Film Reviews | SpoutBlog

Category Archives: Film Reviews

Tribeca Review: Sita Sings the Blues

May 2, 2008 – 5:26 pm

Nina Paley’s Sita Sings the Blues is a strange and beautiful little film, a potentially wispy slice of autobiography smartly elevated through irresistible, orgiastic style. The 82 minute feature cross cuts between the story of the director’s own divorce, and a loose retelling of the ancient Indian myth Ramayana; we’re led back and forth between [...]

By Karina Longworth | Also posted in Film festivals, Tribeca 2008, animation | Comments (0)

Review: Iron Man

May 2, 2008 – 4:00 pm

More convincing as sex fantasy than political allegory, IRON MAN suggests the answer to combating Them is for Us to reestablish the link between mechanized killing and the body.

By Karina Longworth | Comments (5)

Soderbergh’s Che Films Likened to Lawrence of Arabia

April 30, 2008 – 10:58 am

The Argentine and Guerilla have been labeled, together, “Lawrence of Latin America”

By Christopher Campbell | Also posted in Awards, Classics, cannes 2008 | Comments (3)

Bid on J.D. Salinger’s Review of ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’

April 29, 2008 – 4:00 pm

The reclusive author called the original Indiana Jones film “unwitty”, “unfunny” and “awful”.

By Christopher Campbell | Comments (0)

Tribeca 2008: War, Inc

April 29, 2008 – 12:01 am

The John Cusack “comedy” (generic term used loosely) gives anti-war filmmaking a bad name.

By Karina Longworth | Also posted in Film festivals, Politics, Tribeca 2008 | Comments (6)

Tribeca 2008: Somers Town

April 28, 2008 – 3:12 pm

I saw six films at Tribeca this weekend, and five of them were completely blown off the map by Somers Town, Shane Meadows’ practically perfect follow-up to his 2007 triumph, This is England. England was one of my favorite films of last year, but its political/historical aims, admittedly, occasionally overwhelmed Meadows’ more subtle, character-based observations. [...]

By Karina Longworth | Also posted in Film festivals, Tribeca 2008 | Comments (4)

Harold and Kumar 2: Better Than The Original?

April 25, 2008 – 4:00 pm

The sequel arrives in theaters today accompanied by comparisons to The Empire Strikes Back, Being John Malkovich and Blazing Saddles.

By Christopher Campbell | Also posted in Hollywood, Humor, Lists | Comments (1)

Tribeca Review: The Wackness

April 25, 2008 – 12:01 pm

I saw The Wackness (which has its New York premiere tomorrow at the Tribeca Film Festival) at a special screening held for the critics participating in the Moving Image Institute last week. Afterwards, Sony Classics president Michael Barker was asked about critical response to the film thus far. Barker disclaimed that “most major critics” hadn’t [...]

By Karina Longworth | Also posted in Film festivals, Tribeca 2008 | Comments (3)

Tribeca 2008: Standard Operating Procedure & Conversation with Errol Morris

April 25, 2008 – 10:00 am

The night before Sony Pictures Classics planned to open Errol Morris’ Abu Ghraib doc Standard Operating Procedure in two theaters the Tribeca Film Festival hosted a screening of the film, followed by a conversation between Morris and Jarhead author Anthony Swofford.
Beat to the festival circuit by over a year by Rory Kennedy’s Ghosts of Abu [...]