“Before I Disappear takes Curfew’s fleet 19 minutes and adds another hour and change of disjointed and extraneous nonsense. Perhaps the screenplay was written to mimic the main character’s doped-out dissociative state, but it feels more like a collection of disconnected set-pieces than a cohesive film of its own. Less was more.” – Movie Mezzanine, 11/26/2014
THE HUNGER GAMES: MOCKINGJAY – PART 1 * * 1 / 2
Starring Jennifer Lawrence, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Julianne Moore, Woody Harrelson and Donald Sutherland. Screenplay by Peter Craig and Danny Strong. Directed by Francis Lawrence.
“Bar-Lev’s cameras simply place us at ground level in the midst of pastoral State College, PA as the revelations resound. The deeply unsettling Happy Valley is not a work of reportage so much as it’s a portrait of a community suffering from mass dementia. This is the scariest zombie movie I’ve seen in ages.” – Movie Mezzanine, 11/19/2014
“I realize I’ve described Force Majeure as a comedy, but there aren’t any actual jokes, per se. The pitch-black humor erupts at odd moments during awkward pauses, prompted by Östlund’s droll, dispassionate gaze at all these roiling caveman emotions tamped down for appearances’ sake in such a fussy, affluent locale.” – North Shore Movies, 11/19/2014
THE HOMESMAN * * * 1 / 2
Starring Hilary Swank, Tommy Lee Jones, John Lithgow, James Spader and Meryl Streep. Screenplay by Tommy Lee Jones, Kieran Fitzgerald and Wesley Oliver. Directed by Tommy Lee Jones.
INTERSTELLAR * 1/2
Starring Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Wes Bentley and Michael Caine. Screenplay by Jonathan Nolan and Christopher Nolan. Directed by Christopher Nolan.
