Movie Reviews: This is 40, Jack Reacher, Guilt Trip, Django Unchained, Les Miserables and Parental Guidance
Find movie reviews from and movie times for theaters across St. Louis.
- By Brian Feldt
- Email the author
- December 25, 2012
Editor's Note: All reviews and information aggregated from Moviefone.
This is 40
- Run Time: 134min.
- Starring: Paul Rudd , Leslie Mann , Megan Fox ,Albert Brooks , Chris O'Dowd
- Director(s): Judd Apatow
"This Is 40 isn't always hilarious, but it's ticklishly honest and droll about all the things being a parent can do to a relationship. And why it's still worth it." Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly. Full Review.
"Judd Apatow's instincts have rarely been sharper, wiser or more relatable than in This Is 40, an acutely perceptive, emotionally generous laffer about the joys and frustrations of marriage and middle age." Justin Chang of Variety. Full Review.
"In short, This Is 40, in tried and true Apatowian style, mixes weighty issues about intimacy and cohabitation with astute and smart-alecky pop culture references, crude bathroom jokes, stoner riffs, boob ogling, and existential angst." Steven Rea of Philadelphia Inquirer. Full Review.
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Jack Reacher
- Starring: Tom Cruise , Rosamund Pike , Robert Duvall , Werner Herzog , Richard Jenkins
- Director(s): Christopher McQuarrie
"In terms of pure pop entertainment value, you'll be hard-pressed to find a more smartly constructed, beautifully shot, pulse-pounding movie this holiday season." Drew Taylor of The Playlist. Full Review.
"A superior thriller, with Cruise and McQuarrie slotting together like a bullet in a clip. Like Reacher on the firing range, the aim isn't always true – but the misses are fractional." James Mottram of Total Film. Full Review.
"Tom Cruise is in fine form as mysterious tough guy Jack Reacher finally reaches the big screen." Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter. Full Review
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Guilt Trip
- Run Time: 95min.
- Starring: Seth Rogen , Barbra Streisand , Kathy Najimy , Colin Hanks , Adam Scott
- Director(s): Anne Fletcher
"The humor is mostly gentle in nature; The Guilt Trip is clearly targeted at older audiences less than receptive to the crude jokes that made Rogen famous in movies like "Knocked Up" and "Zack and Miri Make a Porno." Connie Ogle of Miami Herald. Full Review.
"There are laughs throughout, but Guilt Trip isn't joke-happy. The humor is light and well observed, as when Mom keeps playing the audiobook of "Middlesex," and the son gets uncomfortable hearing about anything sexual in front of his mother." Mick LaSalle of San Francisco Chronicle. Full Review.
"Well, it's a masterpiece compared with 'Little Fockers,' the last movie featuring Barbra Streisand." Michael Phillips of Chicago Tribune. Full Review.
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Django Unchained
- Run Time: 165min.
- Starring: Jamie Foxx , Leonardo DiCaprio ,Christoph Waltz , Samuel L. Jackson , Gerald McRaney
- Director(s): Quentin Tarantino
"A sharp shock of a film in an Awards season very full of movies so noble they become immobile. It's wildly unlikely to get much love from the Academy, and that's fine-bluntly, it's too good for them. With its bloody stew of history and hysteria, action taken from movies and atrocities taken from fact, Django isn't just a movie only America could make-it's also a movie only America needs to." Boxoffice Magazine. Full Review.
"Exactly what you might expect from the fearless, controversial director of "Pulp Fiction" - it's overlong, raunchy, shocking, grim, exaggerated, self-indulgently over-the-top and so politically incorrect it demands a new definition of the term. It is also bold, original, mesmerizing, stylish and one hell of a piece of entertainment." Rex Reed of New York Observer. Full Review.
"Django Unchained also has the pure, almost meaningless excitement which I found sorely lacking in Tarantino's previous film, Inglourious Basterds, with its misfiring spaghetti-Nazi trope and boring plot. I can only say Django delivers, wholesale, that particular narcotic and delirious pleasure that Tarantino still knows how to confect in the cinema, something to do with the manipulation of surfaces. It's as unwholesome, deplorable and delicious as a forbidden cigarette." Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian. Full Review.
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Les Miserables
- Run Time: 157min.
- Starring: Hugh Jackman , Russell Crowe , Anne Hathaway , Helena Bonham Carter , Sacha Baron Cohen
- Director(s): Tom Hooper
"Stirring and striking, Hooper's epic musical won't be wanting for awards and plaudits. Danny Cohen's cinematography is stunning and Hathaway's Oscar is guaranteed." Neil Smith of Total Film. Full Review.
"Russell Crowe's pained vocal stylings (they sound more like barks) as relentless Inspector Javert can be forgiven after hearing Hugh Jackman's old-pro fluidity in the central role of Jean Valjean, hiding a criminal past." Joshua Rothkopf of Time Out New York. Full Review.
"Fortunately, this sprawling epic is well-anchored. There cannot be a better big-screen showman than Jackman." Elizabeth Weitzman of New York Daily News. Full Review.
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Parental Guidance
- Run Time: 104min.
- Starring: Billy Crystal , Bette Midler , Marisa Tomei ,Tom Everett Scott , Bailee Madison
- Director(s): Andy Fickman
No Reviews Available At This Time
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Home bitch
5:33 am on Tuesday, December 25, 2012
You Ho!!! Merry Ho mas you queer!!!
greg perry
8:55 am on Tuesday, December 25, 2012
The force-feeding continues.
After the audience and I who saw the trailer for Jack Reacher stopped laughing, I realized a few things. One: HE IS NO STEVE MCQUEEN. Then, I realized I had seen someone trying hard to sell their "star" as someone so tough, it would make Dirty Harry die of laughter--HE IS NO CLINT EASTWOOD. Then, I recalled another cringe-worthy piece of "reporting" from a few weeks ago, that he was planning on remaking The Magnificent Seven, with himself in the lead role, and realized--HE IS NO YUL BRYNNER.
But whatever his camp wishes to force-feed us, there are still plenty of cinema-goers who are not going to spend a dime on this "comedy." BTW, another spin piece on him being the "highest paid" last year--is that salary or earnings (makes a difference considering others were paid higher salaries)?
Also, this controversy DID occur before, with Ann Rice, who felt “Huck Finn” was playing her character; that controversy was gone, after Ms. Rice was to receive a considerable monetary deal for the adaptation with Cruise.
Rock of Ages bombed. MI4 earned most of its money in China, where most well-crafted US action films make a profit, regardless of its star.
Lessons learned: Question what you read now more than ever in this digital age, and don’t be afraid to laugh out loud in a movie theater.
Charles
9:20 pm on Tuesday, December 25, 2012
Greg, I am sorry your comment sounds so typical of some old 'fart' who always laments about 'the good old days' and is blind to current reality instead of appreciating the present generation of actors. Yes, Steve Mcqueen was good in his generation, and of course Clint was good in those days (and still is), but I think in this movie ' Jack Reacher', Tom Cruise is much better than in 'Mission Impossible'. This movie is better than all the James Bonds, Jason Bourne, Jack Ryans, Indiana Jones and Rambos. If you want to get stuck in the so-called 'good old days', you will be missing a lot. I'm looking forward to a sequel of 'Jack Reacher'!
Steve
8:17 am on Wednesday, December 26, 2012
You are spot on Greg, having read and enjoyed every jack reacher novel, I felt nauseous at the image Tom projects. Jack Reacher is 10 foot tall and tough as a tractor! he doesn't drive cars at speed and no way would he blend into a crowd of spectators!