Monthly Archives: December 2024

Classic Film Review: A Scottish Bay, a Burt and a Baby-Faced Peter Capaldi — “Local Hero” (1983)

Posted on December 31, 2024 by Roger Moore

Oh to make the pilgrimage to Pennan, flying in to Aberdeen, recreating the journey a “Local Hero” makes in perhaps the quaintest, cutest film of that golden age of excess, the ’80s. Scottish writer-director Bill Forsyth’s “Gregory’s Girl” announced to … Continue reading →

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Netflixable? Polish “Justice” turns Old (Communist) School in this ’90s thriller

Posted on December 31, 2024 by Roger Moore

“Justice” is a solid if somewhat unsatisfying slow-burn thriller from Poland, a drama set shortly after the country shed Soviet era Russian dominatation. It’s about a heist that went wrong, the pitiless murders that took place when that happened and … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: An Estranged Father and Son find middle ground at the “Chicken Coop”

Posted on December 30, 2024 by Roger Moore

“Chicken Coop” is a drab indie dramedy about dogmatic parents, children who left home to escape that and “bonding” over home repair as they fight over literally everything else. Decent acting doesn’t atone for low-stakes drama, low-heat scenes and dated, … Continue reading →

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Classic Film Review: “Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror,” Murnau invents the Vampire Movie (1922)

Posted on December 29, 2024 by Roger Moore

It has been many years since I had seen the original “Nosferatu: A Symphony in Horror,” an “inspired by ‘Dracula’” vampire film that truly invented “the vampire movie” when it came out in 1922. In this historic silent masterwork the … Continue reading →

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Netflixable? Polish investigator tracks a bloody-minded killer, “Colors of Evil — Red”

Posted on December 29, 2024 by Roger Moore

“Colors of Evil: Red” is a well-acted, sinister and solidly built Polish serial killer thriller based on a novel by Malgorzata Oliwia Sobczak. We follow an intrepid and “new” prosecutor/investigator (Jakub Gieszal) and the judge (Maja Ostaszewskya) whose daughter might … Continue reading →

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Netflixable? “Girl Haunts Boy,” a teen romance for tweens

Posted on December 28, 2024 by Roger Moore

Here’s an exceptionally mild-mannered Netflix teen romance built around a couple of cute young leads made “stars” by earlier Netflix outings. Peyton List (“Kobra Kai”) plays a flapper teen who swipes a magic ring and dies in 1928, only to … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: A Tale Trapped at “The Crossroads,” Never Going Anywhere

Posted on December 28, 2024 by Roger Moore

“The Crossroads” is the sort of movie you get when you park two attractive but bland young actors on a modestly scenic piece of real estate and take romance pretty much off the table. A stunningly dull chat-a-thon of silences, … Continue reading →

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Classic Film Review: Danny Kaye goes Marxist as “The Inspector General” (1949)

Posted on December 27, 2024 by Roger Moore

How might a moviegoer in 1949 have responded to Danny Kaye in the musical version of Gogol’s “The Inspector General?” Watching it anew, my hot take is “It’s a Marx Bros. musical with Kaye trying to play all four Marx … Continue reading →

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Rediscovering Pete Seeger through “A Complete Unknown”

Posted on December 26, 2024 by Roger Moore

Casual fans will be blown away and even hardcore ones impressed by the uncanny musical impersonations that James Mangold’s “A Complete Unknown” Bob Dylan biography is built upon. Timothee Chalamet‘s utter channeling of Babyfaced Bob, the early years, getting the … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: “Mufasa,” everything we didn’t need to know about “The Lion King”

Posted on December 26, 2024 by Roger Moore

The CGI animated savannahs, rivers and rock formations of Africa are photo-real, and the animals populating it have never been more realistically rendered than they are in “Mufasa: The Lion King.” Disney felt the need to have the lions, warthog … Continue reading →

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