Monthly Archives: May 2018

The title “The Sisters Brothers” tells you the tone they’re going for — darkly comic, bloody. Jake Gyllenhaal and flavor-of-the-moment Rami Malek also star in this comic horse opera. And Rutger Hauer. Who plays the Sisters Brothers’ mama? Carol Kane. … Continue reading →

Forest Whitaker is the journalist trying to find the truth. Johnny Depp is the cop who may not know who shot Biggie, but has an idea why he DOESN’T know, in this trailer for the Sept. 7 release. A favorite … Continue reading →

Well, we all needed Victoria Justice to play one last tormented teenager. We all needed to hear her blurt out “What the F?” like Nickelodeon or The Disney Channel wasn’t there to tell her not to. “The Outcasts” unleashes Justice, … Continue reading →

Return we now to the early 1970s, the Golden Age of softcore porn, the days of “The Story of O” and “Emmanuelle” and ooh lah lah — “Immoral Tales”   Days when the cognoscenti could say, “Oh, that’s not obscene. … Continue reading →

The brute simplicity of “O Matador/The Killer” makes it feel like an over-budgeted student film, at times. This Brazilian B-Western as has a striking, alien setting — the desert lands of Pernambuco — and the story and style of storytelling … Continue reading →

My favorite book as a teen was “Papillon,” written ex-con Henri Charriere detailing his years in the French penal colonies of South America — French Guiana and Devil’s Island off its coast. Nicknamed “Papillon,” French for “butterfly,” after a tattoo … Continue reading →

Is there an actor in the history of film who’s enjoyed a better third act in his career than Christopher Plummer? Rhetorical question, of course there hasn’t. An Oscar, his choice among all the roles available to actors of his … Continue reading →

God help me, but I’m a sucker for a good literary screen biography, and the more period perfect the better. The likes of “Becoming Jane,” “Shakespeare in Love” and “The Last Station” might live by formula, a “this inspired that” … Continue reading →

Is the Han Solo stand-alone storyline re-opening an old George Lucas recut and messed up “A New Hope” debate? Maybe. Probably. And is one character from that debated scene glimpsed in the climactic brawl? Maybe.