Category Archives: Reviews, previews, profiles and movie news

There are a few elements of writer-director Philip Yuryev’s “The Whaler Boy” that are off-putting enough to warrant addressing them straight off. It opens with a luridly-detailed behind-the-scenes look at an online sex-chat brothel, a scene that goes on longer … Continue reading →

Here’s one last “Around the World with Netflix” holiday offering for 2021. Better yet, think of “1000 Miles from Christmas” as the first holiday film of 2022. Let’s get an early start — 360 days before Christmas — on the … Continue reading →

“Three Came Home” is a fascinating curio from a Hollywood and America on the cusp of change. This 1951 POW drama was the first to cover ground that “A Town Like Alice,” the movie and later TV series, the series … Continue reading →

A low-budget Belgian thriller of a few years back becomes a lean if not wholly logical James McAoy vehicle of the same title in “My Son,” which has him and Claire Foy playing divorced parents frantically searching for their missing … Continue reading →

I’m guessing you have to know a lot more about the pre-history of the Spanish Civil War than I did going into “Gun City,” a sprawling multi-character muddle film noir take on those years titled “La sombra de la Ley” … Continue reading →

A filmmaker of rare sensibilities, a genuine “actor’s director” who helped Matthew McConaughey and Jared Leto win Oscars, and after “Wild,” became Reese Witherspoon’s go-to filmmaker for her acclaimed cable series “Big Little Lies,” then “borrowed” by Amy Adams for … Continue reading →

Today’s Around the World with Netflix offering is a first year residents med school comedy from Brazil. “Lulli” borrows its premise from the “What Women Want/What Men Want” mind-reading comedies. But in situations and dialogue, in Portuguese or in English, … Continue reading →

“One of Our Aircraft is Missing” has plenty that labels it as dated, a combat film of simple set-ups, primitive effects, plucky characters and attitudes easily seen as morale-boosting propaganda today. But what’s striking about this early production of The … Continue reading →

There’ve been a few attempts, over the decades, to rewrite the history of Billy Wilder’s 1964 clunker “Kiss Me, Stupid.” It’s “underrated” thanks to a winning Dean Martin as “Dino” kperformance, worth re-assessing because of a risque late scene Wilder … Continue reading →