Film Reviews
Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired: Laying bare the facts of the 1978 case
By Hiram Lee, October 5, 2009
The 2008 documentary Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired exposes the character of the legal proceedings from which Roman Polanski fled in 1978.
Toronto International Film Festival 2009—Part 2
“The Iraq war poisoned the water—you can’t undo that, it’s there forever”
By David Walsh, October 3, 2009
Michael Tucker and Petra Epperlein have directed at least three remarkable documentaries about the US invasion of Iraq and its consequences: (Gunner Palace (2004), The Prisoner or: How I Planned to Ki...
“Law & Order” episode makes case for prosecution of Bush administration torturers
By Patrick Martin, October 2, 2009
The season premiere of NBC’s crime drama “Law & Order” was a rarity for American television: an unsparing and essentially honest examination of the crimes being committed by the American governm...
District 9, an attempt at serious science fiction
By Hiram Lee, September 17, 2009
Neill Blomkamp’s District 9 is a science fiction film about aliens forced to suffer under apartheid when their ship stalls in the skies over Johannesburg, South Africa.
GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra—yet another celebration of militarism and war
By Christie Schaefer and Hiram Lee, September 5, 2009
Based on a popular toy and cartoon franchise, GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra is a film that does little more than glorify militarism and war.
Inglourious Basterds: Quentin Tarantino goes to war
By Hiram Lee, September 1, 2009
Director Quentin Tarantino’s latest film is another sadistic revenge tale, this time set during the Second World War.
Balibo: A war crime exposed
By Richard Phillips, August 17, 2009
Balibo tells how five young reporters working for Australian television were murdered in East Timor by the Indonesian military in the lead-up to the invasion of the tiny country in 1975.
Funny People: Requiem for a paperweight
By Tom Horton, August 14, 2009
Funny People, producer-director Judd Apatow’s bid for recognition as a serious filmmaker, serves instead as the first major theatrical failure since his string of hits began in 2004.
Germany: Berlin cinema shows films commemorating the fall of the Berlin Wall
By Bernd Reinhardt, August 11, 2009
On the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall, a cinema in the German capital showed a retrospective of films dealing with the event.
The Hurt Locker: Part of a deplorable trend
By Joanne Laurier, August 10, 2009
The new film directed by Kathryn Bigelow focuses on an Army bomb deactivation—or Explosive Ordnance Disposal—squad, during its last 38 days of deployment in Iraq in 2004.
500 Days of Summer: The eternally sunlit paradise that is Los Angeles
By Jordan Mattos, August 3, 2009
A graphic designer with dreams of becoming an architect falls head over heels for an elusive lady, and the film goes back and forth in time, highlighting the 500 days of their courtship, with equal do...
Is Chéri genuinely ‘subversive’?
By Joanne Laurier, August 1, 2009
In Stephen Frears’ new movie, Chéri, based on a novel by Colette, a voiceover asserts that in Paris, during the Belle Époque (the 1870s to World War I), successful courtesans were the most powerfu...
