Robert Downey Jr.

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Review: Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

A new game is afoot in director Guy Ritchie's return to the world of Sherlock Holmes, but Robert Downey Jr.'s first outing as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's famed sleuth puts Shadows in the shade.
Guy Ritchie's return to the world of Sherlock Holmes
By BRETT MICHEL | December 16, 2011

Review: Due Date

Phillips, Downey, Galifianakis just barely deliver
Phillips, Downey, Galifianakis just barely deliver
By TOM MEEK | November 05, 2010

Review: Iron Man 2

Maybe I’m just relieved that it wasn’t in 3-D, or maybe actor Justin Theroux (frequent David Lynch collaborator and co-scripter of Tropic Thunder ) is just a better writer than the law firm of scribes that pasted together the original, but Jon Favreau’s
Stark alternatives
By PETER KEOUGH | May 07, 2010

Silly season

Now that the Oscars are over, let's get dumb.
Spring pimps for summer
By PETER KEOUGH | March 12, 2010

Review: Sherlock Holmes

In its own way an ideal holiday blockbuster for the moderately educated, the new light-footed overhaul of Sherlock Holmes is three parts self-satisfied mixer to one part hard storytelling, and if anything, the film's popular trailers should have deterred
Boys will be boys
By MICHAEL ATKINSON | December 25, 2009

Review: Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2

Comic-book games are all about wish-fulfillment: What comic book fan hasn't dreamed of laying the telekinetic smack down Dark Phoenix-style, or flinging a few of Gambit's explosive cards?
Marvel's "Secret War" comes to consoles
By MADDY MYERS | October 02, 2009

Review: Fighting

Call this a guide to recognizing your sophomore slump. Dito Montiel won the Directing Award at Sundance with his autobiographical 2006 debut, A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints , but that film had Robert Downey Jr. and Chazz Palminteri.
He’s a muscle-bound clod and she’s a vapid cliché
By DAVID WILDMAN | May 01, 2009

Interview: James Toback

"Eventually, I think Mike should work with kids who have backgrounds similar to his, because he'd be great with them. They'd look up to him."
Sparring over Tyson
By PETER KEOUGH | May 01, 2009

Review: The Soloist

A small, real-life drama about a homeless musical genius set in the urban present.
Troubled reporter meets homeless musical genius
By TOM MEEK | April 24, 2009

Martyr complex

This year the Oscars will honor the men who suffer for our sins and the women who don't wear make-up.
Oscar suffers for our sins
By PETER KEOUGH | January 13, 2009

Wish-fulfillment for a burning world

From the shining big-screen debut of Iron Man to the large amounts of green produced by the Incredible Hulk, this was the year the public couldn't get enough of their favorite heroes.
The 2008 heroic holiday DVD and Blu-ray gift guide
By BRETT MICHEL | December 08, 2008

Autumn peeves

With pundits already reading political significance into summer blockbusters like The Dark Knight (“Is Batman a stand-in for George Bush? Discuss.”), the meatier movies of fall arrive not a moment too soon.
Films with a full agenda
By PETER KEOUGH | September 08, 2008

Please shut up!

How can we miss you if you won’t go away?
Our salute to a few of the most obnoxious people of the week
By PHILLIPE AND JORGE | July 16, 2008

Our superheroes, ourselves

Is there a breed of person more tenderly optimistic, more winsomely hopeful for the best, more loyal to the possibility of good, than the American summer moviegoer?
What the current crop of comic-book action movies tells us about America's identity crisis
By JAMES PARKER | July 09, 2008

Spring brakes

Funny how spring movies can mirror the options of spring break.
Spring Arts Preview: Some diversions before the summer onslaught
By PETER KEOUGH | March 10, 2008

Charlie Bartlett

Yelchin can claim a breakthrough, and Hope Davis adds sass as Charlie’s pill-popping mom.
A rich kid on the road to comeuppance
By TOM MEEK | February 20, 2008

The Boston Phoenix–Alumni Film Critics’ Poll

It’s true, the Boston Phoenix has never won an Oscar.
Our first-ever round-up of the past year’s best movies, with a little help from our friends
By PHOENIX STAFF | February 13, 2008

Straight outta Kafka

We want to get into the shower and not emerge until November 2008.
The Bushies’ enthusiasm for torture is indefensible
By PHILLIPE AND JORGE | July 25, 2007

Doing time

It's not so much about killing as it is about time. Horror scope: Robert Graysmith’s Zodiac obsession. By Peter Keough
Fincher kills it without frills in Zodiac
By PETER KEOUGH | February 28, 2007

Clean and sober

Slow week in Reality Land. Yes, there was the premiere of Season #2 of The Hills , but what can you say about The Hills ?
The Hills , Shooting Sizemore , and more from The Apprentice: LA and I’m from Rolling Stone
By JAMES PARKER | January 23, 2007

Fractured fairy tales

Times are tough when the Dream Factory has a better grip on what’s going on than the people in Washington.
Fantasy and reality compete for the box office in 2007
By PETER KEOUGH | December 28, 2006

Fake Fur

It had to happen, sooner or later: a bio-pic of Diane Arbus, photographer goddess of the alternate America, doyenne of the somber freakout, selfless voyager into the unorthodox. Watch the trailer for Fur (QuickTime)
Steven Shainberg makes over Diane Arbus
By MICHAEL ATKINSON | November 15, 2006

A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints

At the outset of Dito Montiel’s adaptation of his own memoir, we meet Dito (Robert Downey Jr.) in LA in 2005 as he reads from his “wonderful book.” Watch the trailer for A Guid to Recognizing Your Saints (QuickTime)
The familiar story of a neighborhood kid
By PETER KEOUGH | October 11, 2006

Fall back

If you cannot remember the past, so Santayana said, you’re condemned to repeat it. Watch trailers for this fall's new releases.
This season, Hollywood lives in the past
By PETER KEOUGH | September 13, 2006

Fest or famine?

Women filmmakers dominate this year’s festival, and an unflinching honesty marks their movies.
This year’s Boston Film Festival has a woman’s touch
By PETER KEOUGH | September 08, 2006

Route 666

This article originally appeared in the August 26, 1994 issue of the Boston Phoenix .
Natural Born Killers is Oliver Stone's comic debut
By PETER KEOUGH | August 10, 2006

Patty Larceny

When I started off on the "summer of schlubs," I made a couple of rules.
The career of Patricia Clarkson
By RYAN STEWART | July 06, 2006

Scanner brained

In 1977, in his novel A Scanner Darkly , Philip K. Dick invented the perfect drug — at least from society’s point of view. True Dick?: Looking for fidelity to the cyber-punk master. By James Parker
Richard Linklater animates Philip K. Dick’s Darkly
By PETER KEOUGH | July 06, 2006

Apocalypse now and then

With Snakes on a Plane and World Trade Center opening on the same day, this summer won’t be offering the usual escapist fare.
Doom, damnation, and other summer fun
By PETER KEOUGH | May 03, 2006

The Shaggy Dog

Dave Douglas (Tim Allen, who as the Santa Clause series attests is adept at these family shape-shifting comedies) is an LA deputy DA prosecuting an animal-rights activist for setting fire to a biotech company’s lab.
Tim Allen marks his cinematic territory
By TOM MEEK | March 08, 2006

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