Arts & Entertainment

Movie Reviews: 'Gravity,' 'Captain Phillips,' 'Machete Kills,' and More

Movie reviews and movie times for theaters in Cedar Falls, including, "Don Jon," "Prisoners" and "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2." Let Patch help you decide what you're going to see this weekend.

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Gravity

Reviews:

Slant Magazine: Alfonso Cuarón's triumph is an invigoratingly clean, elegant display of action choreography, a La Région Centrale you can still take grandma to see.Full Review

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NPR: Cuaron and his son Jonas have felt the need not just to come up with ways to keep the characters talking — there's even a mildly sneery reference to NPR at one point — but to brush in backstory and motivation, quite as if the peril of being isolated in space with a limited supply of oxygen weren't sufficient rationale for the characters' actions. Full Review

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Captain Phillips

Reviews:

Slant Magazine: It works too hard to keep matters on an even, we're-all-more-alike-than-different keel, which is just one part of its chief problem of forcefully conveying information and intent.Full Review

New York Magazine: It’s when the Somalis spirit Phillips away in a closed lifeboat that Captain Phillips becomes a great thriller, in part because Barry Ackroyd’s camera is stuck inside with the characters and its jitters finally seem earned. Full Review

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Machete Kills
Reviews: Not Yet Available.

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Don Jon
Reviews:

Claudia Puig, USA Today: Johansson gives one of her best performances as the bossy, gum-chewing Jersey girl determined to change Jon into her image of a romantic hero. Tony Danza and Glenne Headly are hilarious as Jon's parents. Gordon-Levitt proves he can act, write and direct with equal dexterity. Full Review

David Edelstein, New York Magazine (Vulture): The movie is a broad ethnic comedy, but there’s nothing broad about the wicked-smart way it’s executed. Full Review

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Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2

Sandie Angulo Chen, Moviefone: "With the original, I was too upset that it was nothing like the classic children's book I loved reading to my children to give into the clever story line. But now that I know not to expect an adaptation at all, I was able to enjoy the sequel and think parents will feel for Mr. Lockwood as he tries to help his son Flint, and let's be clear, those little food-animals are just too cute to resist." Full review.

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Prisoners


Reviews

The New Yorker - Prisoners, despite its gathering anxiety, has some of the pleasures of ordinary thrillers. But Villeneuve, who previously directed “Incendies,” does volatile scenes without exaggeration; parts of the movie are exceedingly violent, though the violence isn’t “fun”— it makes you wince. Full Review

The Guardian - In his first English language film, Quebeçois director Denis Villeneuve has produced a masterful thriller that is also an engrossing study of a smalltown America battered by recession, fear and the unrelenting elements. Full Review

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Insidious: Chapter 2

Reviews

Can we just say this about director James Wan? If you like horror films and you notice he’s directed a horror film, make the investment and see it.

Wan helmed 2010′s “Insidious,” a movie that cost $1.5 million to make and went on to earn over $97 million — and it wasn’t just because of a clever marketing campaign. The guy knows how to manipulate a horror audience. And so, here we are with “Insidious: Chapter 2.” - ABCNews Full Review

With his last helping of old-fashioned ooga booga, “The Conjuring,” still scaring up business in a few hundred theaters, James Wanreturns with two more hours of seat-clenching scares in “Insidious: Chapter 2,” a modestly scaled and highly pleasurable sequel to Wan’s low-budget ($1.5 million) 2011 smash that should have genre fans begging for thirds. Indeed, with a clever coda that suggests how this franchise might easily continue even without. - Variety.com See Full Review

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We're The Millers

"Though the cast partially eschews the family-friendly timidity that the film defers to in the end, this would-be wild thing remains little more than a rowdy endorsement of the status quo." Chris Cabin, Slant Magazine. Full Review

"Get past the comedy and there's something almost weird at the movie's core - a deep cynicism about family and a longing for family, both at the same time." Mike LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle. Full Review

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Any of these spark your interest? College Square in Cedar Falls will be showing all these flicks. Showtimes and ticket cost can be found on the theater's website.

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