Monthly Archives: December 2022

As the author of this New York Mag piece and its accompanying genealogy chart acknowledges, show business isn’t the only place nepotism exists in the American “meritocracy.” An early direct encounter I had with that was lightly mocking, when in … Continue reading →

Boy, the things fanboys will sit through just to see Japanese women in short skirts and knee-boots fight it out with samurai swords. The things screenwriters have to do to set a samurai sword-fighting movie in cheap-to-film-in Budapest. The skills … Continue reading →

The formula for a screen musical biography was already established by the time “Rhapsody in Blue,” which celebrated the brief, brilliant life of George Gershwin in a 1945 film that came out just a couple of years after his death. … Continue reading →

“The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse” is a simply-animated, elegiac parable about a lost child and the friends he makes among the talking wildlife who try to help him. It’s based on a best selling book by … Continue reading →

Disappearances, a connection to the comic book world, a deadpan anti-heroine, a fangirl/fanboy fave or two in the cast. Hayley Law (“Riverdale), Famke Janssen, Donal Logue, Keith Powers, with writer-director Avan Jogia as a heavy. Jan 13.

“Who’s a Good Boy?” is a Mexican variation on the “last guy to lose his virginity” teen sex comedy, one that takes its title from the label for guys who end up in “The Friend Zone,” aka being someone’s pet … Continue reading →

Intriguing world building here, as you might expect. Starving artists are a fascinating self absorbed community, here peopled by believably cute eccentrics. Judd Hirsch is the big name in the supporting cast. “Showing Up” shows up in late spring.

“Waking Up Dead” is an emotionally flatlining romantic dramedy that can’t decide if it would rather be a glib gloss of shallow actors and their shallow lives, or a glib gloss of the struggles that might be hidden beneath all … Continue reading →

Noirish thrillers aren’t wholly unknown in mainland China, but so few have been exported over the years that they’re still unicorns. This is Xiaofeng Li‘s follow up to “Ash,” which covered similar genre territory. Jan 17, it’s available in the … Continue reading →

A moment, if you please, for one last bow and sword-sweeping flourish from Antonio Banderas in the guise of perhaps his greatest screen creation, that swashbuckling catnip-to-the-kitties and the kiddies, Puss-in Boots. The star of “Puss-in-Boots: The Last Wish” is … Continue reading →