Major-studio satire on a major-studio Vietnam War epic. The slipshod plotting, the willful misinformation about how movies are made, and the pandering to the groundlings do not close off all avenues of inspiration. Four fake trailers at the top of the movie, introducing the motley cast of the movie-within-the-movie, give …
Ben Stiller stars as the standard "citizen who's into community issues because he can't deal with the trouble he's got at home," but he wisely steps aside and gives ownership of the film to Vince Vaughn's "suburban Dad looking for bro-bonding." The Watch is about an overzealous neighborhood watch that …
Noah Baumbach is still swinging away at generational divides (The Squid and the Whale) and the plight of the artist (Frances Ha), but here, he trades in his rapier for a foam rubber cudgel. Open on Naomi Watts forgetting the plot of The Three Little Pigs and crying "What the …
Neil LaBute's encore to In the Company of Men is not as infuriating, though provoking nevertheless. Provoking of calmer discussion, that is, in place of fury. This response would be entirely appropriate, since the principal subject under consideration is the inability of men and women to communicate. (Not just man …
A would-be Sherlock Holmes for the Nineties: a junk-food junkie (fridge full of pop-top Tab), a substance abuser (Holmes had his occasional cocaine, remember), an untalented songwriter and guitar strummer (in place of a violin), a social recluse who never meets his clients face to face (employing a bemused Watson …
More a facial expression than a movie. The expression is called Blue Steel (but of course there already was a movie called that), the trademark crinkled-brow and puckered-lip look of the "three-time male model of the year," Derek Zoolander. (He's working on a new look called Magnum, but it isn't …
The oldening of Ben Stiller, who directs, stars, and co-writes here, continues apace. It’s not just the sort-of sad, mostly doomed attempt to recapture (silly) lightning in a (men’s fragrance) bottle 15 years after his first story about the titular superdim supermodel. (Though the few times he manages it are …