I like to think I'm generally accessible, but I give readers the benefit of the doubt of being reasonably culturally-literate.

If film critics could destroy a movie, Michael Bay and Adam Sandler would be working at Starbucks. If film critics could make a movie a hit, the Dardenne brothers would be courted by every studio in town.

I like to think I'm generally accessible, but I give readers the benefit of the doubt of being reasonably culturally-literate.

I hate to see great writers like Ringel and Ansen and Jan Stuart (among many others) being put out to pastures because print media is suffering.

Proving that the best villains have the charisma of a hero, (Jason) Statham makes a strong impression, supplying the kind of menace that permeates the movie even when he's not on screen. His fight with (Dwayne) Johnson doesn't have the bang you'd expect from a The Transporter versus The Rock match-up, but the climactic Statham-(Vin)Diesel battle more than delivers.

Obviously the Internet has become something of a leveler; it was once a luxury to be able to reach a mass audience, and now anybody can do it, to some extent.

Even before I started going to movies, I loved the idea of them. When I started learning to read as a kid, I started reading the movie pages in the paper and I could tell you what was showing at every theater within a ten mile radius of our house.