The differences between British and American politics are many, but to contrast their portrayals on-screen, you need look no further than the two versions of State of Play. In the original British TV serial, an up-and-coming young legislator catches the Tube to work. In the American movie version, he sits regally in a car driven by a lackey.... Read more

When you probably last ran into him, in The Blair Witch Project, Joshua Leonard was scared, but in Humpday he’s downright terrified. He plays Andrew, a bohemian world wanderer who suspects deep down he’s not the artist he’s long claimed to be, and who shows up unannounced at 2 in the morning on the Seattle doorstep of a college bud he hasn’t seen in a decade.... Read more

Searching for the latest martial-arts assault on your senses from the “Muscles from Brussels,” aka Jean-Claude Van Damme? Netflix can probably feed your fix. Looking for that preposterously cute puppy pic from Jennifer Aniston to tug on your heartstrings like they’re slobber-smeared chew toys? Video on demand from your local cable provider can sate that sweet tooth.... Read more

Can sexual predators be rehabilitated? Director Bob Byington’s 2008 film Registered Sex Offender offers a jaundiced and, some critics say, savagely funny answer to that question via a mockumentary about a young man recently released from prison who has a dangerous taste for dating teenagers.... Read more

You know a technology is really pervading our culture when you see it satirized in a film aimed at the 8-to-12-year-old set.... Read more

Quentin Tarantino came up with a beaut of an idea — a bunch of brainstorms, in fact — for a madcap World War II cartoon. And then never really figured out what to do with them. Inglourious Basterds is a movie about the writer-director’s fevered obsession with movies and, I regret to report, not terribly much more.... Read more

If there’s one thing Liz Canner knows, it’s orgasms.
Lucky lady, right? But, before you make assumptions about her personal life, consider that the 41-year-old filmmaker acquired her encyclopedic knowledge of the big O almost accidentally. After years of making documentaries about social justice and human rights issues, Canner needed a break from the heavy stuff. So, rather than focusing her camera lens on pain, she set out to learn about pleasure.... Read more

Quick, name a hit movie from South Africa. Until now, the only name likely to come up was The Gods Must Be Crazy, the 1980 comic saga of a Bushman whose life is disrupted by a Coke bottle tossed from a plane.... Read more

For me, the path to movie criticism began at the Boston Phoenix newspaper, where I sold advertising space to transsexual prostitutes. These entrepreneurs of pleasure were not my only customers, of course, just the ones I remember most vividly. The year was 1979. Dreaming of glory in the world of big-city alternative journalism, I had applied for a job at the Phoenix and, to my surprise, was immediately granted an interview with its second-in-command.... Read more

Back in the day, kids bought plastic “action figures” based on movie heroes. Now they watch movie heroes based on action figures. Like the Transformers saga, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra is a film that owes its existence to a line of toys.... Read more