Led Zeppelin's Madison Square Garden concert (the distinct bulge in lead singer Robert Plant's pants, on stage, keeps this from being a family show) is reproduced with a high-quality image and high-quality sound. The problem of how to shoot so stationary an event is solved with kaleidoscopic and psychedelic visual …
The directorial feature from cinematographer Ellen Kuras portrays a pivotal decade in the life of American war correspondent and photographer, Lee Miller (Kate Winslet). Miller’s singular talent resulted in some of the 20th century's most indelible images of war, including an iconic photo of Miller herself, posing defiantly in Hitler's …
The young daughter of a journalist disappears into the desert without a trace— eight years later, the broken family is shocked when she is returned to them, as what should be a joyful reunion turns into a living nightmare. Written and directed by Cronin, and starring Jack Reynor, Laia Costa, …
Lee Daniels' schmaltzy abridgement of the Civil Rights movement. Cecil Gaines (Forest Whitaker), an African-American man born into a family of sharecroppers and schooled in the art of “knowing he’s black,” spends 34 years of his life in domestic servitude under seven presidents. While Cecil dignifiedly fights to change the …
A Rapture story with its heart in the right place: that is, in sympathy with the poor souls who are left to wonder what sort of God just snatches away their kids, their parents, and their airplane pilots. According to the tagline, The End of the World Has Only Just …
After millions of people vanish and the world falls into chaos, the only light is a charismatic leader who rises to become head of the U.N. But does he bring hope for a better future? Or is it the end of the world?
Hokey supernatural thriller set in the English countryside in a traditional Old Dark House, complete with spooky housekeeper and battalion of cats. Sam Elliott is incongruously entertaining as a California tourist with a handsome suntan, a Mark Spitz mustache, and a fondness for expressions like "No deal" and "Take it …
Romantic comedy-thriller of the type populated (and lorded over) by Nick and Nora Charles. And a perfectly acceptable example of the type for anyone who remembers the Thin Man series as something less than sacrosanct classics (who remembers them, in other words, clearly). The one who makes the difference here …
A wish-fulfillment fairy tale, more voguishly known as an empowerment myth, concerning a So-Cal sorority sister, Fashion Merchandising major, and Miss Hawaiian Tropic runner-up (Reese Witherspoon, in her mile-wide vein of mockery) who gets herself admitted into Harvard Law School to chase after her ex-boyfriend -- and oh by the …
The sequel follows our pretty-in-pink Harvard Law grad to our nation's capital (or Capitol) as a legislative aide with a personal agenda: to outlaw animal testing in the cosmetics industry and simultaneously to free the mother of her pet Chihuahua, Bruiser, in time for her nuptials. (Wishful point of reference: …
How do you make a boring film about gangster twins in ‘60s London, one of whom is a violent, paranoid schizophrenic homosexual, and both of whom are played by Tom Hardy? Easy: neglect the violent, paranoid schizophrenic homosexual and play up the other one’s girlfriend. While you’re at it, give …
Wagnerian comic book: a primeval forest (with Maxfield Parrish-ish atmospherics), a pair of unicorns, pointy-eared elves, pointy-nosed agents of darkness, and naturally "a champion, bold of heart and pure in spirit." It's a thing to delight the very very innocent and a thing to depress the even very slightly sophisticated. …
Wagnerian comic book: a primeval forest (with Maxfield Parrish-ish atmospherics), a pair of unicorns, pointy-eared elves, pointy-nosed agents of darkness, and naturally "a champion, bold of heart and pure in spirit." It's a thing to delight the very very innocent and a thing to depress the even very slightly sophisticated. …
Overblown anecdote about a shipboard foundling (found at the turn of the century and hence christened "1900") who never leaves the transatlantic liner throughout all his days, despite an untaught pianistic prowess, in styles ranging from Late Romantic to Impressionist to boogie-woogie ("When you don't know what it is, it's …
Another Robert Redford literary adaptation (what else?), complete with a voice-over narration almost as nagging as that of A River Runs through It. The narrator is an uncredited Jack Lemmon, suffering a prefatory heart attack on the golf course, lying flat on his back in the rough off the fairway, …