timgrierson Page 6 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
What Movies From the '90s Will Critics Include In <em>Sight & Sound</em>'s Top 10 (AKA The Only Poll That Matters)?
These days, there are so many film polls and online Top 10 lists that the idea of ranking movies can seem rather old hat. But amid all that list-bait, there is one movie poll taken more seriously than all others: Sight & Sound's once-a-decade poll of the greatest films of all time. The British film ...
Joss Whedon: Revenge Of The Nerd
Five years ago, Joss Whedon's career wasn't going so well. The man behind the TV shows Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel had recently written and directed Serenity, a big-screen version of his short-lived series Firefly. It was his feature directing debut, and it was a commercial disappointment. No...
John Cusack In A Goatee? Quoth The Raven: Meh.
John Cusack is one of those actors whom everybody likes. He was a consistently enjoyable presence in '80s films like Better Off Dead and Sixteen Candles, and he won the hearts of a generation of young women by being the most sensitive man ever in Say Anything. Since then, he's been an indie staple (...
What <em>The Avengers</em> Means For The Future Of Comic-Book Movies
Tomorrow, Marvel's The Avengers will open in certain parts of the globe—not the U.S., which won't see the film until May 4—and Marvel's four-year odyssey of laying the groundwork for this action blockbuster will finally be over. It's been an impressive run commercially, if not always critically. (Ca...
<em>The Lucky One</em> and <em>Think Like a Man</em>: Hollywood Wants You to Have a Terrible Love Life
Like a lot of people, I learned about relationships at a young age by watching movies and TV shows. Only now in my adult life do I realize how much influence Cheers and Woody Allen and L.A. Story had on me: They helped to create a sense that love was this melancholy thing that rarely lasted, no matt...
Is It Time To Forgive Mel Gibson?
As much as our society loves to mock celebrities, we love to forgive them even more. We'll pick on Lindsay Lohan for her drug problems or Nicolas Cage for his bankruptcy money woes* and bad movies, but, deep down, we're hoping that they'll pull out of their nosedives. The redemption story is a power...
When Serious Actors Become Action Stars: A Guide
This Friday, Lockout opens, and beyond its prison-colony-in-space hook, probably the most interesting element to this sci-fi film is "Holy cow, is that Guy Pearce kickin' all that ass?" Why, yes, it is—and it's a conscious departure from the serious dramatic roles we usually see from him (Memento, L...
Do You Like Self-Conscious Scary Movies? <em>The Cabin In The Woods</em>, Reviewed.
Sixteen years ago, I saw Scream for the first time. I loved it. Not only was it funny and smart, it felt like a game-changer: a movie that exploded all the conventions of its genre while at the same time being a really good example of its genre. By pointing out all the clichés of horror movies, Scre...
20 Years Ago, Hollywood Became Self-Aware; Or, How A Robert Altman Movie Helped Create TMZ
Everybody loves a comeback. It's always gratifying to see an athlete or musician or actor rebound from a potentially career-threatening injury or drug problems or racist comment and re-emerge to reign triumphant again. Of course, there's also a selfish component to other people's comebacks: On some ...
Why Did We Ever Like These Movies? <i>American Reunion</i>, Reviewed.
When you think of the big franchises of the last 10-15 years, you've got your Lord of the Rings and The Matrix and Harry Potter. But in its own special category has to be American Pie. For a four-year run starting in the late '90s, Jim and Stifler and the rest of their Michigan crew were Hollywood's...
Why The Phony Ratings Controversy Over <em>Bully</em> Is Giving The Movie A Wedgie
Once upon a time, Harvey Weinstein, the unofficial king of independent film distribution, wanted to release a movie that shined a light on the harsh reality of teenagers' lives. But the harshness of that reality found him running afoul of the Motion Picture Association of America's ratings board, wh...
Will Ferrell, King Of WTF
Will Ferrell has a movie coming out this Friday, and there's a chance you aren't even aware of it. That's probably fine with him—although that doesn't mean he's not really proud of this film....
Say Goodbye To Mumblecore: How The Duplass Brothers Rise Above The Ramble
It's really easy to hate mumblecore. Not the movies—just that name. A collection of like-minded low-budget indie films about 20-somethings (usually white and pasty) trying to find their way in the world, "mumblecore" calls to mind all the weakest tendencies in these movies—specifically, their ineffe...
The Eddie Murphy You Love Is Dead
While suffering through this year's Oscars—ha ha, Billy Crystal kissed George Clooney, ha ha—it was hard not to think, "Geez, if Brett Ratner had kept his mouth shut, none of this would have happened and Eddie Murphy could have been the host." Indeed, the news last year that Murphy had agreed to hos...
<i>Silent House</i> And The Rise Of The Gimmicky Horror Movie
On Friday, the horror movie Silent House comes out. One of its selling points is that it stars Elizabeth Olsen—who was terrific last year in a very different sort of horror film, Martha Marcy May Marlene—but probably the hook that will be most intriguing to genre fans is that the whole movie takes p...
A Teen Movie That Really Wants To Offend You (And Show You Its Boobs). <em>Project X</em>, Reviewed.
Project X is one of those movies I suspect really, really wants certain people to give it bad reviews. Produced by Todd Phillips, the director of the Hangover movies and Old School, this teen comedy has set its sights on nothing less than being the most shameless, most titillating crazy-party film e...
The Razzies Are The Worst
Because awards season is so endless and so relentless in its hyperbole—Best This and Greatest That and Sexiest Whatever—you can understand why some folks get sick of all the accolades and decide to flip them on their head. Hence, all those end-of-the-year worst-movie polls, which give critics one la...
Oscar Week: Why <em>The Descendants</em> Should Win Best Picture
Tim Grierson and Will Leitch will be writing regularly on Gawker and Deadspin about movies, starting this week. Today and tomorrow, we're going to shower love on our favorite films that are up for Best Picture. First up, why we'd be happy if The Descendants won the Oscar. Follow Grierson & Leitch on...
Oscar Week: In Defense Of <i>Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close</i>
Tim Grierson and Will Leitch will be writing regularly on Gawker and Deadspin about movies, starting this week. We begin with defending the indefensible: praising the Oscar-nominated movie everyone seems to hate. Today, why you're wrong for hating Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close. Follow Grierson &...