HUSTLERS is about as subtle as a pole dance when it comes to making a case for the poetic justice of what a gang of strippers did to the very Wall Street bankers who plunged the country into financial chaos back in 2008. And that is how it should be. The script written by director… Read More »
JASON BOURNE
I’m put in mind of tea leaves. Good quality tea leaves that have rendered such a wonderful cup of tea that you wonder if maybe, just maybe, there’s enough of their essential, unique quality left to take one more infusion to make a cup as good as that first one. And so it is with… Read More »
MONA LISA SMILE
MONA LISA SMILE is what can diplomatically be called a safe film. Its full of lush cinematography that evokes a cloying sense of nostalgia for the early 1950s where the action takes place. There are the adorable outfits the almost all-girl cast wears. The soundtrack is full of pop standards calculated to set the mood… Read More »
THE PRINCE AND ME
It is eminently fitting that THE PRINCE AND ME includes a scene where all-American heroine Paige (Julia Stiles) gives incognito Danish prince Edward (Luke Mably) a lesson in how to do laundry. This occasionally whimsical potboiler churns suds like an industrial washing machine spiffing up 100 pounds of bland with almost as much soft soap. Think… Read More »
THE OMEN
Liev Schreiber co-starred in one of the few remakes that worked, THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE. It was that remake, in fact, that restored my faith in the concept of re-visting a classic film. Alas, Mr. Schreiber’s latest adventure in remakes, THE OMEN, is much less successful. There are no new insights, no shift in perspective that breathes… Read More »