Monthly Archives: May 2022

It was a city remote enough from the rest of the world’s experience or knowledge of Chinese geography that we couldn’t place it on a map. But Wuhan’s name would enter the consciousness in infamy as a global pandemic burst … Continue reading →

Thrillers beyond number have been built on the “throw a bunch of characters together and ‘test’ them” trope. So why not “Escape the Field?” Characters wakes up in a tractless/endless corn patch, with a single sinister scarecrow watching over it. … Continue reading →

A Frenchwoman of a certain age considers the question from the US Customs officer at LAX, and speaks her mind. “I want to start a new life.” And so she sort of does, 50 and “putting herself out back there” … Continue reading →

Leave it to Sam Raimi to sidetrack the efficient but creatively flatlining Marvel money train of Avengers idolatry. Granted, the director of the sparkling, soulful original “Spider-Man” trilogy spends the first two acts of “Doctor Strange in the Universe of … Continue reading →

You can make the argument that Richard Pryor was the greatest, and I’ll hear you out. Some will toss Lenny Bruce in there to stir it up. But once you’ve said your piece, we’ll look at the evidence, the influence, … Continue reading →

“Mishan Impossible” is a picaresque tale of clueless but cute kids hunting “India’s most wanted criminal” to score some cash, set against the ultra-violence of India’s child trafficking epidemic. It takes forEVER to get started — a 30 minute prologue … Continue reading →

This is why we travel “Around the World with Netflix.” We peek into other cultures, weigh their differing values, mores and customs. Sometimes, we puzzle over how different we can be, from culture to culture, continent to continent. And sometimes, … Continue reading →

Roger Michell, the South African-born British director of theater, film and TV, passed away without notice (“undisclosed”) last fall, before his final two filmed works — one of them a new documentary about Britain’s longest reigning queen — were released. … Continue reading →