LIVE BY NIGHT is so sumptuously photographed that it can almost make up for its shortcomings. Based on the novel of the same name by Dennis Lehane, it has weathered its translation by becoming a slight story heinously overblown. It also suffers from too many false endings. So many, in fact, that I can’t vouch… Read More »
MUPPETS, THE
THE MUPPETS have always had a sweetly subversive humor about them. They were never mean spirited, but when they were at their best, the jokes were sharp with a rollicking sense of the absurd and a keen sense of characterization. Jason Segal, co-writer and co-star of the latest Muppets vehicle, has homed in on exactly what gave… Read More »
PUNCTURE
PUNCTURE is a remarkable story told in a disappointingly unremarkable way. Based on a true story, this tale of a small-time lawyers taking on Big Pharma offers no surprises about the evil that the profit motive can produce, but it does have one enormously redeeming quality that makes it worth watching. Chris Evans. As Mike… Read More »
ADAPTATION
ADAPTATION is the story of one man’s epic quest to adapt the unadaptable. In this case, turning THE ORCHID THIEF by Susan Orlean, into a feature film. The problem is that the non-fiction book is a rambling account of a rogue orchid hunter with the history of orchid mania and a glimpse of contemporary Seminole… Read More »
SEABISCUIT
If you are very lucky, who wont know anything about Seabiscuits story so that this remarkable true tale can unfold for you in all its improbable glory. Gary Ross adaptation of Laura Hillenbrands bestseller, also titled Seabiscuit, is a heartwarming, uplifting experience and while such adjectives are not usually paired with films that are also… Read More »
SILVER CITY
SILVER CITY, the title of John Sayles latest film, sounds like a pale reflection of El Dorado, the mythical city of gold that European sought way back when. They were obsessed with dreams of wealth beyond imagination and the power it would buy for them. With eyes on that prize, they failed to see the… Read More »
CAPOTE
Bennett Miller’s CAPOTE, based on the book by Gerald Clarke, depicts the juncture in the life of Truman Capote (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) as he goes from being a respected author of note to the most famous writer in America. Certainly the book that triggered the transformation, “In Cold Blood”, whose writing process is the time… Read More »
BREACH
In a moment of supreme and unintentional irony, Robert Hanssen, the quarry in BREACH, tells his assistant, Eric O’Neill, who doesn’t know yet what his real assignment concerning Hanssen is, that he was never interested in making headlines, only history. Of course, they will shortly be making both, but neither of them is aware of that yet.… Read More »
THE KINGDOM
THE KINGDOM wants to be SYRIANA by way of BLACK HAWK DOWN, but by earnestly following those templates, it renders itself an unsatisfying pastiche that has neither conviction nor surprise, much less the pervasive sense of uncertainty for which it so desperately strives. Instead, it comes across as schmaltzy, predictable, and insidiously imperialistic. It’s the… Read More »