TheRetroCritic

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This year saw the release of Café Society , the latest film by Woody Allen. Set in the 1930's, it starred Jesse Eisenberg, Kristen Stewart and Steve Carell as three parts of an awkward love triangle. Jesse Eisenberg is Bobby Dorfman, a young neurotic who moves to Los Angeles to work for his uncle Phil (Carell), a wealthy talent agent. Though he is tasked with small errands, he gets to opportunity to attend a lot of fancy parties and he soon falls in love with Phil's secretary Veronica (Stewart). What Bobby doesn't realise, however, is that Veronica is having an affair with Phil, who is unsure whether to leave his wife for her or not. This sort of plot is very reminiscent of other Woody Allen films so this new outing definitely suffers from some overly-familiar scenes here and there. The love triangle is only the focal point early on in the film as Bobby eventually moves back to New York where he starts working in a club run by his brother Ben, who happens to be a gangs

Channing Tatum, Steve Carell and Mark Ruffalo star in Foxcatcher , the Oscar-nominated film based on the shocking true story of an Olympic wrestler and his brother's destructive encounter with bizarre multimillionaire John E. Du Pont. After Tatum's wrestler Mark Schultz is called in by the wealthy entrepreneur (and avid bird watcher) to his vast estate, he is promptly hired to train for Du Pont (Carell) as part of the Foxcatcher team in the hope that another Olympic win lies ahead. Unfortunately, Du Pont's strange behaviour becomes something of a problem as it becomes quite clear that he's not quite the talented wrestling coach he painted himself out to be. Add to that a drug problem, an odd relationship with his mother (played by Vanessa Redgrave) and some altogether inappropriate behaviour and you've got yourself one awkward training environment for Schultz to say the least. Things take a turn for the worse when Du Pont hires Mark's brother David (Ruffalo

Back when Steve Carell was still mostly known for being that odd news guy in both Bruce Almighty and Anchorman , he finally got his first lead comedy role in The 40-Year-Old Virgin , a film which, on paper, may not have sounded all that exciting but, in Judd Apatow's reliable hands, did very well indeed. The film's premise is exactly what the title suggests as Carell plays Andy, a 40-year-old virgin we first meet one morning as he absently parades his morning boner while he gets ready for work. This sets most of the tone for the rest of the movie. We soon meet Andy's co-workers, incidentally an all-star cast packed with Apatow regulars from Seth Rogen to Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann. Even Jonah Hill gets a cameo appearance. When Andy's "friends" figure out his big secret, this kick-starts their imaginations as they each decide to get him laid and impart their silly wisdom about sex upon him. Whether they're doing all this just to see Andy make a fool o

Here's one it took me a while to finally watch. The idea of Steve Carell and Steve Buscemi as crappy magicians duelling with a Jim Carrey David Blaine parody sounded great but somehow I missed it. Having finally seen it, I'm not entirely sure as to why the film exists but it did have its moments. The film opens on Carrell and Buscemi as kids with the former picking up a boxed magic set presented by a Houdini-style magician (played by Alan Arkin) and developing a passion for that particular occupation. We cut to present day where both friends have partnered up and are now in-house magicians over at some fancy Vegas hotel: they've been doing their act for years and, although they're good at it, it's clearly dated and the arrival of a new stunt-based magician steals their thunder to the point where they're soon separated and out of a job. Oh, and along the way Olivia Wilde shows up. It's a good story with some great characters so the film definitely had

And so the legend of Ron Burgundy continues... This time, Will Ferrell's dim-witted anchorman and his beloved crew take on 24 hour news after our favourite news man is fired by Harrison Ford's moody boss, thereby leaving his station, his wife and his son before, once again, hitting rock bottom. Luckily, he is found by a dude interested in hiring him for a new concept TV channel, GNN, which would offer the news 24/7. He accepts and sets out to put his news crew back together starting with Champ (David Koechner), who is running a fast food place where he passes off bat meat as chicken, then moving on to Brian Fantana (Paul Rudd), who takes pictures of cats for a living, and finally Brick (Steve Carell), who is believed to be dead by many including himself. As soon as the team is back together, the film finally gets genuinely fun. A lot of the jokes play out much like you thought they would in the trailer but that's ok since this sequel has a LOT of jokes. It's a long

Now the film's sequel is finally out, I thought it would be a good time to check out Anchorman: The Legend Of Roy Burgundy again and see whether the hit comedy about a moronic San Diego anchorman and his crew still holds up. This first movie took 70's news anchor Ron Burgundy, Will Ferrell's genius creation, and tried to extend his one joke nature into a multi-joked storyline with loads of other characters. The result was very light plot-wise but big on goofy shenanigans and full of silly and memorable moments. We follow Burgundy at the peak of his popularity, reading mostly animal-themed news and partying with his pals, played by Paul Rudd, Steve Carell and David Koechner, when a driven new female colleague (Christina Applegate) shows up and turns it all upside down. We occasionally switch to Veronica Corningstone's point of view as she comments on this man-led industry. Burgundy and Corningstone soon become involved, thanks to a solid burst of jazz flute and tal