Joel Silver

With a premise not much more believable than Snakes on a Plane, this slickly made thriller entertains us from start to finish by never flinching once. It may be utterly ridiculous, but it's played with full-on dedication by a gifted cast and a filmmaker who knows how to ramp up tension out of thin air, so to speak. Yes, it's utterly idiotic, but it's so much fun that we want a sequel even before this film crashes to the ground.

Relapsed alcoholic Air Marshal Bill (Neeson) has far too much personal baggage as he heads to work on a trans-Atlantic flight. Still grieving over his daughter's death as he drinks a bit of coffee with his whiskey, his hopes of a quiet flight are soon dashed when he receives an in-flight text threatening to kill a passenger every 20 minutes if he doesn't pay a huge ransom. So he kicks into action-man gear. But things start getting seriously surreal as he struggles to find anyone on the plane who doesn't look shifty. He seeks assistance from steely stewardess Nancy (Dockery) and too-helpful passenger Jen (Moore). But everyone begins to wonder if Bill might be the real villain here.

Filmmaker Collet-Serra packs the screen with red herrings, as all of the passengers fire wary glances at each other, moan about the general chaos of the flight and do all of those stupid things that make air travel so tiresome. The only thing missing is a screaming baby. Not that you'd hear it above the crazed panic this cat-and-mouse situation induces. It's so frantic that we barely have time to wonder how someone could get on a plane with a briefcase full of cocaine. Or a bomb. So we just hang on as the turbulence escalates.

Continue reading: Non-stop Review

Ritchie, Downey and Law are back with another manic romp that feels more like a Victorian James Bond adventure than anything about the famed Conan Doyle characters. While it has the same comical energy, it's not quite as fun as the first go-round.

Brilliant Cambridge professor Moriarty (Harris) is up to no good, taking on Holmes (Downey) by messing with those around him, including his girlfriend-nemesis Irene (McAdams) and his partner Watson (Law), who plans to retire after his upcoming wedding to Mary (Reilly). But nothing goes as planned, and Holmes and Watson are propelled into a vicious game of intrigue that sends them to Paris where they team up with a sexy gypsy (Rapace). They also get help from Holmes' brother Mycroft (Fry) as they head to a climactic showdown in Switzerland.

Who needs logic when the action is this wildly exhilarating? And much of it is drastically slowed-down so Ritchie can show us Holmes' powers of deduction as well as whizzing bullets, explosions and other cool-looking things. The dialog is the same mix of faux intelligent banter and shameless innuendo, which gives the actors something to play with, especially as Downey and Law amusingly move beyond bromance into Brokeback territory.

But we do need some logic. This plot is so messy that it never engages us. And as it builds to a climax in a crazy cliff-perched Alpine castle, we begin to lose interest. Even with the bigger action, zingy dialog and colourful characters, this film barely works up any steam. Whenever Holmes isn't being mischievous, Downey actually looks bored. And Rapace is so sidelined that it's difficult to understand why she's here at all; the filmmakers never give her anything interesting to do.

It's a shame the screenwriters never push the characters further. But at least Ritchie keeps things moving briskly, filling the screen with comical nuttiness and big-gun mayhem. Even if Moriarty makes no sense (would someone this intelligent resort to such a ridiculous plan to make his fortune?), Harris adds heft in the role, including some jagged chemistry with Downey. Let's just hope that the requisite third film lets us in on the joke.

On a mission in Bolivia, a five-man black-ops team is betrayed by their power-mad CIA boss Max (Patric) and left for dead. But they embark on a mission to get revenge and clear their names, with Clay (Morgan) leading techie Jensen (Evans), demolition expert Roque (Elba), driver-pilot Pooch (Short) and sniper Cougar (Jaenada). They also enlist the help of a sexy-but-shady woman (Saldana) as they track Max and his vile henchman (McCallany) from Miami to Los Angeles and try to stop his nefarious Bond-like plan.

Continue reading: The Losers Review

RocknRolla is sexy, fast, loose, smart, and extremely funny. It's crammed with colorful criminals, which Ritchie and cinematographer David Higgs backlight to great effect. It chokes on delightfully screwy schemes, which the director and his editor James Herbert slice, tape, and test drive at breakneck speeds. And that's the key. It keeps moving, hardly caring if you are keeping up.

Continue reading: RocknRolla Review

What they generally aren't is full of capers designed by crackheads in search of comic relief, or a dominatrix dying to destroy the gold market with a Da Vinci alchemy machine only a cat burglar from Hoboken could steal.

Continue reading: Hudson Hawk Review

There you have Osmosis Jones, a combination of clunky live action and cool, creative animation that tries too hard to please both adults and kiddies while journeying inside one disgusting body.

Continue reading: Osmosis Jones Review

I remember a time when I used to enjoy Seagal. Such films as Above the Law, Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, Under Siege, and Out for Justice are all solid action films from the '90s. Under Siege is even kind of good. But lately, films like Under Siege 2, Fire Down Below, and The Patriot have shown the age of the Italian stallion of Aikido.

Continue reading: Exit Wounds Review

Unfortunately, star Bruce Willis, director John McTiernan and company couldn't duplicate the heart-pulling thrill of the first one with two increasingly mediocre sequels. Die Hard 2 and Die Hard: With a Vengeance suffered because of stuffing thrills and spills in every crevice, to the point where I expected the Road Runner to make a cameo. Everyone involved seemed to forget that simplicity made the original so riveting. There's one flawed New York City detective trapped in a skyscraper with only his wits and some firearms to stop a band of talented international terrorists.

Continue reading: Die Hard Review

But can you technically call this new House a remake? Helmed with vague sensibilities by music video director Jaume Serra, this vacant lot bears absolutely no resemblance to its predecessor, save for the fact that they both feature suspicious wax museums. That's like saying Titanic is a remake of The Poseidon Adventure because they both take place on capsized luxury liners.

Continue reading: House Of Wax (2005) Review