Any film with Gary Oldman and Denzel Washington can’t be bad, and this isn’t.  But it could have used a more coherent plot. The book in question is a bible and the tagline goes: “Some will kill to have it. He will kill to protect it.” But it’s never clear what good it’s going to do for whoever possesses it.  Some good Mad-Maxish action sequences though.

FF=2

This is quite a film.  It’s graphic and not for the faint of heart, but nothing here is gratuitous.  This film is about something.  See it.  It provides no easy answers.

FF=0

Would you believe a Thai martial-arts western with super-powered wizard warriors set in the 1800s?  I kid you not.  See it not.

FF=3

Not as good as I expected.  A locked-room (actually a locked-island) mystery procedural crossed with Antonioni’s =Blow Up=.  I haven’t read the book, so I can’t compare. A few harrowing scenes that earn its R rating, but the movie is a bit plodding as you sift through all the evidence.  The eponymous girl saves it.  She has great presence.

FF=1

Probably not a bad film if I hadn’t sussed out the Big Secret during Leo’s first walk through the grounds of the asylum.  That makes it hard to comment on it.

FF=3

Pretty damn good. The storyline unfocuses a little now and again but things keep moving. Some very intense scenes. I think Timothy Olyphant would make a good Jack (but I’ve said that since “Deadwood”).

FF=1

It’s too long, and it’s more of a prequel to the familiar Robin Hood story we all grew up with, but I enjoyed this film. I can’t speak much to the history (I know Richard died in France but I don’t recall Philip invading the British Isles), but I was carried along by the various treacheries and betrayals that pepper the plot, and excellent action sequences (which you expect from Ridley Scott).  I didn’t find much chemistry between Crowe and Blanchett, so I tended to FF through those scenes.

FF=2

Three separate storylines that seem to have nothing in common but collide at the end.  I usually love this type of a tale but this kind of fell flat for me.

FF=2

What a romp. Chloe Moretz steals the whole damn film. (No surprise why she’s now got more film offers than any other actress in Hollywood.) Turn off your critical faculties, suspend your disbelief from the top branch of the highest nearby tree, then sit back and let it happen.

FF=0

A pleasant surprise. A mistaken-identity farce that requires ninja-class ability to suspend disbelief, but has some laugh-aloud lines. James Franco (as “Taste”) gives a lesson in how to steal a scene from the stars.

FF=1