The Last Airbender / M. Night Shyamalan 7/30/10 In adapting a popular Nickelodeon cartoon, Shyamalan plays to all his worst tendencies while downplaying or outright ignoring his strengths. The chief offense and the wellspring that allows all the film’s other flaws to flower is, sadly, that tendency towards deliberateness which has defined Shyamalan’s style since he began. Steve Carlson
Predators / Nimrod Antal 7/30/10 Antal keeps the Predator in the background for a long time. That’s a double-edged sword, though. While we get to spend time with our wisecracking characters, we all know where the story’s going, which cuts the suspense down. But the movie isn’t in the scare business. Rather, “Predators” is about 80% fan service, consisting mostly of callbacks to the original. Matt Lynch
[Rec] 2 / Jaume Balaguero & Paco Plaza 7/30/10 Balagueró and Plaza take the religious subtext of the first film and run with it, effectively blending the zombie and exorcism sub-genres. Unfortunately, the duo have long since used up their bag of stylistic tricks and proceed to offer a whole lot of editing between different cameras, breaking the momentum which carried the first film. Mike Maguire
Toy Story 3 / Lee Unkrich 7/23/10 For a company that built a reputation as the makers of the best family films in the business, Pixar are working awful hard at dropping that word “family” and laying claim to making the best films in the business. The delightful “Toy Story 3,” helmed by longtime company stalwart Lee Unkrich, is no exception, hitting staggering highs nearly unheard of in a third franchise installment. Steve Carlson
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The Last Mistress (2007) / Catherine Breillat 7/7/10 Breillat shakes up period melodrama with postmodern feminism and sexual provocation—and the latter allows her to subvert another period cliché, filling the frame with more flesh than cloth. Sam C. Mac
The Thing (1982) / John Carpenter 4/18/10
It all comes to vivid life thanks to Carpenter’s distinctive style. Shots of expansive gray skies and daunting miles of white arctic tundra create an unsettling tone for this nightmare, one unfolding thousands of miles from civilization. Brendan Peterson
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Breathless (1960) / Jean-Luc Godard 6/29/10
Godard can get away with reinterpreting 30s gangster pictures and 40s noir cinema as a desperate, tragic waste because his Michel is such a profligate and disconcerting presence, so unconcerned with getting caught. Calum Reed
Inception / Christopher Nolan 7/23/10 While not the masterpiece some have claimed it to be, “Inception” is a thrilling genre piece masking a dynamic character study. It successfully merges spectacle with feeling, creating a lasting vision of a man living on the razor's edge of his own reality. And as he did in "Shutter Island," DiCaprio brilliantly personifies this type of ravaging human dilemma. Glenn Heath, Jr.
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