Call me stupid, but I didn’t understand the book and I didn’t understand the movie. What was the absurdly unbelievable tale of coexisting on the Pacific for 225 days with a Bengal tiger about? I gather it is meant as a parable, or allegory, but of what? On top of that, my anti-Indian prejudice based […]
What one thinks of this movie will depend on the views one brings into the theater. For me, I think the “war on terror” is the gravest policy mistake our country has made since the Vietnam War. Of course, any and all who perpetrated the horrors of 9/11 should have been pursued and brought to […]
There are a bunch of jokes that make you laugh, but never uproariously, and that’s about it. Overhanging what there is of a story is a monumental disconnect: husband and wife are both in low-paying (or non-paying) jobs and they are facing bankruptcy, yet he drives a BMW, she a Lexus; he gives his father […]
The music is kind of blah, the lyrics sophomoric, and the movie played like a stage musical, with pauses for applause after every set piece. When I saw Les Mis in the theater I found it a derivative and lukewarm Phantom of the Opera. What was notable in the film version were the performances – […]
Pitch perfect. The ultimate Tarantino. Gratuitous violence has never been so fun. A miscast Leonardo DiCaprio – although not as bad as Brad Pitt in Inglorious Basterds – was my only quibble, but all the other actors were so great it hardly mattered. Samuel L. Jackson was Oscar-worthy, but Christoph Walz was on a higher […]
Denzel Washington walked an impressive tightrope: keeping us rooting for his character while continually disappointing us with his conduct. His co-star was very appealing, and John Goodman was a pleasure, as always. In the end, though, this was strictly a one-trick pony, and that trick wasn’t all that engaging.
The novel staged as a series of tableaux. At first I found it corny, like a Broadway musical sans music; but by the time I figured out, more or less, who was who, I had fallen into Joe Wright’s rhythm and had no more complaint. Keira Knightley was quite good, and lovely as usual, but […]
Jennifer Lawrence sizzled. Bradley Cooper burned. This film was at its most eloquent when neither spoke but looked into the other’s eyes. The plot points were goofily absurd, but that was just background for the onscreen chemistry between the two stars, who made you feel their longing – and their craziness. I felt a little […]
More interesting as history lesson than movie (assuming, of course, that the history was reliable). Daniel Day-Lewis and Tommy Lee Jones were terrific, but they were the only ones with good lines and interesting personalities. The others were drawn from the Hollywood stockyard, and the scenes they played were devoid of subtlety. I felt I was back in […]
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