Posted November 13, 2013in Film Review
“Go For Sisters” 2 stars Not Rated 122 minutes Drama Starring: LisaGay Hamilton, Yolonda Ross, Edward James Olmos John Sayles’ latest effort a dud. Still, even if the legendary independent filmmaker never made another better-than-average movie, the auteur responsible for such instant classics as “The Return of the Secaucus Seven,”
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Posted November 06, 2013in Film Review
“Big Sur” 2 stars Rated R 74 minutes Drama Starring: Jean-Marc Barr, Kate Bosworth, Josh Lucas Adapting Jack Kerouac’s late career novel “Big Sur” (1962) proves an awkward challenge for director-screenwriter Michael Polish. That isn’t to say that the film is a complete failure, but it is disappointing. Nonetheless, it
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Posted October 30, 2013in Film Review
“All is Lost” 5 stars Rated PG-13 105 minutes Action Starring: Robert Redford Robert Redford gives the finest performance of his career in writer-director J.C. Chandor’s literal and metaphorical tale of one man’s attempts to survive on the high seas. Redford carries Chandor’s one-man showcase with a depth of character
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Posted October 23, 2013in Film Review
“12 Years a Slave” 0 stars Rated R 133 minutes Drama Starring: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael K. Williams, Michael Fassbender Steve McQueen is not a storyteller. He is an exploitation filmmaker specializing in outré subject matter who passes himself off as a cinematic artiste. He’s a phony who has managed to
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Posted October 16, 2013in Film Review
“CBGB” 2 stars Rated R 101 minutes Drama Starring: Alan Rickman, Malin Akerman, Justin Bartha You have to hand it to director/co-writer Randall Miller for trying to take on the hornets’ nest of the punk rock movement: CBGB’s, the grungy Lower East Side bar that gave punk a home base
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Posted October 09, 2013in Film Review
“Captain Phillips” 4 stars Rated PG-13 134 minutes Action Starring: Tom Hanks, Barkhad Abdi, Barkhad Abdirahman The grueling 2009 kidnapping ordeal suffered by U.S. cargo-ship captain Richard Phillips comes to tangible life in Paul Greengrass’ nonstop nail-biter. Nerves will be rattled. Regardless of the audience’s political opinions of the underlying
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Posted October 02, 2013in Film Review
“Rush” 2 stars Rated R 123 minutes Action Starring: Daniel Brühl, Chris Hemsworth, Olivia Wilde Ron Howard’s fast-paced portrait of one of Formula One’s fiercest rivalries is a hyper-compartmentalized affair. Everything in Peter Morgan’s too-tightly knit script occurs as one more bubble of narrative information equal to the last. The
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Posted September 25, 2013in Film Review
“The Prisoners” 3 stars Rated R 146 minutes Action Starring: Hugh Jackman, Jake Gyllenhaal, Viola Davis While it lacks the oomph of a concrete true-crime drama such as “Zodiac,” Denis Villeneuve’s taut innovative suspense-thriller keeps you guessing. Renowned for his deserving 2011 Oscar-nominated drama “Incendies,” Villeneuve keeps the narrative puzzle
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Posted September 18, 2013in Film Review
“The Grandmaster” 3 stars Rated PG-13 108 minutes Action Starring: Tony Leung Chiu Wai, Ziyi Zhang, Jin Zhang Director Wong Kar Wai’s first return to the martial arts genre since his extravagant 1994 cinematic feast “Ashes of Time” is a stylistically profound dissection of kung fu as practiced in 1930s-
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Posted September 11, 2013in Film Review
“Salinger” 3 stars Rated PG-13 120 minutes Documentary Starring: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Edward Norton, Judd Apatow Shane Salerno’s exhaustive bio-documentary about one of America’s most enigmatic and reclusive literary figures nonetheless manages to leave out essential elements that are only alluded to in the film. A cavalcade of interviews with
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