All articles by John Hazelton – Page 22
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Reviews
Timeline
Dir: Richard Donner. US. 2003. 116 mins.Packaged as a big budget Michael Crichton adaptation with veteran action director Richard Donner at the helm, Timeline is a breathless adventure romp that sometimes feels more like an educational TV special intended to make medieval history seem cool. Too silly for adults and ...
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Reviews
The Missing
Dir: Ron Howard. US. 2003. 135mins.The versatile Ron Howard stirs up a melange of story elements in The Missing and the result, perhaps surprisingly, is a consistently engaging tale that is part stoic western, part spooky thriller and part dysfunctional family drama. Selling such a hard-to-categorise item to mainstream audiences ...
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Reviews
The Haunted Mansion
Dir: Rob Minkoff. US. 2003. 98 mins.Disney's latest attempt to turn a theme park attraction into a movie relies on impressive design and effects work and a warmly funny performance from Eddie Murphy to pep up an otherwise rather anaemic ghosts'n'ghouls family comedy adventure. The selling points may well prove ...
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Reviews
Dr Seuss' The Cat In The Hat
Dir: Bo Welch. US. 2003. 82 mins. Taken on its own terms, the $100m-plus live-action screen version of Dr Seuss' signature children's book is a no more than typically gaudy and aggressive Hollywood comedy that appears to have been production designed for kids but written largely for adults. US reviewers, ...
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Reviews
The Statement
Dir: Norman Jewison. Canada/France/UK. 2003. 120 mins. As enticingly cast and classically executed as it is, there's something naggingly unsatisfying about The Statement, a religio-political thriller directed by Norman Jewison and adapted by Ronald Harwood from the acclaimed 1996 novel by Canadian author Brian Moore. Co-produced by a string of ...
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Reviews
Gothika
Dir: Mathieu Kassovitz. US. 2003. 99 mins.Featuring Halle Berry in her first solo-starring role, this latest offering from Joel Silver's mid-budget Dark Castle label is a creepy if rather one-note chiller blending the old-fashioned scare tactics suggested by its title with elements from the new wave of Asian horror. Warner ...
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Reviews
Looney Tunes: Back In Action
Dir: Joe Dante. US. 2003. 90mins.The edgy humour of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck et al takes a back seat to frantic and not terribly funny action-comedy in this Warner family offering (set for a Nov 14 US release) that puts the studio's Looney Tunes animated stars together with live-action characters ...
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Reviews
Elf
Dir: Jon Favreau. US. 2003. 97 mins. Elf is a Christmas comedy that's as sweet-natured and goofily amusing as its title character, a gangly innocent played, in his first solo-starring role, by in demand former Saturday Night Live funny man Will Ferrell. Looking to get a jump on the extended ...
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Reviews
Runaway Jury
Dir: Gary Fleder. US. 2003. 127 mins.John Grisham adaptations were big box office performers in the mid-nineties but it's been almost six years since Hollywood last put one of the author's brisk legal thrillers onto the big screen. This Regency Enterprises version of Grisham's 1996 bestseller about a hijacked corporate ...
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Reviews
The Rundown
Dir: Peter Berg. US. 2003. 104 mins. Having successfully flexed his muscles in last year's Mummy spin-off The Scorpion King, wrestler-turned-actor The Rock proves in The Rundown that he can also carry a contemporary movie - with a little help from some more experienced co-workers at any rate. This entertaining ...
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Reviews
The Fighting Temptations
Dir: Jonathan Lynn. US. 2003. 116 mins.Pop diva Beyonce Knowles and an all-star gospel/R&B soundtrack are the main attractions of The Fighting Temptations, a pleasant but formulaic ensemble comedy from MTV Films that teams the singer with Cuba Gooding Jr and British ex-pat director Jonathan Lynn. With Beyonce's recent solo ...
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Reviews
Jeepers Creepers 2
Dir: Victor Salva. US. 2003. 106 mins.Writer-director Victor Salva's sequel to his modest summer 2001 horror hit Jeepers Creepers is as efficiently jolting as the original but not as refreshingly spare or classically creepy. Opening wide in the US (through MGM) and UK (through Pathe) this weekend in the middle ...
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Reviews
The Battle Of Shaker Heights
Dirs: Efram Potelle, Kyle Rankin. US. 2003. 78mins.Dogged - and, of course, publicised - throughout its production by documentary TV cameras, the second low-budget feature to result from Ben Affleck and Matt Damon's Project Greenlight script competition is a sweet if uneven coming-of-age drama-comedy whose major asset is a winning ...
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Reviews
Freddy Vs Jason
Dir: Ronny Yu. US. 2003. 97mins. Hoping to squeeze fresh revenue out of a pair of ageing horror franchises, New Line pits two of the genre's most recognizable icons - Nightmare On Elm Street's Freddy Krueger and Friday The 13th's Jason - against one another in Freddy Vs Jason, a ...
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Reviews
American Wedding
Dir: Jesse Dylan. US. 2003. 96mins.The enthusiastic raunchiness of its gags aside, the third instalment of the American Pie franchise feels like the return of a favourite TV sitcom: the characters are enjoyably familiar and while the set up has changed a little the comedy still has energy to spare. ...
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Reviews
How To Deal
Dir: Clare Kilner. US. 2003. 101mins.The first of three films due this year from 19-year-old US singer-actress Mandy Moore, How To Deal touches on some of the thornier issues of adolescence and family life but eventually resolves itself into a disappointingly insipid teen romance. To match the $41m grossed in ...
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Reviews
Bad Boys 2
Dir: Michael Bay. US. 2003. 147 mins. Finally reuniting stars Will Smith and Martin Lawrence with director Michael Bay and producer Jerry Bruckheimer, the big budget sequel to unassuming 1995 action comedy Bad Boys is the kind of juggernaut we've come to expect from Bruckheimer and Bay since they first ...
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Reviews
Terminator 3: Rise Of The Machines
Dir: Jonathan Mostow. US. 2003. 109 mins. He's back alright, but how big an audience will come back to see Arnold Schwarzenegger as the Terminator 12 years after the franchise's previous instalment, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, became a $500m global smash' The good news for distributors Warner and Sony is ...
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Reviews
Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle
Dir: McG. US. 2003. 111 mins. As its title suggests, the sequel to autumn 2000 hit Charlie's Angels revs up the goofy humour and preposterously gaudy action elements of the first movie - and leaves coherent narrative even further behind in the dust. Youthful moviegoers who helped the original to ...
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Reviews
Alex & Emma
Dir: Rob Reiner. US. 2003. 96 mins Rob Reiner, of course, earned his romantic comedy spurs with When Harry Met Sally. And Kate Hudson showed a talent for the genre in last winter's $100m-plus US grosser How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days. But neither director nor star manages ...