Superhero Drama Written by Jonathan Nolan and Christopher Nolan; based on a character created by Bob Crane Directed by Christopher Nolan What a great summer for Hollywood blockbusters! First Iron Man took the comic book superhero movie, if not to a new level, than at least within striking distance of the best that genre had … Continue reading The Dark Knight
Category: Reviews
The Last Mistress
Erotic period romance Written by Catherine Breillat; based on a novel by Jules-Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly Directed by Catherine Breillat Judging from what little of her work I've seen, Catherine Breillat is an erratically brilliant creator of individual scenes, but a mediocre one of whole movies (I admit that I haven't seen the very well-reviewed Fat … Continue reading The Last Mistress
Viva
Spoof Written and directed by Anna Biller Anna Biller wants to out-auteur Charlie Chaplin. Not only did she write, direct, and co-produce this parody of late sixties/early seventies exploitation flicks, but she stars in the title role. She also wrote some of the songs, animated a drug-induced dream sequence, and designed the sets and costumes. … Continue reading Viva
Water Lilies
[B] Coming-of-age Drama Written and directed by Céline Sciamma Full Disclosure: The Water Lillies reviewer DVD I screened cropped this 1.85:1 movie to a 4x3 frame, cutting off a quarter of the image. Even some of the subtitles were cropped. I have no way of knowing how much this hurt the film. Now, on with … Continue reading Water Lilies
Jewish Film Festival Preview
I've seen a record eight movies coming to the Jewish Film Festival (okay, one's actually a TV series). Here's what I think of them, in order from Masterpiece to What were they thinking? Emotional Arithmetic In the best performance of an excellent career, Susan Sarandon plays an American-born Holocaust survivor (the story is set in … Continue reading Jewish Film Festival Preview
WALL-E
Animated family science fiction Written by Andrew Stanton and Jim Capobianco Directed by Andrew Stanton Andrew Stanton and Pixar made a courageous movie. When Disney finances your big-budget family entertainment, it takes guts to look closely and critically at such consequences of our consumer culture as garbage, obesity, and planetary destruction. Making an almost dialog-free … Continue reading WALL-E
Emotional Arithmetic: Don’t Miss It
Drama Written by Jefferson Lewis, from a book by Matt Cohen Directed by Paolo Barzman When you attend a lot of film festivals, you're often amazed and disappointed about what doesn't get a regular release. As I write this, Emotional Arithmetic has no American distributor. Considering not only the film's exceptional quality but also its … Continue reading Emotional Arithmetic: Don’t Miss It
The Wackness
Dramatic comedy Written and directed by Jonathan Levine I knew Ben Kingsley was a brilliant actor, but I didn't know he could turn himself into Harvey Keitel. As a drugged-out New York psychiatrist, he looks astonishingly like Keitel, and hardly ever sounds British. Although Kingsley gets top billing, Josh Peck gets the central role of … Continue reading The Wackness
Get Smart
Action Comedy Written by Tom J. Astle and Matt Ember Directed by Peter Segal I approach films based on old TV shows with suspicion, but the comic potential of Steve Carell as Maxwell Smart lowered my guard. But while Get Smart has its charms, it doesn't fulfill that potential by a long shot. Carell wisely … Continue reading Get Smart
Love and Honor
Samurai drama Written by Yoji Yamada, Emiko Hiramatsu, and Ichiro Yamamoto Directed by Yoji Yamada Yoji Yamada makes Samurai films like nobody else's. Past works like Twilight Samurai and The Hidden Blade looked at the legendary warriors as lower-middleclass drones, worrying about money as they perform their dull peacetime jobs for an indifferent lord for … Continue reading Love and Honor
Bayflicks 