When Marlon Wayans was a kid in New York City, he lived down the street from a plant that printed Mad magazine. He and his brothers would read copies for free, savoring the vicious wit of the movie parodies. Years later, he became the co-creator of a series of successful parody movies in the same vein, from “Scary Movie” and “Dance Flick” to his latest, “A Haunted House.” Read More

“Zero Dark Thirty” is extraordinary not because it’s about the hunt for Osama bin Laden, but because Oscar-winning director Kathryn Bigelow uses the subject to examine related, and equally important, topics. In another filmmaker’s hands, the movie would likely have been something to tolerate during awards season before being forgotten. Yet Bigelow has created the best film of 2012. Read More

As its redemptive hero toils on a chain gang, traverses a mountain, trudges through sewers and enters a revolutionary barricade, (among other intense trials), the movie musical “Les Miserables” is a zero-subtlety spectacle for the Occupy age and the current Oscar-campaign climes. But it also is a risk-taking and frequently affecting movie that sings its not entirely artificial heart out. Read More

Outrageously talented writer-director Quentin Tarantino has made  tightly constructed, polished films as well as outrageously diverging works of near-insanity. He also is a brilliant critic, somewhat like Jean-Luc Godard, making movies about movies and deconstructing them in endlessly inventive ways. Even Godard hit rough patches. With “Django Unchained,” opening Tuesday, Tarantino takes a small story and turns it into a big sprawl, and the fit isn’t quite right. The movie’s points are so broad — slavery is bad, movies never show it — they almost drift by unnoticed. Read More