Bad Movie

HE’S JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU (HBO on Comcast) An adaptation of the 2004 single-gal self-help book that’s enjoyable multiplex comfort food for most of its running time, but that eventually caves in to the need for closure and corn. Starring Ginnifer Goodwin, Jennifer Aniston, Jennifer Connelly, Drew Barrymore, Scarlett Johansson, Ben Affleck, and Justin Long. (PG-13; runs through Feb. 28) TY BURR FARGO (Comcast Movies: All Movies) Joel and Ethan Coen deliver a film that plays like “Lake Wobegon’’ meets “In Cold Blood.’’ It’s both scary and hilarious as Frances...

HE’S JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU (HBO on Comcast) An adaptation of the 2004 single-gal self-help book that’s enjoyable multiplex comfort food for most of its running time, but that eventually caves in to the need for closure and corn. Starring Ginnifer Goodwin, Jennifer Aniston, Jennifer Connelly, Drew Barrymore, Scarlett Johansson, Ben Affleck, and Justin Long. (PG-13; runs through Feb. 28) TY BURR FARGO (Comcast Movies: All Movies) Joel and Ethan Coen deliver a film that plays like “Lake Wobegon’’ meets “In Cold Blood.’’ It’s both scary and hilarious as Frances...

NEW YORK -- Joel Siegel, a longtime movie critic for WABC-TV and "Good Morning America" who won five New York Emmy Awards for his insightful work, died yesterday, the television station said. He was 63. The station said Mr. Siegel, who was famous for his weekly reviews, had been battling colon cancer. "Joel was an important part of ABC News, and we will miss him," ABC News President David Westin said in a press release. "He was a brilliant reviewer and a great reporter. But much more, he was our dear friend and colleague.

NEW YORK -- Joel Siegel, a longtime movie critic for WABC-TV and "Good Morning America" who won five New York Emmy Awards for his insightful work, died yesterday, the television station said. He was 63. The station said Mr. Siegel, who was famous for his weekly reviews, had been battling colon cancer. "Joel was an important part of ABC News, and we will miss him," ABC News President David Westin said in a press release. "He was a brilliant reviewer and a great reporter. But much more, he was our dear friend and colleague.

Dig deep down into some bad movies and you occasionally find a good idea at the center. "Civic Duty" isn't one of those movies. Still, dig deep enough into this particular bad movie, past its bad central idea, and there's a good impulse here: to call attention to post-9/11 anti-Muslim paranoia. You can even see how a lugubrious psychological thriller like this might actually pull it off, if it hadn't been overdirected into the ground. Throwing a change-up after years of "Six Feet Under ," star and co-producer Peter Krause bears some of the blame, but writer Andrew Joiner and director...

Just because film critics are supposed to be dispassionate, don't think we can't get movie crushes like everyone else. I'll never forget the liberating shock I experienced when a beloved college film professor, an august and intimidating mentor, admitted to his abiding jones for the oeuvre of Angie Dickinson. This has nothing to do with acting skill and everything to do with the allure that hits one's personal fan-boy sweet spot. In that spirit, allow me to come out of the closet and confess that I would happily pay cash money to watch Ashley Judd read hog reports.

"All people in the world, even I, I prefer a bad American movie to a better Norwegian movie. Why is that? It's something which I am trying to study but I have not been successful. I don't know, I have no answer. " Jean-Luc Godard , interview , The Boston Globe, Dec. 28, 2004

The crime of 3-D is that, with a bad movie, the technology holds you hostage. It’s inexplicable why you have to wear the glasses, which, honestly, start to hurt a little. They always do, but when you don’t need them the indignity hurts even more. I watched at least a quarter of “My Soul to Take,’’ the worst horror movie Wes Craven’s made perhaps ever, with the glasses off. It was shot — and is available — in a standard format, and, like many conversions, the 3-D gimmick is like watching a movie through an ashtray.

Came a time, saith the old tales, when the great ice sheets retreated and early man advanced upon the earth — a new man, named Homo Hollywoodus for the stylishness of his dreadlocks (extensions by Trog) and for the perfection of the teeth of his women (caps by Dr. Gnar of Beverly Hills). And, lo, these new people did hunt the woolly mammoth and the ‘‘spear-toothed’’ tiger and did follow much too closely the plot laid down by the great shaman Mel Gibson in ‘‘Apocalypto.’’ And they did call this new movie ‘‘10,000 B.C.,’’ and it was awfully dopey but also kind of fun. ...

To the Hellspawn ranks of Damien, Rosemary’s baby, Rhoda “Bad Seed’’ Penmark, and the Olsen twins, let us now add the title character of “Orphan.’’ Her name is Esther, which sounds about as scary as your bubbe, but as played by the very serious young actress Isabelle Fuhrman she’s a prim little psycho with a taste for cutlery and an accent out of downtown Transylvania. The movie has already come under heavy fire from the national adoption community as the absolute worst PR a foster child could ever have, and correctly so: As a concept, “Orphan’’ is reprehensible.

Dig deep down into some bad movies and you occasionally find a good idea at the center. "Civic Duty" isn't one of those movies. Still, dig deep enough into this particular bad movie, past its bad central idea, and there's a good impulse here: to call attention to post-9/11 anti-Muslim paranoia. You can even see how a lugubrious psychological thriller like this might actually pull it off, if it hadn't been overdirected into the ground. Throwing a change-up after years of "Six Feet Under ," star and co-producer Peter Krause bears some of the blame, but writer Andrew Joiner and director...

Just because film critics are supposed to be dispassionate, don't think we can't get movie crushes like everyone else. I'll never forget the liberating shock I experienced when a beloved college film professor, an august and intimidating mentor, admitted to his abiding jones for the oeuvre of Angie Dickinson. This has nothing to do with acting skill and everything to do with the allure that hits one's personal fan-boy sweet spot. In that spirit, allow me to come out of the closet and confess that I would happily pay cash money to watch Ashley Judd read hog reports.