Author Archives: Roger Moore

Well-cast and acted with sympathic warmth and wit, “Making it Up” is an object lesson in the shortcomings of relying on voice-over narration to tell your story on screen. It’s a dark, maddeningly-manic and almost cute dip into loving someone … Continue reading →

The golden age of big screen satire began, more or less, with 1964’s “Doctor Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb,” peaked with “Network” (1976) and wrapped up with “Being There” and “Life of Brian” … Continue reading →

Alan Arkin, who passed away today at the grand old age of 89, was one of the great comic actors of his generation and a couple of generations that followed. He was one of my all-time favorites, and if he … Continue reading →

With its same sex-coupled hero, its shapeshifting “monster” heroine at war with the “small minded,” its score adorned with “The Banana Splits Song,” a street sax player covering “Careless Whisper,” and characters testing a futuristic car sound system with a … Continue reading →

One of the gifts or curses of reviewing films for decades is that ability to spot a fiasco in the first few frames. Some movies start off with promise and lose it. Some stumble but give you the hope that … Continue reading →

There’s always a hint of defiance in mentioning the movie you’re most determined to steal from. It’s a dare, like “Sure, COMPARE our movie to that one.” Usually, it’s a bit misguided. “You can’t outrun the curse! Haven’t you ever … Continue reading →

Tense, tight and comically dark, movies like “Very Big Shot” are why you take cinematic journeys Around the World with Netflix. If not for the streaming service resurrecting this Lebannese gem from 2016, it might have passed unnoticed, save for … Continue reading →

Richard Armitage gives off Big Liam Neeson energy in “The Man from Rome,” a papal thriller about land grabs, murder and historical church coverups set in that picture postcard in the south of Spain, Seville. But while casting the veteran … Continue reading →

Submitted for your approval, two men sequestered in a “Biosphere” of their own creation, isolated from civilization, Beckett characters in a Pirandello parable of human evolution in a time of ecological crisis and existential disconnect due to ever-changing pronouns. It’s … Continue reading →

Some decent fight choreography and a couple of well-staged shootouts decorate the Malay thriller “The Assistant,” an action pic for those who like their violence bloody and something close to non-stop. It takes a very long while to get going, … Continue reading →