Author Archives: Roger Moore

We will see worse movies this year than “The Great Wall.” But we won’t sit through one more cynical. It’s Chinese pandering — pure agitprop — packaged as Hollywood poppycock. I can hear the pitch now — “Get your MESSAGE … Continue reading →

It’s odd to think that the ancient art form of burlesque has any place in our exhibitionist age. If Lady Gaga and legions of wannabes are willing to bare all, for free, on a red carpet, on Instagram or Facebook … Continue reading →

Telling the full story of Ukraine’s tortured history as a subservient state to Russia, then the U.S.S.R., and more recently Russia again would take a mini series. So “Bitter Harvest” zeroes in on the most infamous Evil Empire crime against … Continue reading →

The Old West has never seemed bloodier, grimmer, more Godless or lawless than the version rendered by Dutch filmmaker Martin Koolhoven. The director of the pictorially striking and tense World War II in the Occupied Countries drama “Winter in Wartime” … Continue reading →

The first animated film to finally suck the life out of “Sing!” has arrived, and “The LEGO Batman Movie” is packing them in to the tune of $55 million on its opening weekend, per Deadline.com.  Parents may already own earlier … Continue reading →

The Great Poet played his part, almost too well. An egoist and charmer, he could be relied on to recite verse, on demand, at parties, at brothels, to strangers on the street. Callous, yet soulful, devoted yet a womanizer, he … Continue reading →

It’s still as pretty as a toybox, eye candy in the brightest plastic colors and textures. The creators of the second big screen LEGO toys movie stick to the rest of the formula, as well. There’s one original pop song. … Continue reading →

Those “Fifty Shades” dullards are still flirting, fornicating, breaking up and tying up in “Fifty Shades Darker,” a film which promises “darker” but delivers “funnier” — with some of the laughs intentional. It’s a soapy sequel, a drinks-in-the-face/masked ball/helicopter crash/melodramatic … Continue reading →

Paramount has revived “The Ring” cycle with “Rings,” a middling update that has few of the chills and little of the suspense of the J-horror original, or its Hollywood version. The ever-cloudy Pacific Northwest is still home to “the videotape … Continue reading →

The fists fly, the bullets blaze and the mayhem borders on magnificent in “John Wick: Chapter 2,” a sequel that ups the artistic ante even as it boosts the body count of that sleeper hit about the assassin’s assassin played … Continue reading →