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Morgan Freeman & Gary Oldman—
Batman Begins
—05/03/05
Morgan Freeman and Gary Oldman on
Batman Begins
and Career Highlights
High Crimes (2002)
Despite my aversion to derivative, lazy, and improbable thrillers, I'd be lying if I said
High Crimes
had no pulp entertainment value.
The Sum of All Fears (2002)
Though this political adventure requires substantial suspension of disbelief, the witty script and mature approach keep the film on track.
Dreamcatcher (2003)
Levity (2003)
Bruce Almighty (2003)
The lazy script fails at every turn fully to exploit the premise...while making the dogged Carrey fetch his shtick.
The Big Bounce (2004)
The Hunting of the President (2004)
Million Dollar Baby (2004)
Million Dollar Baby
makes the line between subtle and obvious seem finer than it is, and delivers its one-two punches Old-Hollywood-style.
Unleashed (2005)
The Dickensian trials of a poor shackled martial artist, but save your great expectations for the next summer action movie.
Batman Begins (2005)
The ne plus ultra of comic-book films...an appropriately tough movie, busy but efficient, rich and thoughtful, and ornamented with visual appeal and exciting action.
An Unfinished Life (2005)
Provides a useful contrast to good dramas....Redford and Freeman should have invested their chops elsewhere.
Lucky Number Slevin (2006)
Tarantinoid...the machinations are all familiar enough that your unoccupied brain may drift off to wonder how Hartnett's made a career out of bad haircuts.
10 Items or Less (2006)
A ridiculous but cheerful toss-off...amusing and charming.
Evan Almighty (2007)
Will presumably charm wee ones, and...go over like gangbusters with the holy rollers, but others may notice this comedy of faith skimps on the comedy.
Gone Baby Gone (2007)
The structure and layered storytelling make
Gone Baby Gone
richly satisfying.
The Dark Knight (2008)
Ledger slips into the purple suit as if it were an animal skin for a primal, archetypal dance...Nolan's richly realized adaptation of a modern American mythology fulfills our faith in the material and its interpreters.
Wanted (2008)
Delivers slam-bang action entertainment, and does it while putting a surprising twist on the archetypal heroic journey.
Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991)
The bones of the story are comfortingly familiar, the action is rollicking, and the metaphorical moustache-twirling of Alan Rickman's Sheriff of Nottingham is priceless.
Glory (1989)
In its broad strokes,
Glory
gets at the spirit of a group of previously unsung black heroes, and the filmmaking is of a high caliber.
Invictus (2009)
Despite hewing fairly closely to the facts, has trouble seeming truthful. Practically everyone behaves like an allegorical symbol rather than a person, a problem the script anticipates and acknowledges but only feebly attempts to solve.
Red (2010)
Stars four Oscar-winning actors. It’s not every day that you’re able to use 'Helen Mirren' and 'heavy artillery' in the same sentence, but
Red
gives you the opportunity.
Dolphin Tale (2011)
In the hands of actor-turned-director Charles Martin Smith, this kid-centric drama provides a welcome family option with positive values and a minimum of frantic, noisy CGI. It's a tale told on a human (and animal) scale.
The Dark Knight Rises (2012)
The Nolans consider the issues of the day...explore the role of legendary heroes (from Robin Hood to Batman and Robin) in galvanizing the public, and labor mightily to ensure that how their Batman ends dovetails with 2005’s
Batman Begins
.
Now You See Me (2013)
So preposterous in its particulars, so ludicrous in its lowdown, that you're liable to kick yourself silly for having bothered to play along.
Transcendence (2014)
A throwback to the fear-mongering science fiction of the past...the lab-bound likes of
The Andromeda Strain
and
Demon Seed
, circa the paranoid '70s.
The Lego Movie (2014)
Zany episodes...provide a clothesline on which to hang social satire and an overriding message that an individual's imagination can trump social and cultural oppression. Throw out the instructions, and make what you want of the world. Plus butt jokes.
Lucy (2014)
Besson reminds us how limber he can be...The material is always cheeky in its sense of humor and stylistic and cultural allusions...and frequently, if not fundamentally, provocative...
Dolphin Tale 2 (2014)
Wait—is this a lesbian dolphin dating movie?
Now You See Me 2 (2016)
Not only can the center not hold, but there is no center to begin with...The story mostly speeds along at an obnoxious rate and pitch, the better to misdirect from the next dumb abracadabra plot twist, but good luck hanging in for over two hours of it.
Going in Style (2017)
Polished but hollow...It’s another sign of the times that Hollywood thinks we can no longer handle the original storyline.
Paradise Highway (2022)
Ambition...effort...well-intentioned...some genuinely affecting grace notes on occasion, but it's also shameless.
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