“The Golden Compass,” for all the anticipation and possibilities, is a mess. While watching director Chris Weitz’s adaptation of the Philip Pullman young-adult fantasy novel, one wonders whether it ...

I’m a guy who spends a lot of time at the movies, as well as the new arts and entertainment writer for a publication that already has a movie reviewer. So I see one of my challenges as staying on my ...

“Every culture has its southerners,” Susan Sontag writes in her 1992 novel, “The Volcano Lover,” set in Naples. According to ...