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SICARIO

September 25, 2015 By Leave a Comment

SICARIO

There are many iconic moments in SICARIO, but the one that sticks in my mind is the one where dedicated and upright FBI agent Kate Macer (Emily Blunt) is being given the lowdown from glib and slippery DOJ agent Matt Graver (Josh Brolin) about what winning the war on drugs will really entail. The camera… Read More »

Tagged With: CIA, covert ops, DOJ, drug lord, drug traffic, FBI, Juarez, Mexican-United States border, narrative, SICARIO, war on drugs

MAZE RUNNER: THE SCORCH TRIALS

September 18, 2015 By Leave a Comment

MAZE RUNNER: THE SCORCH TRIALS

THE MAZE RUNNER: SCORCH TRIALS is a fast-paced, involving adventure tale that is better than the original.  Where that installment, though entertaining enough, had the usual quota of young adult novel clichés, this one is a lean, mean look at a dystopian future run by an evil entity with noble intentions. Those are, of course,… Read More »

Tagged With: book to screen, MAZE RUNNER, narrative, sequel, young adult

PAWN SACRIFICE

September 18, 2015 By 1 Comment

PAWN SACRIFICE

Chess has never been more compelling cinematically than in PAWN SACRIFICE. Whether you know nothing about the game, or you are a grand master, the story of Bobby Fischer’s rise to the world championship, and the toll it took on his already fragile psyche, has all the suspense and intrigue of an espionage thriller. That… Read More »

Tagged With: based on a true story, Bobby Fischer, Boris Spassky, chess, cold war, government surveillance, Liev Schreiber, narrative, paranoia, PAWN SACRIFICE, politics, Steven Knight, Tobey Maguire

Chris and Paul Weitz Talk ABOUT A BOY

September 3, 2015 By Leave a Comment

Chris and Paul Weitz Talk ABOUT A BOY

Chris and Paul Weitz were the directors of the wildly successful AMERICAN PIE. I was suitably impressed that they were able to switch successfully from broad farce to an insightful, even sensitive, comedy about a man who refuses to grow up and a boy who had no choice in the matter. Talking with them, it quickly became apparent that… Read More »

Tagged With: ABOUT A BOY, AMERICAN PIE, book to screen, Chris Weitz, comedy-drama, Hugh Grant, London, narrative, Nick Hornsby, Paul Weitz, Single mother, Toni Collette

Listen to GRANDMA

August 28, 2015 By 1 Comment

Listen to GRANDMA

After her granddaughter, Sage (Julia Garner), has confided to her that she needs an abortion, Elle (Lily Tomlin) cuts right to the heart of the issue.  Not the politics, mind you. Nor the question of how a modern teenager like Sage, someone with plenty of birth-control options, found herself in this position. Elle says the… Read More »

Tagged With: abortion, Betty Friedan, credit cards, GRANDMA, grief, Lily Tomlin, mother-daughter relationship, narrative, Oscar contender, Paul Weitz, women's movement

THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E.

August 11, 2015 By 2 Comments

THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E.

Having quaffed a drink laced with something that will shortly knock him cold, Napoleon Solo (Henry Cavill) does the sensible thing. He gathers some throw-pillows and carefully places first them, and then himself, upon the nearest sofa. Once, he explains to the person responsible for slipping him the mickey, he hit his head during the… Read More »

Tagged With: 1960s, Armie Hammer, atom bomb, based on a television series, CIA, cold war, espionage, feature, Henry Cavill, Illya Kuryakin, KGB, Napoleon Solo, narrative, THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E.

Dreary DARK PLACES

August 7, 2015 By Leave a Comment

Dreary DARK PLACES

DARK PLACES is awash with dark moodiness as it tells a raggedy story that suffers from a failure of to find a narrative structure as strong or as compelling as the performance of his star, Charlize Theron. Based on the novel by Gillian Flynn, on whose novel of the same name GONE GIRL was based,… Read More »

Tagged With: book to screen, Charlize Theron, Gillian Flynn, murder, mystery, narrative, suspense

FANTASTIC FOUR, Alas Not So Much

August 7, 2015 By Leave a Comment

FANTASTIC FOUR, Alas Not So Much

So the story goes, when the first atomic bomb was being tested out there in the New Mexico desert, no one was sure that that chain reaction that started with detonation would end with the explosion. There was, in other words, a chance that the reaction would continue until our planet was a burned out… Read More »

Tagged With: cgi, FANTASTIC FOUR, Marvel Comics, Miles Teller, military-industrial complex, narrative, origin story, parallel dimensions, super hero, teleportation

ZERO DARK THIRTY

August 5, 2015 By Leave a Comment

ZERO DARK THIRTY

ZERO DARK THIRTY starts, tellingly, with a dark screen and audio clips from 9/11. Air traffic control chatter, 911 calls, and the anguished, astonished voices of people who have no frame of reference for what is happening to and around them. In doing so, the film compels the viewer to relive that day not with… Read More »

Tagged With: 9/11, Al Qaeda, based on a true story, CIA, covert operations, Jessica Chastain, Kathryn Bigelow, narrative, Navy SEALS, Osama Bin Ladin

SHAUN THE SHEEP MOVIE

August 5, 2015 By 2 Comments

SHAUN THE SHEEP MOVIE

Four decades ago there was a Monty Python sketch in which Graham Chapman and Terry Jones discussed why a flock of off-screen sheep were hopping about on their back legs, attempting (badly) to fly, and doing something in trees that appeared to be nesting. It appeared that they had been led to believe that they… Read More »

Tagged With: aardman, animation, Mark Burton, narrative, Richard Starzak, SHAUN THE SHEEP MOVIE, stop-motion animation

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