Tag: Robert Redford

Film Review: Pete’s Dragon

Recapturing that ol’ warm fuzzy Disney feeling.

The biggest kind of warm fuzzy.
The biggest kind of warm fuzzy.

For those who remember the 1977 Disney classic, Pete’s Dragon, you may wonder why an obscure title such as that one would need a remake. To be honest, the remake doesn’t answer that question. But nevertheless, the new Pete’s Dragon is a very charming family film. Pete’s Dragon has an old school magical feel to it, with similar familial themes to classic 1970s Disney films such as The Apple Dumpling Gang, Bedknobs and Broomsticks, Escape to Witch Mountain, and the original of the same name. Aside from the less-than-ideal usage of country-tinged pop songs to convey the right emotions we should be feeling, and the absence of musical numbers, Pete’s Dragon is a solidly executed and delightful adventure.

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Film Review: A Walk in the Woods

Go take a hike: Redford, Nolte lead us on pleasant enough Walk

Bill (Robert Redford, left) and Stephen (Nick Nolte) wonder what they’ve gotten themselves into.

A Walk in the Woods, based on Bill Bryson’s popular 1998 memoir of attempting to hike the Appalachian Trail, is inevitably going to be compared to Wild, last year’s film of Cheryl Strayed’s memoir about hiking the Pacific Crest Trail, on the opposite side of the country. Aside from similar plots, though, the two films have little in common; Wild is the better picture by far, but A Walk in the Woods holds its own as a sort of lightweight, droll counterpart. What Wild did for solo women hikers on the PCT, A Walk in the Woods might do for the grandfather set on the AT.

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Film Review: Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Captain America is in a post-Avengers world.

New suit. New foe. Same tude.
New suit. New foe. Same tude.

The surprise 2011 hit, Captain America: The First Avenger, succeeded because the iconic yet campy superhero received a modern injection of cinematic energy and solid storytelling.  The main reason for the Captain’s successful re-emergence into mainstream pop culture was the charisma and multi-generational appeal of actor Chris Evans.  Evans returns in his third stint as the star-spangled rescuer in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, a film with another solid plot extracted from the Marvel universe, a fantastic grip on character arcs and relationships, and an epic sense of scale that, obviously, takes place in a post-Avengers universe.

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Film Review: “The Conspirator”

Robin Wright and James McAvoy in THE CONSPIRATOR. © 2011 - Roadside Attractions

starring: James McAvoy, Robin Wright, Evan Rachel Wood, Alexis Bledel, Kevin Kline, Tom Wilkinson, Justin Long, Norman Reedus, Danny Huston, Jonathan Groff, Johnny Simmons, Stephen Root, Colm Meaney

written by: James Solomon (screenplay/story), Gregory Bernstein (story)

directed by: Robert Redford

MPAA: Rated PG-13 for some violent content.

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