If you put yourself through the wringer only once this year, you could do worse than The Strangers. 
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Groucho Reviews
Latest Film Reviews
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The Strangers (2008)
If you put yourself through the wringer only once this year, you could do worse than The Strangers. -
Commando (1985)
An audacious comic-book movie on steroids...cinematic junk food, but even a dieter deserves to cheat once in a while. -
Predator (1987)
A dumber version of the Alien franchise, but this initial picture works anyway, as an atmospheric exercise in pure, primal action with a science-fiction-y twist. -
Bee Movie (2008)
Seinfeld's pleasingly idiosyncratic comic voice comes through in the haphazard, slaphappy storyline. -
Face/Off (1997)
This is your action movie on drugs—any questions? -
Anger Management (2003)
Full-blown 'Jack'—his face a spectacular special effect of full-blown energy—remains an irresistible act. -
Twister (1996)
It may not be fashionable to like Twister, but darn if it isn't an entertaining electro-shock of action cinema. -
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008)
George Lucas adopted a new mantra: 'It's only a movie, it's only a movie, it's only a movie.' And he's right. It'll certainly do for a Friday night. But to...fans, the 1980s films are more than movies. -
Get Smart (1995)
The time is right to reappraise the revamp: yes, it's a shadow of the original series, but it has its high points. -
Before the Rains (2008)
A poor man's rehash of A Passage to India. -
Le voyage du ballon rouge (The Flight of the Red Balloon) (2008)
All suggestion and no imposition, a subtle meditation on how we position ourselves in space and to what end. -
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (2008)
Adamson is willing to jettison Lewis' 'quaint' (I'd say loveable) whimsy and mythical acumen in favor of more martial sequences that'll sucker in the Lord of the Rings crowd. -
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005)
Though Adamson lacks Lewis' storytelling confidence...The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe still comes across as a quirkily diverting children's entertainment. -
The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (a.k.a. The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones) (1992)
Approached with an open mind, The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles offers an intriguing angle on one of the greatest characters in modern cinema. -
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)
The eventual arrival of towering screen presence Sean Connery as Dr. Henry Jones, Sr. alongside Harrison Ford as Dr. Henry Jones, Jr. allows for what may be adventure cinema's most potent pairing. -
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984)
If it was a sign of the times for Indiana Jones to take on more of a comic-book aspect, the film's accomodation of darker themes and explicit imagery came as something of a shock to many. -
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
The postmodern heir to North By Northwest...like any deathless classic, Raiders is a perfect marriage of star and material. -
A Raisin in the Sun (2008)
A quintessentially American play, revisited...this one has towering performances from Rashad and McDonald. -
El Orfanato (The Orphanage) (2007)
A series of serviceable creep-outs and jolts...the pretzel-shaped resolution feels like too little too late. -
Dou fo sin (Flash Point) (2008)
Martial arts junkies won't want to miss Flash Point, a sequel to director Wilson Yip and star and action director Donnie Yen's S.P.L. (a.k.a. Sha Po Lang or, for us Americans, Kill Zone). With its em... -
The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964)
Ask anyone who knows about The Fall of the Roman Empire, and their response is sure to include the word "sumptuous." From back in the day when epic meant upwards of 10,000 extras, gargantuan sets, an... -
Mio fratello è figlio unico (My Brother Is an Only Child) (2008)
The Italian dramedy My Brother Is an Only Child traces a boy's journey from a crumbling family home to something like the opposite. Beginning in 1962 with an adolescent passage in the 400 Blows vein,... -
First Knight (1995)
First Knight—a brave attempt at a fresh cinematic angle on Arthurian legend—has a few interesting ideas, but is ultimately brought down by a squishy script, a director (Jerry Zucker) lack... -
A Passage to India (1984)
After a fourteen year absence from the silver screen, David Lean vigorously attacked the challenge of adapting E.M. Forster's novel A Passage to India. What would be Lean's final film has much to rec... -
The Savages (2007)
Tamara Jenkins' dark comedy The Savages applies bracing wit to the problem of immature adults forced to grow up and take on roles of parental responsibility for rapidly infantilized parents. It's no... -
Sleuth (2007)
The script includes a verbal motif that reminds us of what binds the film's four central talents together: 'I want to show you something.' -
Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007)
"The world is an evil place," or so says a compromised diamond dealer in the crime melodrama Before the Devil Knows You're Dead. "Some of us make money off of that, and others get destroyed." Dark bu... -
Juno (2007)
One frequent criticism of certain screenwriters is to point out that their characters all sound the same. To some, this phenomenon is a terrible sin; to others, it's simply a matter of style. Though... -
Body of War (2008)
Filmmaker Ellen Spiro and legendary TV journalist Phil Donahue join forces for Body of War, a portrait of wounded veteran and antiwar activist Tomas Young. One thread of the narrative follows Young's... -
Friday Night Lights—The Second Season (2007)
After a freshman season that artistically neared perfection (but dwelled in the ratings basement), Friday Night Lights returned to NBC in fall of 2007 determined to win a larger audience without sacr... -
Cheers—The Ninth Season (2008)
Time continues to be good to Cheers, the enduringly funny sitcom with a talent for psychological head games and nasty repartee. As dire as the character's frustrations could get, Cheers always mainta... -
Young@Heart (2008)
With an average age of 80, the Young@Heart chorus stays terrifically active. Under the direction of tenacious Bob Cilman, the two dozen singers tackle challenging songs that are mostly rock and punk.... -
88 Minutes (2008)
Another lamebrained variation on the noir standard D.O.A., 88 Minutes propels itself through a requisite excess of plot to keep viewers guessing from whence the stench of herring comes and, as they s... -
The Visitor (2008)
Character actor Richard Jenkins finally steps to center stage in The Visitor, Tom McCarthy's follow-up to indie darling The Station Agent. While not lacking in comic observation, the new film has a t... -
My Blueberry Nights (2008)
Master of moody romance Wong Kar-Wai--the auteur behind In the Mood for Love--stumbles a bit with his first English-language picture, My Blueberry Nights. The usual components remain: pop music, slo-... -
The Forbidden Kingdom (2008)
The long-anticipated pairing of martial-arts stars Jackie Chan and Jet Li arrives under great scrutiny. On the one hand are the great expectations; on the other is healthy skepticism that Stuart Litt... -
Forgetting Sarah Marshall (2008)
The Judd Apatow juggernaut rolls on with Forgetting Sarah Marshall, which Apatow produces for writer-star Jason Segel. Like his onetime Freaks and Geeks co-star Seth Rogen, Segel is an unlikely star... -
Never Forever (2008)
Writer-director Gina Kim helms this corker about the delicacy of marital infertility and sympathetic infidelity. Vera Farmiga (The Departed) plays Sophie, a Caucasian housewife married into a Korean-... -
Leatherheads (2008)
With Leatherheads, director-producer-star George Clooney clearly has in mind a "Golden Age of Movies" pastiche like The Hudsucker Proxy, made by his Oscar-winning buddies the Coen Brothers. But lacki... -
Irina Palm (2008)
For something completely different (though also written and directed by men), there's Irina Palm, which casts Marianne Faithfull as a self-described "frump" who dresses like a housecleaner but discov...