Monthly Archives: January 2020

“The Hard Way” is a C-grade action pic filmed in Bucharest. There’s lot of gunplay, a couple of decent brawls, and few pithy one-liners, trash talk mostly, from Michael Jai White (the once and always “Black Dynamite”). “Let me hip … Continue reading →

A big Oscar announcement day for “Joker,” “Jo Jo Rabbit,” Netflix, “1917” and “Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood.” Nine best picture nominees meant that at least four best pictures apparently directed themselves. No nom for Greta Gerwig, in other words. … Continue reading →

Who will be nominated, who peaked with The Golden Globes or Critics Choice Awards? Who will be content to pull an Indie Spirit Award nomination? And will this be the only time The Academy jams up the schedule like this … Continue reading →

Another top ten finish in the US puts “Little Women” at $74.5 million in North America. Tally that with $17 million+ in Britain, $15 million elsewhere and Greta Gerwig has turned Louisa May Alcott’s warhorse novel into a $107 million … Continue reading →

In America and much of the Western world, film schools are an indulgence of the children of privilege. Talent from other classes occasionally makes its way in, but by large, that’s who you see there. In South Africa, in the … Continue reading →

Remember Paris Hilton? Because you have to in order to “get” the um, “jokes” in the “comic” spoof “Reality Queen!” It’s about an about-to-fade reality TV star trying to recapture her status in the Age of Memes. And it’s about … Continue reading →

Wise are the filmmakers who look to Alfred Hitchcock, “the master of suspense,” for inspiration, twists and story structure in creating their screen thriller. But foolish are they who bollix things as thoroughly as the hapless folks who made “The … Continue reading →

It’s nigh on impossible to tell a gay coming-out/coming-of-age story on the screen these days without occasionally lapsing into melodrama. The decades of such films that precede every new entry can’t seem to find new characters or new waypoints to … Continue reading →

The faintest hint of “The Notebook” pops up in “Live Twice, Love Once (Vivir dos veces),” a wistful if somewhat strained Alzheimer’s romance from Spain. Emilio (Oscar Martínez) is an elderly mathematics professor who isn’t quite ready to accept that … Continue reading →

A Feb. 21 sequel to the creepy doll movie, this one with Katie Holmes as the mom menaced.