Monthly Archives: December 2023

The transitioning transgender man has a moment at the pharmacy. He’s finished up his purchase with a request for “Plan B,” the “morning after” birth control pills. And the pharmacist is a bit confused, which the still-female Feña disarms with … Continue reading →

A modern day “mission gone wrong” combat thriller, also starring Milo Ventigmilia and Luke Hemsworth, this one makes it to screens right around Valentine’s Day. Looks generic, and feels Aussie. Let’s see what we see.

This one really closes the deal, right? Might even erase memories of David Lynch’s more twisted and truncated “Dune.”

What a curiosity Bogart’s “Sirocco” is, a “bizarro” “Casablanca” that mirrors Humphrey Bogart’s definitive romantic lead performance, but sees this American meddling in the Middle East as an amoral cad, precisely the way noble cafe owner Rick Blaine described himself … Continue reading →

Make it stop. Because at this point, we’ve kind of given up on “make it better.” Warner Brothers and DC finish the job of wasting the great casting coup of their “Justice League” era comic book film adaptations in a … Continue reading →

A clumsy riff on Shakespeare with mismatched leads, a bit of nudity – only some of it sexual — and a busload of F Bombs, “Anyone But You” is about as close as Hollywood can get to a rom-com that … Continue reading →

The Christmas box office this year won’t be one for the record books. A few big films that might have been bigger, a family treat that keeps on giving and nothing spectacular among the titles with lower expectations. “Aquaman 2: … Continue reading →

His was an unlikely stardom, arriving late as fashions and tastes in movie manhood changed to suit him. “He wasn’t very tall,” Humphrey Bogart’s sometime co-star Mary Astor wrote. “Vocally, he had a range from A to B, his eyes … Continue reading →

It’s time to accept that those “Release the Snyder Cut” t-shirts aren’t aging well. Because as Joseph Campbell taught us, the most important element in any “hero’s journey” is to pick a hero worth following. Writer-director Zack Snyder isn’t that … Continue reading →

Any resemblence between Shakespeare and the Polish rom-com franchise “The Taming of the Shrewd” is abandoned altogether for “The Taming of the Shrewd 2,” the sequel to the popular, franctious and almost-bawd rom-com of last year. So I guess that’s … Continue reading →