Act of Valor

Hope Floats directed by Forrest Whitaker to a screenplay by Steven Rodgers is a feel-good movie selling a relatively innocuous version of the Hollywood dream—i.e. that all the world’s problems come from people, especially parents and children, not hugging each other enough and giving tongue to their feelings of love for each other. The other…

That Carlos Reygadas, boy genius, keeps his plot mostly out of sight suggests that he is embarrassed by it — and rightly so

Twice Upon a Yesterday, whose British title was The Man With Rain in His Shoes, was directed by Maria Ripoll as a pretty transparent imitation of Sliding Doors but without very much of that film’s wit or stylishness. I have nothing in principle against this kind of metaphysical fable and think of its great exemplar,…

A paean to tough women is perhaps not the best way of exploring feminine vulnerabilities, but a portrait of a psycho-bitch is always something that will find a market.

Chasing Amy is another slacker movie and thus another piece of redundant evidence that America has become far richer than is good for it. Boys the age of this film’s director, Kevin Smith, whose earlier efforts are Clerks and Mall Rats, ought to be doing their army basic training, or serving as apprentices at some…

A charming, unpretentious little movie from Mexico that gradually reveals to us hidden depths and a surprising emotional power