Word: critics
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...Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries). In past decades, to please consumers in the U.S.--PDVSA's biggest market, which buys two-thirds of its exports--Venezuela often ignored OPEC's guidelines, stepping up production even when oil prices hit rock bottom in the late 1990s. But Chavez, a harsh critic of the U.S. who accuses the Bush Administration of backing a failed coup against him in 2002--a charge the White House denies--has led a successful campaign to revive a demoralized OPEC, curtailing Venezuelan production to gain what Rodriguez calls "fairer prices...
...film of all time in the U.S. Spider-Man 2 has set records of its own: it reached the $200 million mark for domestic box office in just eight days. These two sequels - and the third Harry Potter movie, The Prisoner of Azkaban - have also received the blessing of critics, some saying the projects are better the second or third time around. Everything old is gold again. Is this good news or bad? Does sequelmania provide evidence of a pop culture that has discovered a savory supply of renourishment or a culture that is simply feeding on itself? Indeed, does...
...easy to see why the Shrek and Spider-Man sequels earned the critic's vote: they are action films turned into relationship movies, with the ogre and the college boy trying to be normal while coping with their unique outsider status. Peter, having faced geek tragedy in the first episode, now considers early retirement. Believing that he can't both save the world and get the girl, he tosses away his costume and renounces his arachno-essence. It takes a woman's love to convince him that his mask doesn't disguise his identity; it is his identity...
...here the relative freedom a sequel can bring. The first film in a series is like an awkward first date. Once they are past the getting-to-know-you stage, writers can flesh out characters they could only sketch in the initial film. Any critic could name a fistful of follow-ups that outshone originals: The Bride of Frankenstein; The Good, the Bad and the Ugly; The Road Warrior; Aliens; Batman Returns. In TV, improving with age is the norm: a good sitcom, whether Mary Tyler Moore or South Park, ripens in its third or fourth season. Films used...
This is serious material, and you cannot blame serious filmmakers--the movie was written by Jay Cocks (formerly a TIME critic) and directed by Irwin Winkler, producer of some of the best movies (Raging Bull, The Right Stuff) of recent times--for being seduced by it. But something goes terribly wrong in the execution. Kline suggests Porter's intractable snootiness but none of his perpetually boyish elan. Judd mostly simpers. The Porters had, it seems, a marriage of inconvenience, leavened in the movie by glam settings, the irrelevant appearances of famous people and, of course, the tunes Porter is occasionally...