Steven Soderbergh is an executive producer of MAGIC MIKE XXL, but that is the only trace of that director to be found in this sequel that is more about joy than angst. Channing Tatum, returning as the eponymous male stripper, has taken the fun and dazzle from the original and eschewed most of the cerebral… Read More »
DOPE is Genius
DOPE is a provocative blend of gritty realism, gentle compassion, and piercing social satire that is so unlike anything that has come before that its maker, Rick Famuyima, may have just invented a new cinematic sub-genre in the spirit, and brilliance, of the Coen Brothers’ FARGO. Boldly venturing into issues of identity, class, gender, sexuality,… Read More »
ALOHA
ALOHA is a glorious, unkempt disaster of a film. Individual elements are ambitious, even praiseworthy, but the narrative arc of this comedy-drama about Hawaiian legends, the privatization of space, and a hunky guy with commitment issues falls apart almost as soon as the whirl-a-gig ride begins. Credit where it’s due, though, writer-director Cameron Crowe is… Read More »
NED RIFLE Completes the Cycle
Hal Hartley is the master of astringent whimsy and scathingly erudite satire. No better examples of his talents are to be found than HENRY FOOL (1997) and its follow-up, FAY GRIM (2007). Both deal with a character, Henry (Robert John Burke), who may or may not be the devil inserting himself into the desperately dull… Read More »
HOME is Where the Heart is
Based on the novel “The True Meaning of Smekday” by Adam Rex, HOME is a sweet animated film that is equal parts cheery and poignant. Aimed more at kids than at adults, it takes the time-honored themes of friendship, family, and keeping promises and wraps them in an imaginative new package as shiny and inviting… Read More »
DANNY COLLINS Overcomes
Narratively, DANNY COLLINS commits more than a few faux pas, but there is such warmth to the melancholy of a life discovered to have been wasted, that the winces they produce are worth enduring. Writer/director Dan Fogelman (CRAZY, STUPID, LOVE) may be too quick the play the melodrama card, but I prefer to focus on… Read More »
Al Pacino Exalts THE HUMBLING
THE HUMBLING is a throwback to a time when attention spans were longer, characters were created out of complex and even contradictory behaviors, and the story was an extension of the characters, not a glib contrivance. Based on the 2008 novel of the same name by Philip Roth, it is a study of Simon Axler, an actor crumbling as he feels his craft drifting away leaving him in limbo between reality and delusion, comedy and tragedy, meaning and nothingness.
TOP FIVE = Top Flight
TOP FIVE starts a little out of chronological sequence with two protagonists walking down a Manhattan sidewalk discussing art and life. Specifically art versus life with one opining that a movie is just a movie while the other disagrees. The man, as we will shortly learn, is Andre Allen (Chris Rock), superstar funnyman and recovering… Read More »
BIRDMAN or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)
THE SHORT VERSION: One of the best films of the year.
SEX AND THE CITY
SEX AND THE CITY, the television series, was all about fashion labels and sex. Delivered in tantalizing half-hour gobbets, it was the perfect fantasy antidote to real life. The women were fabulous, the stories were glamorous, the dialogue wittily impudent, and the glorification of the trivial was a deliciously wicked guilty pleasure. This is a… Read More »
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- …
- 24
- Next Page »