Steven Rea

Steven Rea has been an Inquirer reporter since 1982, writing about film and filmmakers, books, pop music and popular culture. He has been a movie critic since 1992.

He was born in London and raised in New York City, where he graduated from Stuyvesant High School. He graduated from San Francisco State University with a major in English and Creative Writing and attended the Writers Workshop graduate program at the University of Iowa.

His work has appeared in Entertainment Weekly, TV Guide, Family Fun and other publications. He also writes fiction and poetry.

His column, "On Movies," appears Sundays in Arts & Entertainment, and his reviews normally run in the Weekend section on Fridays.

Read Steven's blog On Movies Online
Latest post: Outrageous Oscar Omissions!! - 02/03/2010
Email Steven at srea@phillynews.com

On Movies: There was no rushing this Russian tale

By Steven Rea, Inquirer Columnist

Posted 02/05/2010

Michael Hoffman was back at home in Boise, Idaho, this week after months of hoofing around Europe and the States to promote his film, The Last Station - a film that on Tuesday received Academy Award nominations for two of its stars: Helen Mirren and Christopher Plummer. A roiling costume drama about the final, stormy days in the marriage of the great Russian author Leo Tolstoy and his hard-tested wife, Sofya, The Last Station was five years in the making.

Outrageous Oscar Omissions!!

Car chases, fighting, and lots of parkour - 02/04/2010: By Steven Rea, Inquirer Movie Critic

District 13: Ultimatum, a hopped-up, hammy sequel to the 2004 urban French action romp, is, like its predecessor, rife with parkour stunts - parkour being a daunting discipline that involves running, jumping, rolling, leaping, sliding, and sidling over, around, and along various large obstacles and altitudinous edifices. Roof-hopping, check. Banister-leaping, mais, oui.
Travolta, Rhys Meyers pummel Paris - 02/04/2010: By Steven Rea, Inquirer Movie Critic

As evidenced by the locomotive 2008 action hits Taken and Tell No One, the city of Paris lends itself especially well to high-speed chases, ricocheting fire fights, and the elaborate destruction of buildings and street furniture.
Bigelow, Cameron tied at 9 for Oscar - 02/03/2010: By Steven Rea, Inquirer Movie Critic

It could be a reality TV show: A divorced couple compete for prizes before an audience of millions.
On Movies: Fun with John Travolta - 01/29/2010: Jonathan Rhys Meyers, fresh from playing that Tudor icon, meets his iconic costar cold on the set of "From Paris With Love."

By Steven Rea, Inquirer Columnist

The first time Jonathan Rhys Meyers and John Travolta met was on the set for their first scene together in From Paris With Love. Charlie Wax, a belligerent, shaved-headed, goateed American - a full-tilt Travolta - is being detained by a French customs agent at the airport. He's trying to bring a bag full of energy drinks into the country, the French customs official is telling him non!, and the exchange is getting ugly.
Our critics' selections - 01/30/2010: Crazy Heart Jeff Bridges gives the performance of his career as a whiskey-soaked, washed-up country star looking to put his life back on track in this beautifully observed character piece. The songs are gems, and the supporting work from the likes of Maggie Gyllenhaal, Robert Duvall, and an uncredited Colin Farrell is uniformly stellar. R
A cunning detective drama probing language, conscience - 01/28/2010: By Steven Rea, Inquirer Movie Critic

A police procedural that's less about criminal matters than it is about dialectics and existential quandaries, Corneliu Porumboiu's Police, Adjective is an anti-thriller in which little happens - there is plenty of talk, but even more silence. This cunning and provocative Romanian film requires patience, but its rewards are many: It's hard to imagine how a scene in which a police captain barks an order to bring him a dictionary can be loaded with suspense, but, really, it is.
A strange, gloomy detective thriller - 01/28/2010: By Steven Rea, Inquirer Movie Critic

The strange and gloomy Edge of Darkness is Mel Gibson's first job in front of a camera since M. Night Shyamalan's UFO nuttiness, 2002's Signs. The fact that the wild-eyed movie star looks considerably worse for wear could certainly be attributed to the role at hand: Gibson is Tom Craven, a Boston Police Department detective who has just witnessed his twentysomething daughter being blown away.
On Movies: 'Crazy Heart' director long loved the music - 01/22/2010: By Steven Rea, Inquirer Columnist

Scott Cooper - the actor-turned-writer-and-director whose Crazy Heart beautifully describes the late-career trajectory of a faded country music legend - grew up in the mountains of Virginia. "At a very young age I was introduced to the music of Bill Monroe, Ralph Stanley, Doc Watson, the great bluegrass musicians, and cut my teeth listening to them," he says, explaining why, and how, this world and these artists mean so much to him.
Our critics' selections - 01/23/2010: Crazy Heart Jeff Bridges gives the performance of his career as a whiskey-soaked, washed-up country star looking to put his life back on track in this beautifully observed character piece. The songs are gems, and the supporting work from the likes of Maggie Gyllenhaal, Robert Duvall, and an uncredited Colin Farrell is uniformly stellar. R
A 'toon that's manic and nutty - 01/21/2010: By Steven Rea, Inquirer Movie Critic

If Fantastic Mr. Fox is stop-motion animation at its most refined and meticulously crafted best, then A Town Called Panic is stop-motion at its messiest and nuttiest. Aesthetically, it's a whole other kettle of fish, but this manic Belgian 'toon is nonetheless, like Mr. Fox, splendid, smile-inducing fun.