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Jonah Hill, Channing Tatum Have Fun on ‘21 Jump Street’
Rating: 3.5/5.0CHICAGO– There are various opinions about TV-to-movie remakes, mostly negative. That is why “21 Jump Street,” based on a 1980s TV show, manages some grudging respect. Jonah Hill,...
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Will Ferrell Experiments with Surreal ‘Casa de mi Padre’
Rating: 3.5/5.0CHICAGO– Will Ferrell can never be accused of sitting on his comic laurels, nor repeating himself. “Casa de mi Padre” is a complete set-in-Mexico Spanish language film, including...
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Mary Elizabeth Winstead is Emotionally Wrecked in ‘Smashed’
Rating: 4.0/5.0CHICAGO– “Young Drunks in Love” could be the subtitle of the new film “Smashed,’ or maybe “Recovery Can’t Recover All.” Regardless, Mary Elizabeth Winstead gives a career-defining...
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Nick Offerman Stars in Episodic ‘Somebody Up There Likes Me’
Rating: 3.0/5.0CHICAGO– At the start, I’ll admit to kind of hating Bob Byington’s truly unusual “Somebody Up There Likes Me,” playing this weekend at the Music Box Theatre in Chicago with local actor...
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In Youth, It’s Good to Be ‘The Kings of Summer’
Rating: 3.5/5.0CHICAGO– Real summer movies shouldn’t be about superheroes or overwrought science fiction, it should be about long days working that trigger in the animal soul that awakens a sun-warmed...
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Horrible ‘We’re the Millers’ Wastes Huge Potential
Rating: 2.0/5.0CHICAGO– There was a point in “We’re the Millers” when the story fell off the table like a Slinky from a mountaintop. It’s as if other writers took over from a far superior dark comedy,...
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‘In a World...’ Reveals a Voiceover of Heart, Hilarity
Rating: 4.0/5.0CHICAGO– One the most familiar movie clichés is the sonorous voice that intones “In a world…” to begin a movie trailer, and then extols the virtues of that upcoming feature. Lake Bell,...
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Diablo Cody Loses Tone in Awful ‘Paradise’
Rating: 1.0/5.0CHICAGO– Diablo Cody’s directorial debut, “Paradise,” now available everywhere On Demand and released this Friday in some markets theatrically, is an unmitigated disaster. It’s the most...
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Big Laughs Await in Sly, Fun ‘The LEGO Movie’
Rating: 4.5/5.0CHICAGO– The funniest movie in a long while features no human beings, just animated bland faces among interlocking plastic bricks, the toys which inspired the film. “The LEGO Movie”...
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‘22 Jump Street’ is a Proud Bargain Bin Blockbuster
Rating: 3.0/5.0CHICAGO– “22 Jump Street” is a big budget Hollywood sequel that actively comments on the diminishing returns of sequels. Directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller know that for every...
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Imagine What Could Have Been for ‘Danny Collins’
Rating: 2.0/5.0CHICAGO– “Danny Collins” is a shoulda-woulda-coulda film. It was inspired by the true story of a John Lennon letter acquired by a musician 40 years after he was suppose to to have...
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Ever-Present Passion in ‘Me and Earl and the Dying Girl’
Rating: 4.0/5.0CHICAGO– There are feelings encoded in a film, imparted by the creators, which sometimes takes a while to become apparent. “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” is an example, with a...
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Drac Pack Still a Drag in ‘Hotel Transylvania 2’
Rating: 2.5/5.0CHICAGO– For the younger set unable to experience the mystique of Dracula, Wolfman and Frankenstein in their original creations, “Hotel Transylvania 2” may prove to be an introduction to...
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Terence Malick’s Feverish Dream in ‘Knight of Cups’
Rating: 3.5/5.0CHICAGO– I’ve been quoting Martin Scorsese over the years, that he said “movies are a psychotic’s feverish dream on display.” In searching for those words, I found he never said it. He...
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Michael Keaton is a Man with a Brand in ‘The Founder’
Rating: 4.0/5.0CHICAGO– Michael Keaton is the real reason to see “The Founder” – it’s a movie that probably wouldn’t work at all without him. Keaton portrays Ray Kroc, the man who turned McDonald’s...
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Emotionally Animated ‘My Life as a Zucchini’
Rating: 3.5/5.0CHICAGO– Leave it to the Europeans to inject some realistic drama into the art of animation. The recently Oscar nominated “My Life as a Zucchini” is opening in Chicago this weekend, and...
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Emotionally Perfect Cowboy Elegy in ‘The Hero’
Rating: 5.0/5.0CHICAGO– The great character actor Sam Elliott – known mostly for his cowboy roles in film/TV and his unique bass sounding voiceovers – gets an opportunity to deliver a nuanced and...
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Despite One Premise, Laughs Are Plenty in ‘The Little Hours’
Rating: 3.5/5.0CHICAGO– It occurred to me in assessing “The Little Hours” that the basic premise is somewhat like “The Beguiled” – a man is taken in, rooster-like, into a henhouse where there are women...
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‘The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part’ is Flat Out Funny
Rating: 4.0/5.0CHICAGO– There are two things I love as a film observer. The pretty colors of modern animation … and to laugh. I got both in the appropriately titled “The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part.”...
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