Yearly Archives: 2016

  Monty Python’s Terry Jones uses puppets as a way of livening up a talking-economic-heads documentary about capitalism’s psychology-driven business cycles in “Boom Bust Boom.” But the biggest smirks in “Boom Bust Boom,” an otherwise most informative explanation of why … Continue reading →

It’s a cut throat industry, that music business. Infested with sharks, drowning in money and drugs, easy sex, a world of “loaded dice and poisoned chalices,” where success is dictated by luck or timing. It’s a wonder anybody gets out … Continue reading →

What kind of mother names her son “Eloi?” You know, after the pretty, gullible, post-humanity humans of H.G. Wells’ “The Time Machine”? The sort of woman who then nicknames the kid “Lolo” and is shocked when that poor judgment pays … Continue reading →

The mysteries of the heater, the high hard one, baseball’s overpowering pitch, are explained by the game’s power pitchers, a physicist, a brain cognition expert and the hapless hitters who have to swing at smoke in “Fastball,” a very engaging … Continue reading →

Here’s a lean little slice of sci-fi that proves you can be thought-provoking on a budget. “Creative Control” is about blurring lines between virtual reality and reality and the dangers the narcissists among us face when our desires take precedence … Continue reading →

Zoe Bell, probably the most famous living stunt-woman thanks to Quentin Tarantino making her a co-star of “Grindhouse” and “The Hateful Eight,” takes her shot at leading lady in “Camino,” a chase-through-the-jungle B-picture set in revolutionary Latin America. It’s a … Continue reading →

Gerard Butler has been Jean-Claude Van Dammed to a career of blood-drenched B-movies like “London Has Fallen.” Well, and big-budget dogs like “Gods of Egypt.”: At least he’s not all Egypto-tanned for this one. “London,” the sequel to “Olympus Has Fallen,” … Continue reading →

You’ll want to catch “The Wave” because it’s fun to see Hollywood disaster movie cliches rendered in Norwegian. It’s got a Jeremiah, warning the locals that The End is Nigh, the end in this case being a tsunami in their … Continue reading →

Tina Fey gives her finest, funniest big screen performance by essentially doing in “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot” what she did so well on TV’s “30 Rock.” She plays the lovelorn, put-upon and insecure woman in a man’s world, and surrounds herself … Continue reading →

Funny that no one ever thought to pair up screen veterans Richard Schiff and Ricky Jay as brothers before. They look alike, and have this complimentary intensity — Schiff (“The West Wing”) and his quiet, simmering, rational rage, Mamet-pal Jay … Continue reading →