Author Archives: Dann Gire

Betty Anne Waters (Hilary Swank) talks to her brother Kenny (Sam Rockwell) before he goes to jail in the fact-based drama “Conviction.” The performances are better than the material in Tony Goldwyn’s fact-based drama “Conviction”, and the material was pretty good to begin with. “Conviction” (a great title for its obvious double meanings) traces the […]

Frank Moses (Bruce Willis), left, fights off assassins with Marvin (John Malkovich) and Victoria (Helen Mirren) in the action film “RED.” I walked into Robert Schwentke’s “RED” thinking I would see a silly, geriatric revisiting of “The A-Team” or “Mission: Impossible.” I got a crazy, off-the-charts, action comedy lamenting how society shoves aside senior citizens […]

Jennifer (Sarah Butler) becomes victimized by a violent gang in Steven Monroe’s remake of 1978’s “I Spit on Your Grave.” I cannot defend Steven Monroe’s remake of the 1978 exploitation horror benchmark “I Spit on Your Grave as a great work of art, or barely a work of art at all. But at least his […]

Craig (Keir Gilchrist), left, befriends a patient (Zach Galifianakis) in a hospital ward in the comic drama “It’s Kind of a Funny Story.” It’s kind of funny, yes. Kind of serious, too. Kind of sad as well. Mostly, it’s kind of restrained and keeps its characters at an elbow’s length, just enough for us not […]

Penny Chenery (Diane Lane) and Lucien Laurin (John Malkovich) cheer for their favorite racer in the under-horse sports drama “Secretariat”. If this movie were a horse, it would be shot. You know, for being lame. Randall Wallace’s hokey, worshipful horse operetta “Secretariat” comes to the big screen practically devoid of dramatic conflict, an essential ingredient […]

Best pals Eduardo Saverin (Andrew Garfield), left, and Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg) engage in legal disputes over the creation of Facebook in David Fincher’s “The Social Network.” David Fincher’s superbly wrought “The Social Network” robustly chronicles the messy birth of that cultural, economic, political and sexual game-changer called Facebook, and does it with style, wit […]

American driver Paul Conroy (Ryan Reynolds) tries to dig himself out of a bad situation in the claustrophobic drama “Buried.” “Buried” takes place inside a coffin. No cutaways. No flashbacks. For 95 minutes. Just an American truck driver buried in a coffin somewhere in Iraq. The only things in there with him are a crummy […]

Soren (voiced by Jim Sturgess) leads the owl brigade to the rescue in “Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole.” “Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole” is one strange bird. It’s an animated fantasy obviously intended for children, yet it depicts genocidal violence perpetrated by gladiator-like birds of prey locked in death […]

Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas), left, takes on a young Wall Street trader (Shia LaBeouf) in “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps.” In Oliver Stone’s sequel “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps,” financial uber-villain Gordon Gekko goes soft, the characters around him go soft in the head, and the director who hard-balled capitalism in his 1987 drama “Wall […]

A family (Jamie Lee Curtis, Kristen Bell and the immortal Betty White) star in the revenge-themed comedy “You Again.” “High school was a horror movie!” Marni shrieks. “And this weekend was the sequel!” Actually, if Marni could see her own movie “You Again,” she would realize high school was nothing compared to the horror that […]