Negligible Woody Allen effort. The fact that Allen the actor is nowhere in the cast is no doubt part of the problem, but chiefly because his substitute, Kenneth Branagh, is a problem unto himself. (The Purple Rose of Cairo managed to become one of Allen's best films without his on-screen …
Marcel Proust, just the way you always pictured him: the milky eyes, the dark bags beneath them, the coughing and wheezing, the twenty-four-hour-a-day pajamas and robe -- all the sundry signs of a sensitivity so great that it compels him, for example, to insulate his room with cork. What the …
1) In order to boost sales, a young author and some friends visit a bookstore and loudly attempt to give her tome better shelf placement. 2) Two strangers exchange funny jabs after one attempts to cut in line at a Starbucks. 3) A date with a Gap model ends in …
Director Fina Torres injects a pop sensibility (brightness, coolness, breeziness) into a traditional Cinderella story about an aspiring classical singer -- a Venezuelan mezzo in flight from the altar to the garrets of Paris. Loopy dialogue ("A Brazilian who does yoga is like a Russian bullfighter"). Adoring photography of the …
To deal with Jacques Rivette, it eventually becomes necessary to come to grips with the issue of length. At three and a quarter hours, this entrancing fantasy is far from his longest effort. In his own defense, Rivette will cite a "tradition" of length in movies -- Griffith, Gance. (He …
S-f sickie to do with a serial killer who drowns women on camcorder, bathes the bodies in bleach for a doll-like finish, and masturbates over them while suspended from fourteen steel rings piercing his dorsal flesh. What makes it science-fictional and not just high-tech is the red-licorice body stocking that …
Like many musicians, accomplished Saudi cellist Nasser (Samer Ismail) has aspirations for greatness, though he feels like he’s held back by the old, dilapidated instrument he’s forced to play. When Nasser is offered the chance to take possession of a gorgeous red cello by a mysterious shop owner (Tobin Bell), …
Hostage thriller, with a breathless pace and an oxygen-deprived plot, from a story idea by Larry Cohen: a companion piece to Phone Booth, but freed, through the technology of mobile phones, for a lot of car chases and running around. Kim Basinger throws herself, body and soul, into the role …
Following the lead of the Vito Russo book of the same name, documentarians Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman propose to trace the whole history of the depiction of homosexuality in American movie houses. The outcome is highly entertaining in the usual way of compilation films in the vein of That's …
The biography of the director Ehsan Khoshbakht, who left his home country Iran for London due to political issues.
Maladroit basketball fantasy that speaks to the current miseries of the Boston fan: the Celts are back in the NBA finals, in the old Garden, and two local zealots kidnap the opposing team's surly star (the shaven-headed as well as shaven-armpitted Damon Wayans) before Game Seven. The actual effect is …
A situation reminiscent of Jack Clayton's Our Mother's House (1967): a family of sudden orphans buries their Mum on the premises and keeps her death a secret. Writer-director Andrew Birkin, working from a novel by Ian McEwan, takes an hour to get to where Clayton got in a few minutes; …
Fine in principle: three goyim (Ellen Burstyn, Diane Ladd, Olympia Dukakis) ought to be able to portray Jewish widows, and a black director (Bill Duke) and past specialist in action films (A Rage in Harlem, Deep Cover) ought to be able to direct them. All it should take is imagination. …
Italian zombie film (practically like saying Italian lasagna). For some unknown reason, the dead are rising a week after being laid to rest, and the impassive graveyard watchman must split open their skulls, one way or another, to lay them back down. Fine all-around production -- sets, lighting, color -- …
Italian zombie film (practically like saying Italian lasagna). For some unknown reason, the dead are rising a week after being laid to rest, and the impassive graveyard watchman must split open their skulls, one way or another, to lay them back down. Fine all-around production -- sets, lighting, color -- …