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Review: Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son
Reviews
Righteous Kill
A predictable, tedious thriller
By
BRETT MICHEL
|
September 17, 2008
RIGHTEOUS KILL
" alt="photo of 'RIGHTEOUS KILL'">
1.0
Stars
Carla Gugino has spent 20 years toiling, often topless, in the hope she’d appear in a film that might attract an Al Pacino or a Robert De Niro. She’s finally made it, starring alongside Pacino
and
De Niro. Alas, it’s been nearly a decade since the two were choosing roles based on quality rather than cash. Hence, she’s mired in Jon Avnet’s predictable, tedious thriller (his last film was
88 Minutes
, perhaps Pacino’s career nadir — until now), playing Karen Corelli, a sex toy for Turk, De Niro’s hot-headed cop. (At least she gets to keep her bra on.) When criminals who’ve slipped through the cracks of the justice system begin turning up dead, a serial killer is suspected within the NYPD, and it’s up to veteran detectives Turk and Rooster (Pacino) to find him. For their second substantial on-screen pairing (after 1995’s
Heat
), couldn’t these two legends have found a project that would make Carla Gugino proud?
100 minutes | Boston Common + Fenway + Fresh Pond + Chestnut Hill + Suburbs
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Maybe I’m just relieved that it wasn’t in 3-D, or maybe actor Justin Theroux (frequent David Lynch collaborator and co-scripter of Tropic Thunder ) is just a better writer than the law firm of scribes that pasted together the original, but Jon Favreau’s sequel to his creaky adaptation of the rusty Marvel standby Iron Man restores my lack of faith in superheroes.
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Maybe it’s just as well if the writers’ strike forces a cancellation of the Oscars show.
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[
02/18
]
20th Annual Cajun & Zydeco Mardi Gras Ball
@ Rhodes-On-the-Pawtuxet
[
02/18
]
"Dana Levin: A Classical Realist In the 21st Century," an exhibit of paintings
@ Bert Gallery
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A screening of Andy Warhol's Sleep
@ RK Projects + Magic Lantern Cinema
ARTICLES BY BRETT MICHEL
REVIEW: THIS MEANS WAR
| February 16, 2012
What promises to be a modern Jules and Jim (until you realize it's directed by a 43-year-old who calls himself "McG") quickly devolves into Spy vs. Spy territory, only with incompetently staged and edited action and little of that ol' Mad magazine zing.
REVIEW: THE VIRAL FACTOR
| January 17, 2012
Made for a modest budget of $17 million — and feeling like it (who needs convincing explosions in an action movie?), Dante Lam's latest still gets the job done from a run-and-gun standpoint.
REVIEW: EXTREMELY LOUD AND INCREDIBLY CLOSE
| January 17, 2012
Too soon? For Stephen Daldry's 9/11 drama, the right time is "never."
REVIEW: THE DIVIDE
| January 10, 2012
Many a teleplay for The Twilight Zone threatened atomic Armageddon, and though Frontier(s) director Xavier Gens nukes New York in the opening shots of his latest thriller, he finds more inspiration in the horrors of human nature as seen in the old TV show's episode "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street."
REVIEW: MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – GHOST PROTOCOL
| December 20, 2011
Impossible Missions Force agent Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) returns to the screen in dramatic fashion as new teammate Jane (Paula Patton) and the returning Benji (Simon Pegg) break him out of a Russian prison.
See all articles by:
BRETT MICHEL
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