Sherlock Holmes (2009)

Sherlock Holmes (2009)

Film review by: Witney Seibold

Sherlock Holmes (Robert Downey, Jr.) is an irascible know-it-all who drinks heavily, boxes professionally, is wholly unclean, and seems to have a stronger romantic regard for his investigative sidekick Dr. Watson (Jude Law) than he does for his American criminal ex-girlfriend Irene (Rachel McAdams). While the literary purist in me was longing for a more straightforward adaptation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s legendary detective novels, I was still entertained by the Holmes-as-action-hero approach of Guy Ritchie’s new film.

The White Ribbon

The White Ribbon

Film review by: Witney Seibold

Told like a fable, plotted like a 19^th century novel, subtle as a poem, and as damning as the early works of Nietzsche, Michael Haneke’s “The White Ribbon” provides an intellectual hammer that will condemn provincial life, fascism, groupthink, and guilt tactics that seems to mark any form of civilization at one point.

3 Idiots

3 Idiots

Film review by: Witney Seibold

I have said this before, but: I love the ethos behind Bollywood filmmaking. If you have a poor populace living in a hot area of the world, you’d better given them their money’s worth, and enough time indoors to beat the heat. Most every Bollywood film I’ve seen has been over 3 hours long, has featured grandly dramatic climaxes of thuddingly obvious melodrama, and at least three song and dance numbers. Bollywood filmmakers are going to make damn sure you feel livened and joyous and sated by the time you leave, even if they have to sing and dance for hours to do it.

Up in the Air

Up in the Air

Film review by: Witney Seibold

Jason Reitman’s “Up in the Air” stars out as a wicked comedy about the current state of the American economy, which feels a lot like the winking frankness of his “Thank You for Smoking,” slowly morphs into a sweet unexpected (and unexpectedly honest) romance, like his “Juno,” dips dangerously, dangerously close to an unwanted sentimentality, and ends on a perfect note of purgatorial irony that ensures it will be remembered as both a parable of our troubled economic times, and a Sturges-does-Dante contemplation of human connectivity, and the self-inflicted stasis we can unwittingly (or somewhat wittingly) put ourselves in. It’s one of the best films of the year.

Invictus

Invictus

Film review by: Witney Seibold

One would assume that, upon hearing that Clint Eastwood (who will be 80 this year) was making a sports movie, that it would be, without fail, a film about an underdog baseball team. Perhaps playing in the 1930s.  Odd, then, that Eastwood would decide to make a film about the historical World Cup match between the South African and New Zealand rugby teams. Odder still, that the impetus for the underdog team to win was a not-so-secret presidential decree from the saintly Nelson Mandela.