Slate Magazine - Summary Judgment

The critical buzz on The Brave One and In the Valley of Elah.

Blake Wilson — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 16:39:41 EST

The critical buzz on The Brave One and In the Valley of Elah.

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The critical buzz on 3:10 to Yuma and Shoot 'Em Up.

Blake Wilson — Fri, 7 Sep 2007 13:01:39 EST

3:10 to Yuma (Lionsgate). Critics like this Western, in part because it feels familiar—it remakes the 1957 classic of the same name and is steeped in the conventions of the genre, though it's more expressive and violent than the original. In The New Yorker, David Denby writes, "I found myself settling into its stern logic and its physical splendor with a grateful sigh." At the same time, the new film is too elaborate for some: The Village Voice's J. Hoberman sighs, "What's lost in [director James] Mangold's rough-hewn exercise in barroom-brawl baroque is the original one-on-one." As the New York Times explains in a review of a new special-edition DVD, the original film was "a psychological drama, as intense as a Bergman marital duel, but played out in a forceful exchange of looks and gestures." In any case, reviewers think performances are fine—especially Russell Crowe as the brilliant psychopath at the center of the movie and Peter Fonda as a grizzled bounty hunter. (Buy tickets to 3:10 to Yuma. Buy the original 1957 version on DVD.)—Sept. 7

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The critical buzz on Ladrón que roba a ladrón and The Nines.

Blake Wilson — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 17:16:49 EST

Ladrón que roba a ladrón (Lionsgate). A bunch of Latino immigrants, trusting in their invisibility in a casually bigoted Los Angeles, set out to pull off an outrageous heist. This describes the plot of Ladrón que roba a ladrón ("A thief who steals from a thief"), but also the production: As critics note, "the film bears a suspicious, almost lawsuit-worthy resemblance to the Ocean's movies" (Nathan Rabin, the Onion's A.V. Club). So much the better, most reviewers think. USA Today's Claudia Puig fully endorses the caper, writing: "It's not a watered-down imitation or a south-of-the-border remake. It is clever, funny and very entertaining." The movie's political message is played lightly, but the Austin Chronicle hears it loud and clear: "Ladrón is grand Hollywood entertainment for and about a long-ignored culture that's just now starting to sense the potential vastness of its own economic and political influence. To make an intelligent heist film is difficult work; to shoot an entertaining sociological study is near impossible. To manage both at the same time has got to be some kind of minor miracle." (Buy tickets to Ladrón que roba a ladrón.)—Aug. 31

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The critical buzz on The Nanny Diaries and The King of Kong.

Blake Wilson — Fri, 24 Aug 2007 12:58:50 EST

The critical buzz on The Nanny Diaries and The King of Kong.

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The critical buzz on Superbad.

Blake Wilson — Fri, 17 Aug 2007 12:21:07 EST

Superbad (Sony). Last month, the New Yorker's David Denby lamented the state of romantic comedy, as epitomized by Judd Apatow's phallocentric Knocked Up. But this teen sex comedy, co-written by that film's star, Seth Rogen, and co-produced by Apatow, has him rethinking his position: "I recently wrote that I could happily do without any more movies devoted to the breaking of the male bond. Yet here's an uproarious and touching picture on that theme." Superbad follows two high-school nerds in their mock-epic quest to score booze and get laid. It's incredibly (incredibly!) obscene and, critics think, extremely hilarious. David Edelstein of New York magazine notes "a nonstop stream of F- and P- and D-words that would make David Mamet sit up and salute." But as the New York Times' Manohla Dargis writes, the film is attuned to "[t]he divide between what a man says … and how he really feels inside … no matter how unapologetically vulgar their words, no matter how single-mindedly priapic their preoccupations, these men and boys are good and decent and tender and true." In a phrase: Classic Apatow. (Read Dana Stevens' review of Superbad in Slate. Buy tickets to Superbad.)—Aug. 17

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