Joseph Jon Lanthier

Even when Wagner & Me seems uneven as an art historical study, it's fairly successful as a travelogue.

If only Beineix could have imagined an existence for his star-crossed protagonists beyond the source material (the question of whether successful maternity would have sobered Betty yelps for an impossible sequel), he may have managed a sultry masterpiece.

Under the modern mannerisms lies a rather clumsily Romantic -- one might say Wordsworthian -- rant that juxtaposes urbanity against a nebulous, fictitious past.

Much like the work of generational cohort Michael Robinson, Alex Ross Perry's films are steeped in a viscous cultural past.

Oh, the things that money can buy.

The movie's final act tries, somewhat admirably, to consolidate the plot's myriad interpersonal conflicts.

An uncommon example of purely allegorical cinema, Paul Fraser's film foregoes plot almost entirely in favor of thematic resonance.

The specific narrative handicaps throughout are mostly too banal to warrant exegesis, though the choice of vintage pop tunes for dramatic underscoring is particularly grating.

Despite the fact that Goodall narrates the bulk of the material, there are scant details about her concrete contributions to animal and life science save for her observing of chimp-made tools.

Engendering an experience both visually slick and narratively sprawling, the apropos-of-nothing professionalism of Protektor often feels more like branding than filmmaking.

Part of the issue here may be the nature of the talking heads themselves, most of whom are culled from Trungpa's inner circle and lack the objectivity needed to properly judge his philosophy or make it accessible.

Broadness this indolent hardly even stirs one to antipathy.

Tim Heidecker's Swanson does not amuse us in spite of the pity he inspires but because of it.

Touted at the time of its release as a comparatively enlightened western, A Man Called Horse now looks like well-researched sensationalism—and is, admittedly, all the better for it.

Director Brian Lilla alternates between talking heads and animated graphics to elucidate first how dams work and, obligatorily, to put a human face on those who would be affected.

Lookin’ to Get Out, however, though pieced together with Ashby’s trademark character sympathy and technical aplomb, is one toke over the line: Unkempt and unconvincingly funny, the film is infused with the thin, despondent languor of a mourning man’s second-hand marijuana smoke.

The documentary veers between repetitive and didactic pronouncements of a call to inaction and more affectionately told stories about Koani's life as an "ambassador wolf" on the elementary school circuit.

Following the faux-opiate flecked suit of docs like One Fast Move or I'm Gone, The Beat Hotel can't quite rise above its obvious desire to appeal to the former demographic in spite of their apparently limited patience for historical exegesis.

The lack of plausible conflict mars the movie's highly commendable depiction of San Francisco as a the new porn capital.

Much of this content, which involves complex social movements in Burma, Iran, and elsewhere, is necessarily abridged, but it's often done so to the point of incoherence, making Gene Sharp's connection to what we're seeing seem contrived.

The camera is at its most effective when it seems dumbfounded at what it's indexing.