Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium (2007)

Aimed at an audience too young for the spooks of “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,” the jawbreaker-bright “Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium” stars Dustin Hoffman as the 243-year-old owner of a magical toy store where planes, balls, books, sock monkeys and dolls come alive. The set-up: Magorium is ready to “move on” (die, that is) and sees in his store clerk (Natalie Portman) a successor to his trade. He just needs to make her believe. Directed by Zack Helm, the film recalls “Romper Room” and other tyke-pitched fare, which is adorable. And yet, it is grinding. I felt for Portman. At the climax, she conducts and dances her way through an over-baked sparkle-filled scene and looks miserable. “Star Wars” prequels miserable. That said, she didn't look ready to cry. Thank heaven or wherever (as the movie says), for Jason Bateman. Playing a Gene Wilder role (accountant) perfectly straight, he steals the film, sock monkey in tow. C+

The Wolfman (2010) and Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992)

What better double feature than “The Wolfman” and “Bram Stoker’s Dracula”? Each is a remake of a classic Universal horror film set in the 1890s, unfolding gore galore with Anthony Hopkins running amok and nearly all the chips placed on visual style. One sinks, the other wins. By a fang.

In the long-delayed “Wolfman,” Benicio Del Toro (“Traffic”) plays Lawrence Talbot, an English-born stage actor with a troubled past and a smothering whack-job daddy (Anthony Hopkins in full nuthouse mode). Early in, Talbot vows to find the man (beast?) who ripped his brother to shreds, but … well, you know all this … Talbot is bitten by a werewolf and, in turn, becomes a furry killer himself. Roar. Slash. Howl. Who’s the first werewolf? Need I ask? Nothing is shocking here, even with barrels of blood, guts and shattered bones being thrown at the screen. “Wolfman” works so diligently to create a mood of Euro-repression and horror that it forgets to create characters that breathe. The cinematography is so desaturated and drenched in fog, every actor seems to vanish into the background. I desperately wished this were shot in a stark black and white, as was the original, so it could have at least provided visual goose bumps. Not so. There’s a tail-end (sorry) fight between CGI werewolves that makes the recent “Hulk” film finale seem quaint. Emily Blunt co-stars as a Victorian dress, err, woman under duress. C

Francis Ford Coppola -- past his 1970s prime -- cast Gary Oldman as the sadist warrior who renounces God and is punished for eternity to feast on blood in “Dracula.” Oldman rocks as the first vampire, who ages, morphs and disintegrates on screen, from warrior to wickedly old skin-and-bones drag queen to a pile of rats and then a human bat. The scenes where he licks a bloody razor and laughs as an infant is devoured are skull-splitting spooky. The visuals, music score and eroticism also crackle 20 years on and after the lesser “Twilight.” I’ve never seen blood so alive, such a full, living red character on film. What style. The movie derails in other casting. Keanu Reeves is a disaster as a law clerk. Winona Ryder comes and goes as the count’s beloved dead bride and then the reincarnated Mina. I’m not certain what creature lives above Cary Elwes’ lip, but I’m certain Elwes fears it to this day. I always waiver on Hopkins’ over-the-top Van Helsing, but I truly dug it this time. If any man can be fully delirious, why not this guy? Tom Waits, mad master of music, plays one hell of a Renfield. It’s all more camp, then art. B

Zodiac (2007)

During the audio commentary of “Zodiac,” James Ellroy declares this stellar David Fincher film “one of the greatest American crime films ever made.” True. It’s also one of the best films about American journalism and obsession, he kind that cracks one’s life like broken crystal. During the 1970s in San Francisco, the self-named Zodiac killed at random, rambled in cryptic letters to the “Chronicle,” ruled radio and TV, disappeared for years. He owned the information, and therefore the city, and one shudders at what he could have done with the Internet. Among the lives he ruined: The detectives (Mark Ruffalo and Anthony Edwards) and newspapermen (Robert Downey Jr. and Jake Gyllenhaal) who picked up the pieces and stored the evidence. Fincher and writer James Vanderbilt give us a suspect (John Carroll Lynch of “Fargo”) who presents a veiled sense of evil, but manages to stay outside the spotlight. “Zodiac” is wildly accurate, from the newsroom cigarette smoke to the endless interviews and dead-ends that keep detectives busy. Fincher’s masterpiece. A

The Core (2003)

“The Core” is an End of the World Thriller that had me screaming “Burn, baby, burn!” Every minute in this John Amiel-directed film is a bust, making the similar but thoroughly watchable “2012” seem like high art. The film’s most mind-numbing scene has the sun’s microwave heat melting the entire San Francisco Bay Bridge, but only giving the living motorists below sunburn. But that’s just bad science, and this is the place of miracles. Case in point: Aaron Eckhart is made haggard, dull and whiny, while every bit of intelligence that embodies Hilary Swank is erased. Stanley Tucci fares worse as the egomaniac physicist whose shadiness is best demonstrated by his wet-noodle wrist. (Homophobic? You bet.) The badness of the scenes where our heroes endlessly bicker like spoiled children are bottomed only by the ones in which they mourn and weep over one another, but truly appear like they could give a crap. At one point Tucci’s doomed academic sighs, “What the fuck am I doing?” I imagine it’s a phrase the cast often spoke. D-

The Conversation (1974)

Between turning out “The Godfather” Parts 1 and 2, Francis Ford Coppola made another film that ought to be on my All Time Favorites list. With its focus on early 1970s audio surveillance and wicked phone tapping, “The Conversation” defines the era of Nixon paranoia more so than “All the President’s Men.” Yet, its script/production schedule preceded Watergate. The film’s not just about privacy. It’s also about the art of sound, the difference between hearing and listening, and the consequences of the job. Gene Hackman plays Harry Caul, a professional eavesdropper who lives to record the impossible, including a jittery couple walking around San Francisco’s Union Square. As much as Harry strives to invade the privacy of others, he works to guard his own until his latest employer (fronted by a young, quietly menacing Harrison Ford) starts turning the screws. This is Coppola at the height of his powers, laying out a morality tale about technology, privacy and faith, so expect to be intrigued and laid flat by a devastating finale. Hackman gives his greatest slow-burn performance, topped only by his boisterous detective in “The French Connection.” A+

Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief (2010)

A misfit boy learns that he not only has incredible powers, but that he is a vital player in a supernatural drama outside the scope of normal humanity. Harry Potter? Well, yes. But also Percy Jackson. Who? Think Boy Wizard - Sorting Hats + “Clash of the Titans.”

In “Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief,” our title character (get the pun?) is thrown from a sorry existence into the realm of gods, demigods and monsters. Chris Columbus directs this franchise kick-off as he did the first two Potter films, but to lesser effect.

“Percy” is adventurous and has ace scenes (Uma Thurman as Medusa), but it lacks the spark that makes even an adult think with childhood whimsy, “I want to do that!” The adult cast is underused, underwhelming, or in the case of Catherine Keener (as Percy’s mom) saddled with oblivious roles. FYI, we have Pierce Brosnan and Sean Bean looking for things to do.

Young actor Logan Lerman as Percy seems more boy band than action hero, but he’s fun to watch, particularly when baffled at a magical pen or, slack-jawed, discussing “The French Connection” in a prison-like casino. Logic? There is none.

When did the gods of the universe, with all their might, immigrate to the United States? I guess if you watch Fox News or vote GOP or you are 5th grade or under in America, this is natural. God and gods equal USA. For me, I am stumped. Never mind. I digress. Out. C+

Land of the Lost (2009)

The best actor in “Land of the Lost,” a remake of a cult 1970s TV show I never saw, is Matt Lauer. The pompous newsman spoofs himself as he knocks egos with Rick Marshall, a mentally vacant scientist played by Will Ferrell. Marshall advocates not just time travel, but alternate time lines -- mash-ups of present, past and future -- and, of course, he travels there, hence the title. These book-end scenes provoke a solid laugh, recalling Tom Cruise’s ill-fated visit with Lauer several years ago. As for the rest of this comedy … it’s lost in its own alternate time warp, ruled by screenwriters who still laugh at the mention of the word “breasts” and think groping them is even funnier. Also hilarious: Asking a woman if she is “wet.” In a children's film. Ferrell and second-banana Danny McBride (as a redneck adventurist) riff off each other as if they were co-hosting an unending “Saturday Night Live” skit from 30 years ago, with $100 million special effects and nowhere to go. D

Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

What a banner year 1967 was for film, “Cool Hand Luke,” “The Graduate,” and “In the Heat of the Night.” But “Bonnie and Clyde” tops them all. If you’re older than 13, you know the story: Clyde Barrow (Warren Beatty) and Bonnie Parker (Faye Dunaway) rob banks, shoot, kill, and die in a hail of bullets. In this Arthur Penn-directed tale, the couple stumbles into their life of crime, botching their first robberies at a shuttered bank and a grocery, with family (including a frantic sister-in-law played by Estelle Parsons) close by. The first murder is almost accidental, the others come easier. Penn dishes out the dark humor in droves, always with an edge of violence that still shocks with its exploded body parts and proximity. Beatty and Dunaway themselves explode as the original gangster couple with heaps of personal issues, faults and an unending hunger for stability during a financial depression that provides none. I could rave about Gene Hackman as an elder brother Barrow, but it’s Denver Pyle (yes, Uncle Jesse!) who burns brightly as a lawman with a raging psychotic lust for murder, barely masked by his quest for justice. A+

Adventureland (2009)

Set in 1987 amid a world plagued by “Rock Me Amadeus,” the stoner comedy “Adventureland” is a small film that focuses on the rites of passage for many young twenty-somethings: summer jobs, sex, pot, crashing the car, fighting with you parents. (I said most, not me.) Jesse Eisenberg is such a youth, out of college with grad school on the horizon, he’s forced to take a job at a Pittsburgh theme park after his father’s job crumbles. Adventureland is full of dorks, oddballs, the maintenance guy who sells tall tales of coolness (Ryan Reynolds) and the truly cool, truly messed up girl (Kristen Stewart). The comedy and some drama come from these people stumbling and finding their way toward adulthood and love. The movie excels at not making (all) of the adults idiots, but just older people capable of making equally bad decisions. The best scene has our hero’s mom busting him for having booze in the car, when the bottle belongs to his father. Nothing is said between father and son. But the shared look, the acceptance of both men, faults and all, is a far step above most any entire film in this often crude genre. B+

Terminator: Salvation (2009)

Nothing much happens. That may be the most surprising takeaway from “Terminator: Salvation,” the fourth film in the franchise started by James Cameron. Set after military supercomputerthingy Skynet goes berserk, but before John Connor sends comrade-in-arms Kyle Reese back in time to save his … Aw, hell, I don’t have the stamina for tracking this plot. This time travel ball of string makes “Lost” seem like “Pokey Puppy.” The barest fact: Connor must rescue his future pop from death by Skynet or he’s nonexistent toast. In doing this, Connor invades Skynet HQ and comes face-to-face with the T-800 – the killer robot played by Arnold Schwarzenegger 25 years ago. It’s a huge charge to see (CGI) Ahnuld’s evil mask once again. What a blast that film was! But there’s little blast here despite great action and a new, ashen look. Director McG and his army of writers almost provide a game changer that would reset this franchise’s clock, but wimp out. Sam Worthington of “Avatar” cements his rising-star status as a seemingly unkillable fighter. But as the ranting and raving Connor, Christian Bale’s performance is as robotic as the metallic zombies chasing him. C+

The Messenger (2009)

"The Messenger" sets out to tell us about the difficult task faced by U.S. Army personnel assigned to the job of informing parents and spouses that their loved one has died. Sets out, but fails. Ben Foster (“3:10 to Yuma”) is Will Montgomery, a wounded veteran with three months remaining on his contract. He’s tasked, with as much training as I received writing press releases, into this notification duty under all-rules, no-hugs Capt. Tony Stone (Woody Harrelson). When the two set out to inform families, this is a heartbreaking piece of cinema. Yet, miscalculated dramatics bring ruin. Will near stalks a new war widow because he … feels sorry for her? Is in love? Either way, it's bogus. Long stretches of scenes ring false. "Hurt Locker" had several scenes anti-logical to (what little I know of) military practice, but it excelled in its human truths. This doesn't. The acting is superb -- Foster owns the film, and Harrelson provides fine support -- yet there must be a better depiction out there that treats this vital task with the absolute seriousness in which it must be carried out. B-