A screen-filling spread of comic-book covers clue us in at the outset -- those of us, anyhow, who were unacquainted with the series of British "graphic novels" from Fleetway Publications -- as to the provenance of the titular superhero, a test-tube lawman in the anarchic Third Millennium, with as rigid …
The chain-rattling spirit of The Golden Age of Television rattles on: a foursquare (or just plain square) presentation of the facts in the case of an East German refugee who hijacked a Polish airliner to fly to freedom. Can hijacking, even in a sympathetic cause, be condoned? Can hiding expository …
Boys' night out becomes boys' nightmare out, when they take a wrong turn en route to the boxing match and witness a gangland killing. An action film in the Walter Hill mold, a sort of combination of Trespass and The Warriors, but reduced even further: a Walter Hillock, if you …
Very pretty Chinese period piece, set in a silk-dyeing mill in the 1920s and 30s (much blue light and amber, much red dye and yellow). "Very pretty," though, is not the highest compliment to pay a tawdry little tale with strong sadistic and voyeuristic elements, centered around a young bride, …
The last year of her life finds a strapped Judy Garland leaving her kids behind while she embarked on a six-week concert tour of Britain. Director Rupert Goold was fortunate to have for his cinematographer Gabriel Yared (Every Man for Himself, The English Patient). Yared, who clearly understands the parameters …
Barren and banal lives in Babylon, Long Island, the old stomping ground of first-time filmmaker Eric Mendelsohn. An ensemble piece, meaning that the barrenness and banality are spread as wide as the Mojave. (There is a ready-made poignance about the late Madeline Kahn musing to herself that she still feels …
Bright colors, ’toony graphics, abundant closeups — mostly of adorable redhead Judy (Jordana Beatty, soon to be filmed as fabled Eloise of the Plaza Hotel). She is like a typhoon sugar high, her kid brother is named Stink, and Aunt Opal (Heather Graham) is also juvenile. The ancestral muse is …
Impoverished view of impoverished life on the streets of Harlem. "Yo." "Wha's up?" "Tha's bullshit, man." "Fuck you, man." "What the fuck!" "You're fucked up, man." "Fuck that." "You better stop bullshittin' me." "Shut the fuck up." "What the fuck is wrong with you?" "Freeze, motherfucker!" "You crazy, man." Etc. …