Roger Elbert
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- DirectorPeter WeirStarsJim CarreyEd HarrisLaura LinneyAn insurance salesman discovers his whole life is actually a reality TV show.Giving the film a perfect four star score, Roger Ebert compared it to Forrest Gump, claiming that the film had a right balance of comedy and drama. He was also impressed with Jim Carrey's dramatic performance.
- DirectorMick JacksonStarsKevin CostnerWhitney HoustonGary KempA former Secret Service agent takes on the job of bodyguard to an R&B singer, whose lifestyle is most unlike a President's.Roger Ebert, who gave the film three out of four stars, remarking "The movie does contain a love story, but it's the kind of guarded passion that grows between two people who spend a lot of time keeping their priorities straight."
- DirectorNeil JordanStarsStephen ReaJaye DavidsonForest WhitakerA British soldier kidnapped by the IRA soon befriends one of his captors, who then becomes drawn into the soldier's world.The Crying Game received worldwide acclaim from critics. Roger Ebert gave the film a four-star rating and described it as one that "involves us deeply in the story, and then it reveals that the story is really about something else altogether."
- DirectorJohn HillcoatStarsViggo MortensenCharlize TheronKodi Smit-McPheeIn a dangerous post-apocalyptic world, an ailing father defends his son as they slowly travel to the sea.Roger Ebert awarded the film 3.5 out of 4 stars, praising Mortensen and Smit-McPhee's work, but he did criticize the film for not being as powerful as the book.
- DirectorMichael RadfordStarsJohn HurtRichard BurtonSuzanna HamiltonIn a totalitarian future society, a man, whose daily work is re-writing history, tries to rebel by falling in love.Roger Ebert awarded the film 3.5/4 stars, writing that it "penetrates much more deeply into the novel's heart of darkness" than previous adaptations, and describing Hurt as "the perfect Winston Smith."
- DirectorJohn HillcoatStarsRay WinstoneGuy PearceEmily WatsonA lawman apprehends a notorious outlaw and gives him nine days to kill his older brother, or else they'll execute his younger brother.Roger Ebert, giving it 4 out of a possible 4 stars, described the film as "A movie you cannot turn away from; it is so pitiless and uncompromising, so filled with pathos and disregarded innocence, that it is a record of those things we pray to be delivered from.
- DirectorSteven SpielbergStarsRichard DreyfussFrançois TruffautTeri GarrRoy Neary, an Indiana electric lineman, finds his quiet and ordinary daily life turned upside down after a close encounter with a UFO, spurring him to an obsessed cross-country quest for answers as a momentous event approaches.Roger Ebert "thought the original film was an astonishing achievement, capturing the feeling of awe and wonder we have when considering the likelihood of life beyond the Earth. ... This new version ... is, quite simply, a better film ... Why didn't Spielberg make it this good the first time?
- DirectorRobert ZemeckisStarsJodie FosterMatthew McConaugheyTom SkerrittDr. Ellie Arroway, after years of searching, finds conclusive radio proof of extraterrestrial intelligence, sending plans for a mysterious machine.Roger Ebert gave a largely positive review, believing that Contact was on par with Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) as Hollywood's most cinematic study of extraterrestrial life. "Movies like Contact help explain why movies like Independence Day leave me feeling empty and unsatisfied," Ebert commented.
On December 21, 2011, Ebert added Contact to his Great Movies collection. - DirectorAlex ProyasStarsRufus SewellKiefer SutherlandJennifer ConnellyA man struggles with memories of his past, which include a wife he cannot remember and a nightmarish world no one else ever seems to wake up from.Roger Ebert writing in the Chicago Sun-Times called it a "great visionary achievement," while also exclaiming that it was "a film so original and exciting, it stirred my imagination like Metropolis and 2001: A Space Odyssey."
- DirectorHarold RamisStarsBill MurrayAndie MacDowellChris ElliottA narcissistic, self-centered weatherman finds himself in a time loop on Groundhog Day.Roger Ebert revisited it in his "Great Movies" series. After giving it a three-star rating in his original review, Ebert acknowledged in his "Great Movies" essay that, like many viewers, he had initially underestimated the film's many virtues and only came to truly appreciate it through repeated viewings.
- DirectorJohn BadhamStarsMatthew BroderickAlly SheedyJohn WoodA young man finds a back door into a military central computer in which reality is confused with game-playing, possibly starting World War III.Film critic Roger Ebert gave the film four out of four stars, calling it "an amazingly entertaining thriller" and "one of the best films so far this year", with a "wonderful" ending.
- DirectorBlake EdwardsStarsDudley MooreBo DerekJulie AndrewsA Hollywood composer goes through a mid-life crisis and becomes infatuated with a sexy, newly married woman.
- DirectorJames BridgesStarsMichael J. FoxKiefer SutherlandPhoebe CatesA disillusioned young writer living in New York City turns to drugs and drinking to block out the memories of his dead mother and estranged wife.
- DirectorClint EastwoodStarsClint EastwoodJeff FaheyCharlotte CornwellA thinly fictionalized account of a legendary movie director, whose desire to hunt down an animal turns into a grim situation with his movie crew in Africa.
- DirectorJoel SchumacherStarsKiefer SutherlandKevin BaconJulia RobertsFive medical students experiment with "near death" experiences, until the dark consequences of past tragedies begin to jeopardize their lives.
- DirectorCurtis HansonStarsMichael DouglasTobey MaguireFrances McDormandAn English Professor tries to deal with his wife leaving him, the arrival of his editor who has been waiting for his book for seven years, and the various problems that his friends and associates involve him in.
- DirectorFrank MarshallStarsPaul WalkerJason BiggsBruce GreenwoodBrutal cold forces two Antarctic explorers to leave their team of sled dogs behind as they fend for their survival.
- DirectorFrank MarshallStarsJeff DanielsJulian SandsJohn GoodmanA new species of South American killer spider hitches a lift to a small California town in a coffin and starts to breed, leaving a trail of deaths that puzzle and terrify the young doctor newly arrived in town with his family.
- DirectorMartin ScorseseStarsGriffin DunneRosanna ArquetteVerna BloomAn ordinary word processor has the worst night of his life after he agrees to visit a girl in Soho he met that evening at a coffee shop.
- DirectorMike FiggisStarsNicolas CageElisabeth ShueJulian SandsBen Sanderson, a Hollywood screenwriter who lost everything because of his alcoholism, arrives in Las Vegas to drink himself to death. There, he meets and forms an uneasy friendship and non-interference pact with prostitute Sera.
- DirectorTaylor HackfordStarsMeg RyanRussell CroweDavid MorseAlice hires a professional negotiator to obtain the release of her engineer husband, who has been kidnapped by anti-government guerrillas in South America.
- DirectorHampton FancherStarsOwen WilsonSheryl CrowDwight YoakamAimless Vann Siegert takes a bizarre turn in life and becomes a serial killer, tracking down the miserable, the self-destructive and those who otherwise seem willing to die.
- DirectorSydney PollackStarsPaul NewmanSally FieldBob BalabanWhen a prosecutor leaks to a Miami reporter that a liquor wholesaler is suspected in the murder of a union head, the man's life begins to unravel.
- DirectorAntonio CamposStarsRebecca HallMichael C. HallTracy LettsThe story of Christine Chubbuck, a 1970s TV reporter struggling with depression and professional frustrations as she tries to advance her career.
- DirectorStephen FingletonStarsMartin McCannMia GothOlwen FouéréIn a time of starvation, a survivalist lives off a small plot of land hidden deep in forest. When two women seeking food and shelter discover his farm, he finds his existence threatened.
- DirectorLee TamahoriStarsAnthony HopkinsAlec BaldwinElle MacphersonAn intellectual billionaire and two other men struggle to band together and survive after getting stranded in the Alaskan wilderness with a blood-thirsty Kodiak Bear hunting them down.
- DirectorAna Lily AmirpourStarsSheila VandArash MarandiMarshall ManeshIn the Iranian ghost-town Bad City, a place that reeks of death and loneliness, the townspeople are unaware they are being stalked by a lonesome vampire.
- DirectorJohn MackenzieStarsMichael CaineRichard GereBob HoskinsDuring the Dirty War, a half-English doctor in Argentina befriends the police, the rebels and the alcoholic Honorary British Consul, whose Latino wife he seduces. When the consul is mistakenly kidnapped by the rebels, he must pick a side.
- DirectorTarsem SinghStarsJennifer LopezVince VaughnVincent D'OnofrioAn F.B.I. Agent persuades a social worker, who is adept with a new experimental technology, to enter the mind of a comatose serial killer in order to learn where he has hidden his latest kidnap victim.
- DirectorRichard MarquandStarsJeff BridgesGlenn ClosePeter CoyoteA wealthy woman is murdered in her beach house. The husband is allegedly knocked out first. He inherits all. He has a female ex criminal prosecutor represent him in court.
- DirectorBrad AndersonStarsMarisa TomeiVincent D'OnofrioHolland TaylorNew Yorker Ruby Weaver believes she has found the man of her dreams in Sam Deed, who is her best catch in some time--except that he assures her that he came from the future.
- DirectorJane CampionStarsHolly HunterHarvey KeitelSam NeillIn the mid-19th century a mute woman is sent to New Zealand along with her young daughter and prized piano for an arranged marriage to a farmer, but is soon lusted after by a farm worker."The Piano is as peculiar and haunting as any film I've seen" and "It is one of those rare movies that is not just about a story, or some characters, but about a whole universe of feeling"