Tag Archives: movie-reviews

Movie Review: A Veteran adjusts to Civilian Life with “My Dead Friend Zoe”

Posted on February 26, 2025 by Roger Moore

Perhaps only an Iraq War combat vet would dare to tackle Post Traumatic Stress Disorder with the sort of sarcasm and gallows humor of “My Dead Friend Zoe.” Director and co-writer and ex-paratrooper Kyle Hausmann-Stokes’ film’s title character is a … Continue reading →

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Netflixable? The Hallmarkish charms of “La Dolce Villa”

Posted on February 24, 2025 by Roger Moore

You have to get past the sneaky feeling that the rom-com “La Dolce Villa” wasn’t just conceived and rigidly scripted according to “Hallmark” formula, but by some new AI that the greeting card company rents out to production companies. Find … Continue reading →

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Classic Film Review: Jeremy Irons leads a Polish Home Renovation in 1980s London — “Moonlighting” (1982)

Posted on February 11, 2025 by Roger Moore

A cut-rate Polish work crew slips into wintry 1981 London to do an off-the-books home renovation in “Moonlighting,” Jerzy Skolimowski’s droll and intimate comment on capitalism, the collapse of communism and the horrors of cut-rate home repair. It’s one of … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: It’s a wedding, and Reese, Celia, Meredith, Geraldine and Will say “You’re Cordially Invited,” Y’all

Posted on January 31, 2025 by Roger Moore

“Commitment” is a cornerstone of the marriage contract. And it’s damned important in a romantic comedy about marriages as well. Say this for the cast of writer-director Nicholas Stoller’s “You’re Cordially Invited.” These kids — and Will Ferrell and Reese … Continue reading →

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Documentary Review: An Italian who inspired Tarantino, “Piero Vivarelli: Life as a B-Movie”

Posted on January 21, 2025 by Roger Moore

Piero Vivarelli was an Italian B-movie filmmaker, a “genre” director who dabbled in several genres, most famous (at home) for his musicarello pop and rock movies of the 60s. If you’ve never heard of Rita Pavone, Tony Renis, Mina and … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: French couple constrained by the limits of “Just the Two of Us”

Posted on December 23, 2024 by Roger Moore

“Just the Two of Us” is a textbook domestic abuse melodrama, a French film with just enough mystery about it to make us wonder if it will transform into a thriller. Based on a novel by Éric Reinhardt, Valérie Donzelli’s … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: “Moana 2” is nobody’s idea of “an instant classic”

Posted on December 7, 2024 by Roger Moore

Here’s how I described Disney’s 2016 blockbuster “Moana” when it came out. “It is an instant classic, a near masterpiece and the best Disney animated film since its last Golden Age, which produced “The Little Mermaid” and “The Lion King.” … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: A Boxer readies Body and Soul for the “Day of the Fight”

Posted on December 4, 2024 by Roger Moore

“Day of the Fight” is a sentimental and soulful “fight picture,” a movie that follows a former champ through every bit of personal business he feels he has to take care of before his “comeback” that night. The actor-turned-director Jack … Continue reading →

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Classic Film Review: Bronson Brawls and an action auteur is born — Walter Hill’s “Hard Times” (1975)

Posted on December 3, 2024 by Roger Moore

There’s a gentility about “Hard Times,” a bare-knuckle brawling drama set during the Great Depression. It’s a genre piece populated with veteran character actors playing archetypes bound by their own code, playing their parts in a story so pre-ordained that … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: Struggling Siblings reconnect, or try to — “Scrap”

Posted on December 2, 2024 by Roger Moore

Thirtyish Beth smiles and gives her five-year-old daughter a squeeze. “Gremlin, you know I will always take care of you.” As we’ve heard Beth lie like she breathes, we doubt that, even if the little girl she named Barbara but … Continue reading →

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