Top Films by Year
Top Films of 2020
Top Films of 2017
Top Films of 2015
Easy Virtue – 7
A rich farrago of witty repartee, courtesy, I suppose, of Noel Coward’s original script. The American living by her wits, and considerable beauty, plopped in the middle of the decaying English aristocracy is, by now, a well-worn, time-honored conceit, but nonetheless open to japes and gibes, the latter most expertly delivered by Kristin Scott Thomas. […]
Il Divo – 7.5
Stunning moviemaking that, seen on the heels of Gomorrah and Valentino, gave a pretty bleak but colorful picture of Italy. All those marbled floors, high ceilings and columned terrazzos, heavily made-up women and men with deep tans and coiffed hair, who would kiss you and murder you equally without expression. Any doubts that there was […]
Star Trek – 6
Much – nay, most – of the fun in this movie came from a recognition of who the characters would become on the TV series of 40 years ago. If it sounds like I’ve got my verb tense confused, it’s only some time travel I borrowed from the film, specifically Leonard Nimoy’s Spock. The story […]
Three Monkeys – 7
I spent much of the film wondering about the title: were the mother, father and son the “three monkeys,” or was this an allusion to a Turkish proverb, like “hear no evil,” etc.? Finding no answer, I was left to admire the acting and the character study: Dostoevsky came to mind. The cinematography contributed to […]
The Soloist – 5
Ho-hum. This would’ve been a better series of newspaper columns than it was a movie; and as with all “based-on-a-true-stories,” you wondered what touches a screenwriter starting ab initio would’ve bothered including. The religious fundamentalism of the first cellist? The parlous state of the newspaper? The involvement of the L.A. mayor? None of these added […]