HOTEL TRANSYLVANIA: TRANSFORMANIA is a relentlessly obvious and overplayed exercise in draining the last dregs from a moribund franchise. Let me put it this way. Adam Sandler, not known for discriminating taste in projects, took a pass on this material that continues the saga of Drac, the vampiric proprietor of the titular establishment that caters… Read More »
BORAT SUBSEQUENT MOVIEFILM
Borat Sagdiyev, once the second-best journalist in Kazakhstan, makes a return trip to America in BORAT: SUBSEQUENT MOVIEFILM, and he finds a country not so much changed in its dynamics from his last visit, as one that is more extreme. The jokes are harsher, and in many cases funnier. And they need to be. Since… Read More »
THE WAR WITH GRANDPA
Amid the stale jokes and flat direction to be found in THE WAR WITH GRANDPA, one is subjected to cartoonish takes on elder abuse, child abuse, and I’m pretty sure that the bass didn’t enjoy its time during the fishing sequence. Based on the book of the same name by Robert Kimmel Smith, the film… Read More »
Click here to listen to the interview. The first thing you notice about Ben Mendelsohn when you meet him in person is how very blue his eyes are. The second thing is his impish sense of humor coupled with a penchant for being the perfect host (he insisted on ordering coffee for the both of… Read More »
HEARTS BEAT LOUD
Click here for the flashback interview with Brett Haley and Katharine Ross for THE HERO. Timing is everything, as we learn in Brett Haley’s HEARTS BEAT LOUD, an irresistible, perfectly balanced comedy-drama about love, loss, and that old truism about the only constant that we can count on is change. It’s also Nick Offerman being… Read More »
LOGAN LUCKY
Transposing the milieu from glitz to grits, Steven Soderbergh’s LOGAN LUCKY does more set an intricate heist flick in the backroads of Appalachia, it also makes a sly statement about class, culture, and our preconceived notions about those two things. It also has something that most Soderbergh films lack for all their visual impact: heart.… Read More »
THE GLASS CASTLE — Jeannette Walls Interview
Jeannette Walls is a larger-than-life personality, brimming with energy and a ready laugh that fills a room. That she is still laughing after the childhood she describes in her best-selling memoir, THE GLASS CASTLE is a testament to her innate toughness, and to her ability to appreciate the wonder with which her eccentric parents imbued… Read More »
WHY HIM?
Long before he was mild-mannered chemistry teacher turned fearsome drug lord on Breaking Bad, Bryan Cranston made his mark in television comedy by, among other things, keeping Malcolm in the middle, and tending to Seinfeld’s teeth. Those comedic chops stand him in good stead for WHY HIM?, an intermittently hilarious hybrid of the buddy film… Read More »
TRAIN TO BUSAN (Busanhaeng)
New zombies, new rules. If TRAIN TO BUSAN did nothing but find a new take on zombies, it would be worth your time, but this Korean gem goes the extra yardage to gift us with an engrossing story that contains only a soupçon of well-regulated sappy sentiment. It’s far more interested in observing what happens… Read More »
Matt Ross is CAPTAIN FANTASTIC
CAPTAIN FANTASTIC opens with a deer hunt. It’s graphic. It’s violent. Yet there is something about it that shows enormous respect for the animal, and for the young man who brings it down using only a knife. This is not sport, it’s food. That sequence was the first thing I brought up on July 7,… Read More »