The Final Take with Parker Mott

1 Star out of 4
(157 minutes)

Waiting around the corner in Transformers Dark of the Moon.

“It is an insult visually and, therefore, viscerally.”
– John Malkovich in Transformers: Dark of the Moon

It seems a title has to be given to all three Transformers movie. The first Transformers was one of the dopiest movies of 2007. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was one of the most childishly inept films of 2009. Alas, Transformers: Dark of the Moon is the most incomprehensible movie of 2011, or perhaps ever made. Aw, heck. Let’s give them a title. The Transformers trilogy just about always finds a way into our cold hearts of the worst movie of its year. (continue reading…)

3.5 Stars out of 4
(106 minutes)

Great performances in Trust.

Trust – one of the better films of 2011 (and perhaps the most underrated) – is an urgent drama on online sexual predatory, one that made me flee to the internet for more. More answers. More solutions. More reasons. I think it was that urgency. (continue reading…)

2.5 Stars out of 4
(99 minutes)

Run, Forrest, run!

I’m not going to quite recommend TrollHunter but I will admit it had me at the title. A critic aptly called it “The Blair Witch Project meets Where The Wild Things Are”, and he wouldn’t be wrong. Actually he couldn’t be more right. Like the latter, Trollhunter totally exists in a lurid fairytale. But like Blair Witch it wants to be real, and create a semblance of nonfiction. (continue reading…)

3.5 Stars out of 4
(88 minutes)

A goat would rather stand on the table in Le Quattro Volte.

Every shot in Le Quattro Volte is so pure, natural, and picturesque that it deserves its own little museum in Calabria, Italy – the location of Le Quattro Volte. It’s a film without dialogue, is slow-moving, and – from a mainstream perspective – is totally absurd. But it doesn’t overstay its welcome, gliding gracefully along at barely 88 minutes. It’s a piece that “watches”, conveying power and feeling through its images and minute sounds, which would only be a caveat for a person first in line to see Transformers: Dark of the Moon next week. (continue reading…)

3 Stars out of 4
(98 minutes)

A vampire is a little angry in Stake Land.

Stake Land has learned a thing or two from good zombie movies and taken the nonsensical violence from the bad ones and made it better. Many critics have made the careless mistake of calling the monsters in Stake Land “zombies.” No. Like the Infected from Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later these are fast-moving creatures that appear smarter than the average flesh-eater. (continue reading…)

2.5 Stars out of 4
(96 minutes)

Something around the corner in Cold Weather.

Remember Baghead and Cyrus? Well, Cold Weather is just another addition to the twenty-first century mumblecore, where we study twenty-somethings as they live a pointless existence. Director Aaron Katz wants to rearrange the puzzle pieces of the mystery genre in this tiny little genre experiment, one that may have watched Fargo twenty-something times too many. (continue reading…)

The Tree of Life won the Palme D'Or at Cannes this year. It's one of the best movies of the year.

Bad Teacher – 1.5 stars (skip it)
I Am Number Four – 1.5 stars (skip it)
Season of the Witch – 2 stars (skip it)
X-Men: First Class – 2.5 stars (rent it)
The Art of Getting By – 3 stars (see it)
Green Lantern – 2 stars (skip it)
The Tree of Life – 4 stars (see it)
The Bang Bang Club – 2.5 stars (rent it)
Hall Pass – 2 stars (skip it)
Cold Weather – 2.5 stars (rent it)
Stake Land – 3 stars (see it)
Le Quattro Volte (The Four Times) – 3.5 stars (see it)

Movie Pick of the Week: The Tree of Life

1.5 Stars out of 4
(92 minutes)

The hot and not so "bad" Cameron Diaz in Bad Teacher.

Never has a casting choice been so crucial since the dawn of Bad Teacher, a would-be comedy that’s immediate question is: is it “baddddddd” or just bad? (See star rating for details…) Well, the bad teacher is Elizabeth Halsey with Cameron Diaz in the role. That alludes to another, more pressing question: could Cameron Diaz be “baddddddd” or just bad? Among many reasons the answer is she’s just bad because Bad Teacher and its starring actress have a malignant case of Trying-Too-Hard. (continue reading…)

3 Stars out of 4
(139 minutes)

Selma (Bjork) searches for the sounds in Dancer In The Dark.

Danish director Lars von Trier plays Russian roulette with his audience again in Dancer In The Dark. It’s an audacious work, a musical that realizes the absurdity of its world. Its plot is preposterous, but surely all musicals are. I would argue that musicals are intrinsically optimistic but here von Trier’s Dogme 95 ways translate onto this last feature of his Golden Heart Trilogy. This means he spares the melodrama and makes a film that is sordid, raw, and purposely amateur. (continue reading…)

3.5 Stars out of 4
(123 minutes)

Katie Jarvis is cold, enigmatic but likeable in Fish Tank.

Fish Tank begins angry and petrified. We faithfully follow Mia (first-timer Katie Jarvis) through the desolate streets of Britain where she stumbles along the way, her pulse raging. She discovers a tethered horse and wants it as hers. She is accosted by the owners of the horse – two trailer park boys – and they steal her belongings. She flees but persists to have that horse. All girls want a pony. But this would do just fine. (continue reading…)