Howard Hawks’ name next to any project is sufficient to interest me, even as the co-director (and an uncredited one at that), and I was particularly curious to see what he, along with credited general Christian Nyby, did with The Thing From Another World, an early sci-fi classic and the inspiration for John Carpenter’s beloved The Thing (which, I admit, I’m mixed on, though I owe it a revisit). And the verdict is…a solid, workmanlike film that holds up better than one would expect. Like The Blob, it’s nowhere near as corny as one would think, and its brisk pacing and crisp dialogue feel more Hawksian than science fiction cheeseball. The remote arctic outpost where The Thing From Another World takes place isn’t coldly atmospheric like Carpenter’s, and the tone is lighter, but while it lacks any sort of star punch, it also lacks anything to really quibble with, given that it’s an early 1950′s alien picture. There are few genuinely creepy moments, with a sudden attempt to penetrate a door from our oddly-shaped creature being the only semi-exception. A love story subplot is lame, but thankfully limited in screentime, and the kooky mad scientist character, Dr. Carrington, is played with goateed aplomb by Robert Cortnwaithe. The remainder of the cast is, like the movie itself, solid without many standout moments that elevate things from good to great.

61/100

Well, gee. Billed as 2010′s entry in the “indie flick that could” hot shit department, Winter’s Bone certainly has its redeeming qualities—particularly its stark cinematography and a superb lead performance by Jennifer Lawrence—but man, does it feel empty until a gripping sequence near the conclusion. I’d equate my reaction to Winter’s Bone to a lesser version of how I felt about the Coen’s True Grit, which I’d call underwhelming rather than soulless: in True Grit, the film meanders along, always enjoyable but never striking—save for, like Winter’s Bone, a wonderful female star turn in the lead—until the snake scene jolts it out of its sleepwalking solidness (let’s be honest; the Coen’s can do this in their sleep). However, at least the Coen’s track record of their work improving a second time through has me eager to take another gander at True Grit sometime in the future. Winter’s Bone…not so much. Aside from the production values, there’s just nothing to grab onto. Lawrence does everything she possibly can with her part, but its written as somewhat of a small-budget, austere caricature: an abandoned young girl deep in rural Missouri forced to mature in a hurry to care for her family, and overcome a ton of local resistance to her nosing around in the dark secrets lurking in her father’s past. Versions of this have been done endlessly. There’s no spice to it. It meanders along from point A to point B, always pretty and well-acted, but never engaging beyond the surface.

45/100

Hot Fuzz, Edgar Wright’s follow-up to his extremely popular zombie satire Shaun of the Dead (2004), improves on the latter’s strong points in every conceivable way while drastically tightening up its weakest elements. I found Shaun of the Dead‘s sharpness and bite (no pun intended) to taper off significantly in its second half: even at just 99 minutes, it felt too stretched out for its premise. By comparison, Hot Fuzz, an extremely witty spoof on both cops and the skeletons lurking in small town’s closets, doesn’t run out of gas despite being about 20 minutes longer, save for a few draggy moments near the end. It’s frequently very funny, with Simon Pegg playing droll, laser-focused London-police-star-turned-tiny-village-enforcer to perfection, but also has a lot to say about the falsities that abound in the famed “small town values” that preach holier-than-thou goodness while secretly harboring all sorts of resentments and, most importantly, hypocrisies. Jim Broadbent leads a strong supporting cast as the seemingly-chaste Inspector Frank Butterman. It’s also enjoyable to see Hot Fuzz poke fun at the internal strife and jealousies that can push the most successful employees out of the way. Overall, an excellent genre entry, much better than I’d expected. I’d put it a smidge above Wright’s recent Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, though I might take that one on a desert island after second viewings of both.

70/100