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Christopher Borrelli

Christopher Borrelli's reviews only count toward the Tomatometer® when published at Tomatometer-approved publication(s).
Biography:

Chicago Tribune reporter.

Reviews

Movies TV Shows
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002) 95% 5/5 EDIT “Somewhere Akira Kurosawa, the late Japanese master who gave us sweeping war epics like Ran, is shedding a tear. He'd be impressed; not just by Jackson's mastery of scale, but because the director never loses track of humanity in his spectacle.” – Toledo Blade Jan 13, 2026 Full Review Spider-Man (2002) 90% EDIT “Sam Raimi's Spider-Man is a loving day-dream of a superhero movie. It has nothing but warmth and admiration for Stan Lee and Steve Ditko's original 1962 comic. ” – Toledo Blade Sep 24, 2025 Full Review Boogie Nights (1997) 91% 4/4 EDIT “It's a sprawling, grand mess of energy, pathos, storytelling, and chutzpah, the celluloid equivalent of a 16-year-old boy with roller skates on his feet and a jet pack strapped to his back.” – Toledo Blade Sep 24, 2025 Full Review Hard Eight (1996) 82% 4/4 EDIT “Some movies slink to their endings, others leap with glee, some strut, and then there are ones that walk a few steps, duck into an alley way, smoke a cigarette, step out of the shadows, and arrive home at 3:15 a.m. Hard Eight does that.” – Toledo Blade Sep 22, 2025 Full Review Requiem for a Dream (2000) 80% 2/5 EDIT “...director Darren Aronofsky's second film ends up with the usual descent into junkie hell - only one told from the smug, safe vantage point of a filmmaker sweating it out in an editing room.” – Toledo Blade Aug 23, 2025 Full Review Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002) 62% 3/5 EDIT “If anything, Attack of the Clones is a masterpiece of design.” – Toledo Blade Aug 14, 2025 Full Review Superman Returns (2006) 72% 2/5 EDIT “...Superman Returns is as ambitious and heartfelt as it is disappointing and sort of a drag.” – Toledo Blade Jul 8, 2025 Full Review Mission: Impossible III (2006) 73% 3/5 EDIT “There's nothing really wrong with Mission III - except that sneaking suspicion that no surprises and no margin of error is what Cruise...intended.” – Toledo Blade May 21, 2025 Full Review Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999) 54% 2.5/4 EDIT “It's big, goofy fun. That's all. Consider it a visual narcotic, so rich and crammed with imaginative frills and evocative images and dizzying designs that your eyes become drunk just watching it.” – Toledo Blade Apr 16, 2025 Full Review American Psycho (2000) 68% 4/4 EDIT “Harron transforms a badly constructed misogynist fantasy into inspired satire.” – Toledo Blade Apr 4, 2025 Full Review Almost Famous (2000) 91% EDIT “A couple of times tears gathered in my eyes, not because of something sentimental or sad, or a moment calculated to induce tears -- the movie allows room for emotion to collect in quieter ways -- but because of the film's elemental goodness and integrity.” – Toledo Blade Mar 26, 2024 Full Review Amélie (2001) 90% 5/5 EDIT “If I ever wanted to run into a projectionist's booth and hug a canister of film, it was after I saw Amelie for the first time.” – Toledo Blade Feb 13, 2024 Full Review Flags of Our Fathers (2006) 76% 4/5 EDIT “Flags of Our Fathers is about the selling of wartime reality -- actually -- the creating of that reality.” – Toledo Blade Nov 10, 2023 Full Review Atanarjuat the Fast Runner (2001) 93% 5/5 EDIT “The cultural and historical significance of The Fast Runner is modest when compared to the experience of sitting through The Fast Runner itself. It's an extraordinary, absorbing film, a landmark by any standard. ” – Toledo Blade Nov 8, 2023 Full Review The Exorcist (1973) 78% 5/5 EDIT “The Exorcist is a masterful movie three decades later because it was made by filmmakers who had something to say and who knew when to use restraint and when to entertain and when to burrow under your skin. ” – Toledo Blade Sep 29, 2023 Full Review Traffic (2000) 93% EDIT “Traffic is thrillingly alive. From the first frame to the last, the director would rather engage you, startle you with the vastness of his canvas, and offer his extraordinary movie as an antidote to gutless filmmaking. ” – Toledo Blade Sep 7, 2023 Full Review Moulin Rouge (2001) 75% 3/5 EDIT “Moulin Rouge, a provocative acid-blast take on the Hollywood musical, the first big one in a generation, flashes by like a dream and a drunken night at the opera.” – Toledo Blade Sep 5, 2023 Full Review In the Mood for Love (2000) 92% 4/5 EDIT “This is film for film's sake -- pure movie, as it's sometimes called. What's important isn't logic or plot, but that memories of the images and feelings alone are enough to send you into a swoon.” – Toledo Blade Jul 15, 2023 Full Review Mulholland Dr. (2001) 84% 4/5 EDIT “Dreams don't make sense. Dreams don't finish or begin or come with explanations. Ultimately, that's what Mulholland Drive is about: dreams, identity, and, naturally, Hollywood, where dreams and identity get blurry.” – Toledo Blade Jul 11, 2023 Full Review The Blair Witch Project (1999) 86% 4/4 EDIT “[The Blair Witch Project is] the most effective and unsettling horror movie in quite a long time. Just to clarify: after seeing this, you will not sleep well. Invest in a night-light.” – Toledo Blade Dec 15, 2022 Full Review Gladiator (2000) 80% 3.5/4 EDIT “We're on the cusp of a new golden age for moviemaking. Ridley Scott is hardly equipped to light the way, but that he or anybody is willing to deliver a jolt of electricity to a genre as dead and dumb as the Roman epic is thrilling in itself. ” – Toledo Blade Nov 1, 2022 Full Review Go Tigers! (2001) 85% EDIT “It's all true, even though the details are both as chilling as the premise of Invasion of the Body Snatchers and as uplifting as the plots of a half-dozen recent sports movies.” – Toledo Blade Sep 15, 2020 Full Review The Cockettes (2002) 91% 4/4 EDIT “The effect is to actually bring to life the idealistic spirit of the times, to provide a context more resonant than simply the fashions and the music.” – Toledo Blade Sep 15, 2020 Full Review The Lizzie McGuire Movie (2003) 40% 2/5 EDIT “Here, we get a Bizarro Europe where the modest pleasures of the cable series are skipped to make room for a plot every American kiddie flick takes when it heads overseas. It aspires to nothing more than smiling imitation.” – Toledo Blade Jan 15, 2020 Full Review John Mulaney & The Sack Lunch Bunch (2019) 96% EDIT “"John Mulaney & the Sack Lunch Bunch," a holiday surprise, comes as close as anything Mulaney's done to explaining his appeal and outlook.” – Chicago Tribune Dec 30, 2019 Full Review
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