Film Reviews

When an idealistic romantic gets fired from his day job, he is offered a "one-time gig" to break up a girl's relationship for her disapproving parents. This "one-time" gig spreads through word-of-mouth and he ends up becoming a professional match-breaker. However, he ends up falling for one of his clients and must figure out how to balance his secret job with his love-life.

A washed up actor who played Mindhorn, a secret agent with a bionic eye, returns to the Isle of Man, the area where his most famous role was set, to help catch a killer.

Dazzling and raucous, Ryan Trecartin's first feature-length video takes cues from chat rooms, social networking web sites, YouTube, John Waters, and Pee-wee’s Playhouse, and then turns them upside down and inside out to create an entirely singular video genre. In I-Be AREA Trecartin intertwines the stories of an incredible ensemble cast to follow a day in the life of I-BE II, the rebellious clone of I-BE (played by Trecartin). (Wexner Center of the Arts)

An ordinary man sees a bright light descend from the sky, and discovers he now has super-intelligence and telekinesis.

After crossing the border illegally for work, Miguel, a hard-working father and devoted husband, finds himself wrongfully accused of murdering a former sheriff’s wife. After learning of his imprisonment, Miguel’s pregnant wife tries to come to his aid and lands in the hands of corrupt coyotes who hold her for ransom. Dissatisfied with the police department’s investigation, the former sheriff tries to uncover the truth about his wife’s death and discovers disturbing evidence that will destroy one family’s future, or tear another’s apart.

Rogue Trader tells the true story of Nick Leeson, an employee of Barings Bank who--after a successful trading run--ends up accumulating $1.4 billion in losses hidden in account #88888.

An artist working in a remote army post is juggling the storekeeper's daughter, his fiancée newly arrived from the east, and the Indian Chief's daughter. But when a vengeful settler manages to get the army and the braves at each other's throats his troubles really begin.

In this French crime thriller, you can leave the mob, but the mob won't leave you. Louis (Jean Yanne) has retired to a Thailand plantation with an Asian wife and child. Back in Marseilles, however, because a no-holds-barred gang war has broken out, Louis' large collateral family is wiped out, and he is family are slated for destruction.

Three students spend their holidays at the seaside where they are mistaken for Koreans, a minority which is looked down on in Japan. The action develops into a crime story.

At the Winter Olympics of 1980, after two tense weeks amidst growing Cold War fears, the U.S. Olympic hockey team found themselves playing improbably against the legendary unbeatable Soviet Army hockey team for Olympic Gold. From the live footage taken at Lake Placid, NY, and through interviews beginning with the team's assembly through the experience of winning the gold medal.

Toymaker tells a bizarre story about how the Land of Oz was ruled by Prince Kynd, but he was overthrown by Prime Minister Kruel. Dorothy learns from Aunt Em that fat, cruel Uncle Henry is not her uncle, and gives her a note due on her eighteenth birthday, which reveals she is actually Princess Dorothea of Oz, and is supposed to marry Prince Kynd. She, Uncle Henry , and two farmhands are swept to Oz by a tornado. Snowball, a black farmhand soon joins them after a lightning bolt chases him into the sky. They land in Oz, where the farmhands try to avoid capture. Semon becomes a scarecrow, Hardy briefly disguises himself as a Tin Woodman, and Snowball is given a Lion suit by the Wizard, which he uses to scare the Pumperdink guards. Written by Scott Hutchins

In the year 20XX, Dr. Thomas Light, an Nobel Prize winning professor in the field of Robotics, creates a series of 6 revolutionary robots entitled the “Robot Master Series DRN” in an effort to use robotics as a mean to better mankind. As a personal project, Dr. Light creates 2 androids named Roll (a female) and Rock (a male) who are made to be as human as possible from appearance to behavior. His partner and colleague, Dr. Albert Wily, grows enraged and jealous of Light’s success. Dr. Wily decides to reprogram and steal the robot master series to do his bidding so he can wreak havoc and gain control of the city.

A deeply-disturbed priest goes on a murderous night-time rampage across America's highways.

Gil Scott-Heron, one of rap's earliest (and unfortunately unknown) pioneers, gets his full due in Black Wax, the 1982 documentary recently reissued on video. Interspliced between performance footage of Scott-Heron and his Midnight Band are vignettes of him walking around Washington D.C., spouting his views on then-President Reagan (dubbed "Ray-Gun") and generally dropping knowledge. The live performance features many of Scott-Heron's best-known hits, including "Johannesburg," "Winter in America," and "Angel Dust," among others. Warm, intelligent, and insightful throughout, Scott-Heron is clearly enjoying himself and the opportunity to espouse his views. A must for any fan of Scott-Heron's, and definitely worth a look for fans of the funkier jazz music of the mid to late 1970's.

The inhabitants of an institution in a remote country rebel against their keepers. Their acts of rebellion are by turns humorous, boring and alarming. An allegory on the problematic nature of fully liberating the human spirit, as both commendable and disturbing elements of our nature come forward. The film shows how justifiable revolt may be empowering, but may also turn to chaos and depravity. The allegory is developed in part by the fact that the film is cast entirely with dwarfs