The Phoenix Network:
 
 
About  |  Advertise
Adult  |  Moonsigns  |  Band Guide  |  Blogs  |  In Pictures
 
Features  |  Reviews
FIND MOVIES
Find a Movie
Movie List
Loading ...
or
Find Theaters and Movie Times
or
Search Movies

Review: Pontypool

Bruce McDonald deserves some credit for trying
By PETER KEOUGH  |  April 15, 2009
2.5 2.5 Stars

090417_pontypool_main

Bruce McDonald's ambitious shaggy-dog story combining elements of Talk Radio, William Burroughs, and Night of the Living Dead succeeds about as well as could be expected. Grant Mazzy (Stephen McHattie), a poor man's Don Imus, shows up for his morning broadcast at the local radio station in the snowbound Ontario title boondock and finds that the routine of traffic conditions and weather forecasts is being interrupted by reports of inexplicable mob violence and other bizarre behavior. Shots of projectile-vomited blood and eyewitness accounts of cannibalism punctuate musings quoting Norman Mailer and Roland Barthes. McDonald's limiting the action to the radio studio induces claustrophobia and then devolves into staginess. He deserves credit for trying, but he's no David Cronenberg.

BRATTLE THEATRE: APRIL 24 at MIDNIGHT

Related: Review: Crude, Review: That Evening Sun, Review: We Live in Public, More more >
  Topics: Reviews , Norman Mailer, David Cronenberg, William S. Burroughs,  More more >
  • Share:
  • Share this entry with Facebook
  • Share this entry with Digg
  • Share this entry with Delicious
  • RSS feed
  • Email this article to a friend
  • Print this article
Comments

ARTICLES BY PETER KEOUGH
Share this entry with Delicious
  •   REVIEW: PRECIOUS  |  November 18, 2009
    If you thought Celie in Alice Walker's The Color Purple had a tough time of it, wait till you get a load of Precious.
  •   INVISIBLE PLAYMATES  |  November 18, 2009
    To judge from the titles of some of his recent novels — The Book of Illusion s, Oracle Night , Man in the Dark , and now Invisible — Paul Auster's fiction is receding, Samuel Beckett style, into non-existence.
  •   REVIEW: PLANET 51  |  November 18, 2009
    The opening for the latest animated kids’ fantasy is promising — but it’s for another movie.
  •   REVIEW: 2012  |  November 12, 2009
    Doomsday is good therapy. What does it matter that billions die if that brings a family together in one big hug?
  •   REVIEW: WITHIN THE WHIRLWIND  |  November 11, 2009
    Those eager to compare the Obama administration to a Communist dictatorship might check out this story based on the memoirs of the poet Evgenia Ginzburg.

 See all articles by: PETER KEOUGH

MOST POPULAR
RSS Feed of for the most popular articles
 Most Viewed   Most Emailed 



  |  Sign In  |  Register
 
thePhoenix.com:
Phoenix Media/Communications Group:
TODAY'S FEATURED ADVERTISERS
Copyright © 2009 The Phoenix Media/Communications Group