Articles written by Nick Rogers

When in doubt, the man who gave us "Groundhog Day" makes Jack Black eat feces and Michael Cera pee in his own mouth. Yes, we're at the level of a YouTube monkey video.

Dec 3, 2009 - Nick Rogers

The narrative possibilities wane more than they wax, but "Moon" is a modestly engrossing puzzle-box thriller anchored by a multifaceted performance from Sam Rockwell.

Dec 3, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Exhaustive with its rapid-fire references, but if this works as a shiny primer to one day introduce kids to classic sci-fi, fantasy and anime, well, more power to it.

Dec 3, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Land of the Lost is marginally better than Bewitched, if only because it's a fairly straightforward springboard from the original, but the film is depressingly unfunny.

Dec 3, 2009 - Nick Rogers

In celebration of all the pithy talk about Jedi warriors in "The Men Who Stare at Goats," let's put it this way: This is not the political satire you're looking for.

Dec 3, 2009 - Nick Rogers

It's blandly calculated, safe, invulnerable and cute. Michael Oher winds up a supporting player in his own biopic, although Sandra Bullock is a surprisingly strong lead.

Dec 3, 2009 - Nick Rogers

An Education depicts how pie-in-the-sky predictions for our futures can sock even the most sensible among us and represents the major arrival of actress Carey Mulligan.

Dec 3, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Roland Emmerich might not get 12-camera coverage on a single explosion like Michael Bay, but he'll always be a better overall director of canonical cornball action.

Dec 3, 2009 - Nick Rogers

A Serious Man is an existential Hitchcock movie crossed with Jewish spirituality, a dab of mysticism and an idea that, for the Coens, morality and mortality are entwined.

Dec 3, 2009 - Nick Rogers

What could have been Ricky Gervais' magnum opus is instead a rickety romantic comedy that collapses under the weight of its concept. Still, the religious satire is sharp.

Oct 27, 2009 - Nick Rogers

If Michael Moore has as fruitful a next decade as his last one, well, we're all in trouble. However, it's odd to see naive softness trump skeptical hope in "Capitalism."

Oct 26, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Steven Soderbergh closes the decade as he started it - unconventionally approaching a story loaded with scientific terms and deserving of an Oscar nod for its lead star.

Oct 26, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey Jr. do their best to keep up with director Joe Wright's baton, which swings wildly all over a movie whose score needs additional notations.

Oct 26, 2009 - Nick Rogers

"Law Abiding Citizen" is a legal-system thriller so incredulous and boring that it will have audience members seeking loopholes to recoup the $9 they've plunked down.

Oct 25, 2009 - Nick Rogers

With tension deadened by depressing sensory cues for scares, "Paranormal Activity" might be the best-marketed horror movie ever made. But it's so far from the scariest.

Oct 23, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Overpraised as the second coming of American Movie, what Anvil! The Story of Anvil lacks in documentary chops, it makes up for with warm, humane heavy-metal comedy.

Oct 17, 2009 - Nick Rogers

A flawless expansion of Maurice Sendak's story, "Where the Wild Things Are" is a film to treasure, discuss and lovingly revisit. One of the decade's best family films.

Oct 16, 2009 - Nick Rogers

"Trick 'r Treat" isn't the scariest horror movie of 2009, but it joins an elite crop of great ones ... although it was ready to go in 2007. Don't let that sway you.

Oct 15, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Although Management is not a romantic comedy worth prioritizing your time to see, it has the funniest, and most truthful, Joe Strummer-related one-liner of all time.

Oct 15, 2009 - Nick Rogers

If Neveldine/Taylor's films are to resemble video games, this one plays like the secret level embedded by a programmer after a frenzied weekend of mescaline.

Oct 15, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Whip It is a great sports movie, teen slice of life, daffy comedy and insightful drama. Toss in adrenaline-pumping roller-derby scenes, and you leave in an ecstatic rush.

Oct 1, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Despite overt pushiness with played-out indie-quirk elements, "Sunshine Cleaning" gets its brightest rays from a cast able to find natural nuance in their characters.

Sep 30, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Pandorum is a sci-fi horror flick that should be more eager to blow your mind with its developments in the last 10 minutes than numb your butt with the preceding 98.

Sep 29, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Surrogates mostly forgoes bombastic action for a shrewdly cautionary tale that nails the breathless rush of smart sci-fi and features a compelling turn by Bruce Willis.

Sep 28, 2009 - Nick Rogers

FlashForward lives up to potential as a hype-worthy pilot, but its rocketing pace will have to slacken a bit and let its characters breathe to live up to its Lost envy.

Sep 27, 2009 - Nick Rogers

HBO's new comedy doesn't debut as strongly as some of its contemporaries, but if it lets its premise breathe and its three leads bluster, it will soon join their ranks.

Sep 26, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Scuttled off by Fox Searchlight - even overdubbing is botched - "Miss March" shows glimmers of the Whitest Kids U'Know's cockeyed comedy, but is nothing worth pinning up.

Sep 25, 2009 - Nick Rogers

The spongeworthy "Seinfeld" reunion bit will come later. But the cringeworthy plot of the season premiere proves that it's wonderful to be trapped in eclectic Larry-land.

Sep 24, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Bruno Gehard lacks the fresh factor in Borat Sagdiyev's favor, but plotting the pranks does little to diminish their jollity in Sacha Baron Cohen's uproarious new comedy.

Sep 23, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Quentin Tarantino's best film since Pulp Fiction is packed with surprises, sly humor and swift consequential violence, and Christoph Waltz makes for a memorable menace.

Sep 22, 2009 - Nick Rogers

No better or worse than the three films preceding it, "Fast and Furious" is dumb fun that gives its protagonists room to let their strained partnership fester further.

Sep 21, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Who'd have thought, on the cusp of closing the Harry Potter franchise, that the films would be so deathly boring? Why, it's enough to make one long for Chris Columbus.

Sep 20, 2009 - Nick Rogers

This killer-kid horror film modulates its malevolence well thanks to a sturdy theme, an unnerving turn from Isabelle Fuhrman and one doozy of a late-film development.

Sep 19, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Snowbound thrillers rarely live up to potential ("30 Days of Night," the "Insomnia" remake), but "Whiteout" goes beneath them all. This is one of 2009's worst movies.

Sep 18, 2009 - Nick Rogers

After the empty-headed fun of two Crank films, Neveldine/Taylor power up with Gamer - sickening and savvy in its satirical spin on the plot of The Most Dangerous Game.

Sep 17, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Eerie old-time necromancy provides the only goosebumps to be found in a horror film filled with bad performances and constantly copping out with high-volume boo scares.

Sep 16, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Even established comics like X-Men took time to establish a sufficient origin story in film form. Push is written as though it's the second chapter in a boring saga.

Sep 16, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Lacking Office Space's relatable hell or Idiocracy's not-far-off lunacy, Mike Judge's Extract satirizes American ethics in a manner free of anger and, sadly, of laughs.

Sep 3, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Michael Mann is better than most when not at his best. His latest look at emotions betraying calculated crimes is unwieldy, but buoyed by strong themes and Johnny Depp.

Jul 1, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Cobbled together to go around a 2007 writers' strike, "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" junks the original's breezy, goofy fun for massive, oppressive military might.

Jun 23, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Aliens, Vikings and Jesus in the same film. OK, it's just Jim Caviezel, who played Jesus. But where Outlander should have a full-tilt crazy approach, it's instead leaden.

Jun 20, 2009 - Nick Rogers

"My Name is Bruce" won't give you sugar, baby. Not on its budget. But Splenda works fine as a substitute for this Kool-Aid, which Campbell knows fans will happily drink.

Jun 16, 2009 - Nick Rogers

"Toilets are always funny" may just become one of your everyday phrases after watching one of the more agreeably bizarre big-budget mainstream films to hit in some time

Jun 16, 2009 - Nick Rogers

While not the rampaging muckraker he could be, Oliver Stone puts forth quiet rage amid a towering tale of a Texan family whose trappings worked us all over

Jun 16, 2009 - Nick Rogers

It's been more than a decade since Tony Scott made a good movie. But this is "Deja Vu" all over again - somewhat entertaining, starring Denzel, ruined by idiotic action.

Jun 11, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Forget the overrated Spider-Man saga. This is the moviemaking Sam Raimi was built for - macabre, mirthful and manipulative in all the right ways. A wonderful horror film.

May 28, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Improving on "T3" with an involving intensity akin to "T2," this mammoth movie maintains momentum in action and plot and shows Sam Worthington might be bigger than Bale.

May 20, 2009 - Nick Rogers

A sluggish script and another waxen performance from Nicolas Cage prevent deep chills in Knowing, a thriller as aggressively moronic as it is aggressively apocalyptic.

Mar 22, 2009 - Nick Rogers

Like "Step Brothers," "Four Christmases" is a comedy about execrable expectations of American society. Unlike "Step Brothers," it's a dreary, pointless, offensive mess.

Nov 25, 2008 - Nick Rogers

Angelina Jolie's affecting performance and pitch-perfect period details lift Clint Eastwood's mostly riveting, occasionally leaden voyage into the Los Angeles underbelly.

Nov 25, 2008 - Nick Rogers