Nicholas Hoult, an American expat/ex-car thief living in Germany, comes out of retirement to bankroll a kidney transplant for Felicity Jones, his girlfriend of 30 days. Much of Hoult’s acting style consists of covering his face to deflect shards of laminated safety glass, while Academy Award-nominee Jones bleached her hair …
If you live in Colma, CA, the “graveyard capital of the world” where the dead outnumber the living 1500 to 1, there isn’t a whole hell of a lot to do but sing the blues. Might as well get it out on paper, which is exactly what screenwriter/lyricist (and lead …
Colombiana is an Angelina Jolie action-blockbuster without the Jolie. Enter Zoe Saldana, an actress Hollywood can’t quite pigeonhole, as Cataleya, a stock exotic-female vigilante poised to take on a slew of interchangeable male aggressors. The opening sequence — a chase that allows nine-year-old Cataleya (Amandla Stenberg) to show off her …
The soundless opening shots -- of soldiers stripping the bodies on an 1807 battlefield, piling them on carts, dumping them in mass graves -- summon up a powerfully oppressive mood. And the introduction of the title character as an ambulatory ghost (the Beethoven piece on the soundtrack is the "Ghost" …
The homosexual Austro-Hungarian intelligence officer of John Osborne's play, A Patriot for Me, is portrayed predominantly in shades of frigid blue, as if the action were viewed inside an ice cube. This may be someone's notion of "distancing." The movie takes too long to get to the interesting stuff -- …
Ichika Hoshino hears a song by Miku that she has never heard before at a music store. She finds a "Hatsune Miku," who she has never seen before in the TV screen, and says aloud "Miku!?". Although their eyes meet, Miku is startled by Ichika's voice and disappears. Later, after …
A true ... ish story about a British con man, name of Alan Conway, whose gimmick of passing himself off as the reclusive director of 2001, A Clockwork Orange, Dr. Strangelove, etc., proved to be an effective method of cadging drinks, cruising gay bedmates, eliciting cash. At any rate it …
Martin Scorsese's extremely tardy sequel to The Hustler. The twenty-five-year interval between the two should prepare us for some pretty radical changes, and any perceived differences or inconsistencies in the character of Fast Eddie Felson (now a prosperous liquor salesman and only connected to the game of pool in the …
Amateurish murder mystery in which a psychoanalyst tries to smoke out a killer from the quintet of suspects in his group-therapy sessions. Any halfway attentive viewer will very early be able to solve the mystery for himself. All he will need to go on are a couple of too-long-dangling questions …
Iranian filmmaker Majid Majidi's entry into the world of a blind boy, a triumph of humility and empathy. The boy's openness to the world around him in contrast to his father's insulation from it is a constant theme: the soundtrack, in one instance, quiets down to just the distant birdcall …
A phantasmagoria of Armenian history and culture, from the officially disapproved Soviet filmmaker Sergei Paradjanov (among his crimes: homosexuality). A stranger to this territory might well feel the need for some textual commentary, footnotes, and the like, but he would not be bothering to feel that need in a lesser …
A new film starring Nicolas Cage? Where do I sign up?
Steven Spielberg's old-fashioned Prestige Picture, a literary adaptation of both a critical and a popular success, and one with tie-ins to both the black and feminist communities. These last connections give the director a chance finally to apply the universe-embracing ideals of Close Encounters and E.T., not just to imaginary …
A new take on the Steven Spielberg prestige pic.