an evil world
2007-05-07 23:10:00 I would dare not watch this film ever again alone. I could almost see Asami?s innocent face lurking behind. Leave alone Audition?s protagonist Aoyama, anyone would fail to see the sinister in Asami. Takashi Miike sets up the film like an ordinary family drama. It opens with little Shigehiko walking with a gift for her ill mother. However, she?s gone before he reaches. His father a TV producer brings him up. The real drama of Audition begins seven years later when Shigehiko suggests his father... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
Is Departed better than Infernal Affairs?
2007-05-07 23:10:00 I?ve seen Martin Scorsese version of Infernal Affairs, The Departed. However was curious to see the original. I was also kind of tempted to figure out if Scorsese has done justice to the original or if it?s his masterly touch that has transformed it into a classic. So finally my DVDwallah managed a copy of Infernal Affairs and having seen it now could say both the films are great independent of each other. Infernal Affairs is deeply rooted in the culture it comes from. There?re references to... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
Caché: The Hidden Menace
2007-05-07 23:10:00 Hi Bikas! I am a self professed follower of arty French thrillers..I like the way the best films of that genre manage to find something unsettling in everyday affairs. A few days back I once again got proof that the European filmmakers understand paranoia better than anyone else in the world. The evidence came in the form of a very intriguing film called Cache. Its directed by Michael Michael Haneke, the same filmmaker who made the harrowing drama-The Piano Teacher. That film was about a... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
Is Fight Club a masterpiece?
2007-05-07 23:10:00 Have you become your job or your bank statement? Do you find yourself surfing through product catalogues, trying to find something that defines you as a person? Do you often feel like bashing up people without any provocation? If yes then may be its time you should watch Fight Club. David Flincher?s 1999 film Fight Club will scare you and give you a pervert sense of relief. The film conceived as a psychological thriller is certainly much more than merely that. It has deceptively overt... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
The Piano Teacher: 10/10 Ending!
2007-05-07 23:10:00 Dude! I loved your review for the most part but don?t agree with your misguided misinterpretation of the ending. Since your review generally is above reproach, I will only talk about the ending. For starters how did you expect the film to end? With a reconciliation.., a murder or perhaps a ray of hope? All three would have been compromising in my opinion, remember The Piano Teacher is not a thriller hence comparing its philosophy with Cache and expecting the same results is unfair to both... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
The Piano Teacher: What an ending!!#??
2007-05-07 23:10:00 I screamed as the credits scrolled down the screen. How can a film end like this, I thought. The Piano Teacher Erika Kohut (Isabelle Huppert) is really one of the most twisted characters I?ve ever come across on the silver screen and its ending the most unexpected and unexplainable. Michael Haneke sets up the film just like Cache. Everything seems normal. Erika seems to be one disenchanted perfectionist. Living alone with her ?hot blooded? old mother, who?s prying and possessive in her own... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
Hold your breath, 13 Tzameti is here
2007-05-07 23:10:00 If you love cinema and the genre thriller, it?s a crime not to watch this film. After watching 13 Tzameti once you walk out of theatre and take a mouthful of air, do give it a thought how often you missed your breath during the movie. It?s that good and believe me I?m not exaggerating. I won?t give any details of the plot except that it?s a thriller and it?s about a young man, to be precise 22 years old Sebastian, who follows instructions meant for someone else and reaches a place from where... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
Duel: Spielberg?s First
2007-05-07 23:10:00 Next time you drive alone on a highway, you?re going to be on the lookout for the monster truck. A truck-trailer that is obsessed with cars and derives sick pleasure in trampling them. Duel, Spielberg?s one of the first, is a road movie with the touch of an evil. The suspense and dread he successfully creates in the movie is masterly. Watching young Steven Spielberg is like watching the making of a great director. It would have taken no genius to guess after watching Duel more than three... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
The Fantastic Following
2007-05-07 23:10:00 If you are a writer, you would relate to the protagonist of Following but not beyond a point. He?s interested in people to the extent that he follows them literally in the hope that he would gather material to write about. This brilliant concept is executed with style in Christopher Nolan?s 1998 classic Following. Nolan, better known for Memento, shot this movie with no budget. All his actors had regular jobs, hence shooting was only possible over the weekends and it took him about one year to... [[Click on the headline to read this post and comment on it]]
By: DearCinema
A Brilliantly Written Novel That Sets a New Gold Standard for Thrillers
2007-04-06 09:38:00 God’s Spy by Juan Gomez-Jurado Reviewed by Grady Harp, Top 10 Amazon Reviewer Juan Gómez-Jurado is a young writer form Spain who jumps into the circle of fine international novelists with this his first book, GOD’S SPY. Previously published in Spanish as ESPIA DE DIOS in 2005 and a best seller in thirty five countries, it now is ...
By: Blogging Authors
|
|
 |
|
 |
