Kieran Culkin

A collection of random shorts that focus mainly on idiotic male behaviour, this portmanteau comedy is only occasionally amusing, never making anything of its astonishing cast. Frankly, we spend most of the time wondering how the filmmakers lured these A-listers to appear in these pointless, nasty little films. And while the premises have potential, not a single one has a decent punchline.

As a prank, two teens make up a banned online film called Movie 43. While their brainly little brother searches for it, he runs across a series of clips that mainly focus on awkward vulgarity between the sexes. Bitter exes (Culkin and Stone) have a rude exchange that's broadcast on a supermarket sound system. Pratt is shocked when his girlfriend (Faris) asks him to "poop" on her, and agrees because he loves her. Parents (Watts and Schreiber) homeschool their teen son (White) with the goal of showing him how excruciating life will be. Two pals (Scott and Knoxville) kidnap a leprechaun (Butler) who's reluctant to give them his gold. And a 1950s basketball coach (Howard) tries to convince his players that they're winners because they're black.

Others are dating scenarios: Winslet goes on a blind date with a guy (Jackman) who has testicles on his neck; Berry and Merchant play an increasingly deranged game of Truth or Dare in a Mexican restaurant; a pre-teen (Bennett) can't cope when his young date (Moretz) has her first period; Batman (Sudeikis) messes up Robin's (Long) attempt at speed-dating; Banks struggles to cope with her new boyfriend's (Duhamel) obsessive cartoon cat. There are also a few random advert spoofs, including one for the naked-woman shaped iBabe, which leads to trouble for the company CEO (Gere).

Continue reading: Movie 43 Review

Lisa (Paquin) is a Manhattan teen living with her single mother Joan (Smith-Cameron), an actress starring in her breakout stage role while seeing a new man (Reno). One day Lisa distracts a bus driver (Ruffalo), who hits a woman (Janney) in the street, an accident that sends Lisa into a spiral of sublimated guilt, as she lashes out in different ways at a nice classmate (Gallagher), her teachers (Damon and Broderick) and mostly her mother. And she doesn't stop there, meddling in people's lives in her effort to achieve a sense of justice.

Continue reading: Margaret Review

In Toronto, Scott (Cera) is a 22-year-old geek in a rock band. His bandmates (Webber, Pill and Simmons), sister (Kendrick) and flatmate (Culkin) tease him for dating a teenager (Wong), but she's the band's biggest fan. Then he meets Ramona (Winstead), who is literally his dream girl, and to win her hand he has to defeat her seven evil exes in outlandish battles. These include an action movie star (Evans) and a top music promoter (Schwartzman). And one (Routh) is member of a band fronted by Scott's own evil ex (Larson).

Continue reading: Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World Review

Scott (Rory Culkin) is a teen in 1980 Long Island, where his parents (Baldwin and Hennessy) are planning to build a new house while his meathead big brother (Keiran Culkin) is just back from basic training. He has a crush on his neighbour Adriana (Roberts), whose mother (Nixon) is failing to cope with the fact that her husband (Hutton) has Lyme disease. Both families are struggling with social mobility, marital stress and the tensions of the time they live in.

Not to mention some very bad decisions they make.

Continue reading: Lymelife Review

Lyme disease in the Long Island burb is the horror malady of the moment, as constructing new homes smack dab in the middle of the woods may be beautiful but it is also nightmarish. Radio announcers point out that Lyme disease causes psychiatric disturbances and severe mental disorders. Mothers weep at the thought of their kids contracting it and duct-tape the kiddies' clothing together to keep out the ticks. But if Lyme disease is the rampant contagion that all fear, it must have seeped into the residents' skulls and infected their brains. Because the only sensible parental character in Lymelife is Charlie, and he is obviously nuts.

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Continue reading: It Runs In The Family (1994) Review

Music of the Heart begins like any of the other "triumphant teacher" dramas we've all seen. Stand and Deliver and Dangerous Minds both crossed my mind as I sat through the first hour of Roberta Guaspari's (Meryl Streep) struggle to teach a handful of young urban kids how to play the violin. This part of the story is hackneyed and clichéd, and you've seen it before--if not in a previous movie than in some boring after-school special. But where other "triumphant teacher" dramas fail because they concentrate too much on the saintliness of the teacher, this movie succeeds in its captivation of Roberta Guaspari's character flaws, and her struggle as a single mother attempting to raise her two children in East Harlem. When the film expands beyond the existence of just "Roberta the teacher" and into the rest of her life, the film becomes genuinely enjoyable.

Continue reading: Music Of The Heart Review

You know, there's nothing really wrong with "The Cider House Rules," per se.

The story of a cusp-of-manhood orphan trying to find his place in the world is noble and interesting enough, in theory. The performances -- from such recognized talents as Michael Caine, Delroy Lindo, Tobey Maguire and Charlize Theron -- are fine and fully realized.

The screenplay by John Irving, from his own book, is peppered with internal and external conflict and emotion. The snowy mountains of Maine sure look pretty, and the quiet, uncomplicated tone struck by director Lasse Hallstrom gives the film an air of simpler times gone by (it takes place in the early 1940s).

Continue reading: The Cider House Rules Review