Articles by Cole Haddon

IN DEFENSE OF BEN AFFLECK: Can we ever forgive and forget Gigli?

10/18/2007 | By Cole Haddon

When one looks at the long career of Ben Affleck, in particular his resume as an alleged actor, it becomes clear that he is only famous for two reasons: His relationship with Matt Damon and, for a...[MORE]

A RAY OF LIGHT: Danny Boyle again proves perfection in the exception

7/26/2007 | By Cole Haddon

If there is a director working today who could save Hollywood from itself, that person is Danny Boyle. Probably best known for Trainspotting, his ode to heroin which, in 1996, became the British ans...[MORE]

GETTING TO THE HEART OF THE GALAXY: One fan's better appreciation of Star Wars

6/7/2007 | By Cole Haddon

On May 23, just days before the start of the Star Wars Celebration IV at the L.A. Convention Center, I attended a six-movie Star Wars marathon. The commemoration began with the screening of George L...[MORE]

DAZE OF THE DEAD: 75 years of flesh-eating fun

5/10/2007 | By Cole Haddon

Zombie movies have been around since 1932, when White Zombie, starring Bela Lugosi, first hit the big screen, and yet, after 75 years of exploiting the same basic idea, Hollywood and its internation...[MORE]

ROHMER REDUX: Chris Rock revisits Chloe in the Afternoon ... as a comedy

3/15/2007 | By Cole Haddon

Despite Chris Rock’s loud persona, his large, equally loud smile, or the way he paces back and forth across stage like a perpetual motion machine while being funny and, you know, loud, he’s actually...[MORE]

TOM CRUISE: DOES HE GLOW?: Our correspondent gets within striking distance

3/8/2007 | By Cole Haddon

It’s the third day of the Santa Barbara Film Festival and, any minute now, He will walk down the red carpet. Last night, Helen Mirren walked down this same red carpet, but, come on, does the Queen e...[MORE]

DEATH BY CLICHÉ: What we've learned from serial-killer movies

3/1/2007 | By Cole Haddon

With the recent release of Hannibal Rising and this week’s Zodiac — David Fincher’s ode to the men who became obsessed with identifying San Francisco’s Zodiac killer in the ’60s and ’70s — we though...[MORE]

GOLD-PLATED PENS: This year's slate of nominees for screenwriting Oscars is one of the best

2/22/2007 | By Cole Haddon

It’s hard to take seriously any institution that purports to be an awards show for the best of anything, like screenwriting, when it can’t even manage to nominate the best screenplay of any kind thi...[MORE]

ALTERNATE UNIVERSES: Marvel Comics is scraping the bottom of its character barrel with 'Ghost Rider,' but DC can't make hay out of its iconic characters

2/15/2007 | By Cole Haddon

Despite the fact that more Americans know the names of characters created by DC Comics (Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman), Marvel Comics, home of Spider-Man, the Hulk and X-Men, continues to own the c...[MORE]

THE MEDIOCRITY OF MANDY MOORE: Why, sometimes, it's good enough to be "good enough"

2/1/2007 | By Cole Haddon

Mandy Moore is one of the most mediocre entertainers working today. Contrary to the American ideal of striving for perfection, this is not necessarily bad. Being mediocre is underrated. On one en...[MORE]

IN DEFENSE OF RYAN REYNOLDS: Why can't this funny hunk catch a critical break?

1/25/2007 | By Cole Haddon

Ryan Reynolds presents a conundrum: Critics universally loathe every movie he’s been in while simultaneously regarding him as an exceptional comic actor who should already be a member of the A-list....[MORE]

FANTASTIC VOYAGE: Dakota Fanning doesn't get it

1/18/2007 | By Cole Haddon

Pan’s Labyrinth is collecting some of the strongest reviews of the awards season, but the movie — considered by many to be the front-runner for the Best Foreign Language film Oscar — is collecting w...[MORE]

HARD TO HANDLE

Feature | 4/20/2006 | By Cole Haddon

Just a month before the release of Shooter Jennings' sophomore album Electric Rodeo, inspiration struck in the middle of the night, so Jennings and his band, the .357s, went back into the studio to b...[MORE]

GROWING UP THE FAST WAY

Feature | 2/16/2006 | By Cole Haddon

Panic at the Disco guitarist Ryan Ross doesn't know where the hell he is. Somewhere in England, that much is certain. The sky is growing dark outside, even though he just woke up. It's been like this ...[MORE]

Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 10/9/2008

Jumper

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 2/21/2008

Jumper isn’t a comic-book movie, but it feels like one. The only problem is that its hero, David Rice (Hayden Christensen) — a guy who can teleport anywhere in the world — isn&rsq...[MORE]

Juno

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 12/20/2007

In Juno, Ellen Page plays feisty Juno MacGuff, an overly articulate teenage girl who discovers she’s preggers after having sex just once with her geeky maybe-boyfriend, Bleeker (Superbad&rsqu...[MORE]

Atonement

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 12/20/2007

This film is most interesting because it’s presented as the traditional British epic, complete with a foray into World War II (including what might be the most stunning Steadicam shot in movi...[MORE]

The Mist

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 11/22/2007

The premise of The Mist sounds silly: Small-town residents end up trapped inside a grocery store by a mysterious mist that they slowly realize is filled with freakish monsters not of this world. T...[MORE]

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 11/15/2007

It’s been six years and two movies since the Coen brothers directed a feature that didn’t embarrass the memory of everything else they’ve ever made, but, with No Country for Old M...[MORE]

Sleuth

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 11/8/2007

During a recent screening of the remake of Sleuth, numerous viewers were left laughing at more than one scene. Ultimately, this writer realized they, like him, were laughing not at the movie’...[MORE]

Fred Claus

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 11/8/2007

Fred Claus is the perfect example of how a great idea can be ruined by the most competent filmmakers. Let’s start with the idea: Santa has an estranged, underachieving older brother named Fr...[MORE]

Gone Baby Gone

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 10/18/2007

This film will receive a lot more scrutiny than most movies this autumn, if only because Ben “I used to spend all my waking hours giving the media a reason to hate me” Affleck directed i...[MORE]

The Darjeeling Limited

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 10/18/2007

Judging by his latest, The Darjeeling Limited, it appears that director Wes Anderson might have expended his considerable gifts on his previous movies. Since his debut, Bottle Rocket, and its foll...[MORE]

30 Days of Night

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 10/18/2007

There are few actors as annoying as Josh Hartnett, but apparently the key to getting a solid performance out of him is to not require him to speak – or at least speak very little. Like in 30 ...[MORE]

Lars and the Real Girl

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 10/11/2007

Movie studios crave word-of-mouth business as much as they do opening-weekend numbers, but that may be a problem with the charming Lars and the Real Girl, because this is how you might sound recomm...[MORE]

The Jane Austen Book Club

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 10/4/2007

Everything the recent faux-biopic Becoming Jane got wrong, The Jane Austen Book Club gets right by successfully marrying frothy romantic comedy, painful drama and a smart knowledge of the writer&r...[MORE]

In the Valley of Elah

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 9/20/2007

In the Valley of Elah is the first great movie about the stateside aftermath of the Iraq War and should be considered a companion piece to Hal Ashby’s post-Vietnam opus Coming Home. Howeve...[MORE]

Eastern Promises

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 9/20/2007

Eastern Promises proves two things: First, director David Cronenberg knows how to end a movie better than just about anybody else in the business and, second, Viggo Mortensen is the greatest Amer...[MORE]

Shoot 'Em Up

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 9/6/2007

Shoot ’Em Up is a wildly stylized B-film that draws heavily upon influences like the spaghetti Western, Hong Kong cinema and even Frank Miller’s comic-book series Sin City. But never once does it take...[MORE]

3:10 to Yuma

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 9/6/2007

Critics love to unfairly compare movie remakes to their source material, whether that material be literature or movies made in the recent and not-so-recent past. 3:10 to Yuma probably won’t have to de...[MORE]

The Nanny Diaries

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 8/23/2007

An adaptation of the best-selling novel about a directionless recent college grad who spends a summer nannying for a Manhattan couple, The Nanny Diaries is ultimately undone by an undeveloped lead cha...[MORE]

Rush Hour 3

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 8/9/2007

Brett Ratner began his feature-film career as quite possibly one of the worst directors to come out of the ‘90s; he was (and is) the complete opposite of the indie rebels who took over Hollywood aroun...[MORE]

El Cantante

Film review: by Cole Haddon | 8/2/2007

It’s a shame that most people will want to bring up Jennifer Lopez when they talk about El Cantante, because it’s her husband, Marc Anthony, who’s the real star here. As salsa pioneer Hector Lavoe, An...[MORE]