Die Hard (1988) Review
Bruce Willis, Alan Rickman as god-tier Hans Gruber, and one perfect Christmas Eve at Nakatomi Plaza. The rating is not negotiable.
Genre: Thriller (Page 14)
ActionDie Hard 2 (1990) Review
Renny Harlin takes McClane to Dulles Airport on Christmas Eve for the twistiest entry in the franchise. The 8 reflects what the rewatch test has confirmed: the film is genuinely twisty, the action sequences land, the Christmas-Eve airport setting works,…
ActionDie Hard with a Vengeance (1995)
Jackson, John McTiernan returns to direct, Jeremy Irons as Hans Gruber's brother. It is the best Die Hard sequel and the closest the franchise ever came to matching the original.
ActionLive Free or Die Hard (2007) Review
The film is held back from a 9.5 or 10 by the studio's decision to cut the theatrical release to PG-13 and by the inevitable franchise-fatigue cost of being the fourth entry. Olyphant's Thomas Gabriel is the franchise's third great…
ActionTotal Recall (2012) Review
Critics judged Wiseman's 2012 Total Recall against the wrong reference film. The 1990 and 2012 versions of Total Recall are different films, not competing films.
Artificial IntelligenceFutureworld (1976) – Review
Futureworld (1976) earns its 7 as a lean 1970s paranoid thriller. Cheesy, dated, and genuinely unsettling.
Artificial IntelligenceWestworld Series – Review
Westworld Season 1 is near-perfect science fiction television. The other three seasons are a masterclass in how prestige TV destroys itself.
RomanceThe Adjustment Bureau (2011) Review
The Adjustment Bureau earns its 9 by doing something most high-concept films fail at completely: it makes the concept personal without letting the concept. The idea, that a bureaucracy of angelic agents manages human fate, adjusting events whenever people deviate…
Artificial IntelligenceEx Machina (2014) Review
Garland built Ex Machina to be precise, controlled, and unsettling in a register that keeps the audience at analytical distance instead of pulling them into emotional investment. The performances are strong.
DetectiveMinority Report (2002) Review
Minority Report is a Spielberg film arguing against surveillance and predictive control while being too Spielberg to commit fully to the darkness its premise requires. Dick's source material was about the arbitrary nature of certainty, and Spielberg captures that element…
AdventureThe Abyss (1989) Review
The production achievement of The Abyss is extraordinary even by Cameron's standards. The Deepcore rig is a superbly designed setting, confined, functional, full of the specific texture of working machinery that Cameron consistently brings to his industrial environments.
ActionTotal Recall (1990) Review
Total Recall is one of the great entertainments in science fiction cinema, and its pleasures are specific instead of generic. The women around him are sharply written and sharply performed.