This movie entertains. And that, surely, is its aim. After all, enough seems “off” with the science to me (even if it is awfully pretty) that it cannot have intended to educate. But this is not a documentary. It is a drama. And yes, it entertains as a good drama should. I often felt myself…
Movies have made me cry, weep, and hide my head in angst. Before watching this film, none had made me want to vomit at the level of disgust at humanity 12 Years a Slave evokes. Many cultures in the past have enslaved, imprisoned, and suppressed and oppressed others. (Many still do. Human trafficking, alas, is…
Courage. That’s the word that kept coming to mind as I watched Captain Phillips. But the *best* display of courage I saw was not in what Captain Phillips did. It was not in the crew. It was not in the team of SEALS. It was in the medic who treated the man who had been…
Rush is a movie that offers a look at racing unlike I’d ever seen. Okay, so I haven’t seen much about racing. Even so, the movie entertains nicely. But what was more to me was its ability to share a glimpse into the psyches of racecar drivers, even as different as these two drivers were.…
Anger. Grief. Victimization. Joy. Hope. Helplessness. Shame. Trust. Outrage. Support. And love. Love. Short Term 12 is a movie that moves through the above things with the heart and openness needed to truly get a glimpse into the lives shared in the film. I laughed. I cried. I ached deeply inside at the hurt portrayed…
I didn’t like Sutter, the character who is the male lead in The Spectacular Now. But I got him. I didn’t want Aimee, the female lead, to like him as much as she did. But I understood her doing so. And the path he takes her on is anything but spectacular in the positive way.…
What started many of these Summer 2013 coming of age movies? It was Mud, which opened early this past summer. I got around to watching it only this past week. When I think of Matthew McConaughey, I tend to think Rom-Com. But in retrospect, I suppose that’s not completely fair. He was in The Paperboy,…
It seems that so many people have strong feelings about Woody Allen. I do not—in either direction. Even without any bias, I was intrigued with his latest film, Blue Jasmine. And I’m glad I saw it. Like so many of my other movies this summer, this was on my radar based on it being “on…
Moving. That’s the best word to describe my perspective of The Butler. (Lest it be confused with anyone else’s The Butler, I’ll call it Lee Daniels’s The Butler at least this once. There. Done. (Alas, Lee Daniels is only one person and not multiple people named Lee Daniel, so I will not call it Lee…
It took me a while, but I finally watched this movie on DVD. And I’m so glad I did: Rust and Bone is beautiful. It delivers a quiet, deep story about humans and our need for connection. In French with English subtitles, this movie shows characters here that weave through issues of relationships between father…
The sadness that abounds in the story of Fruitvale Station holds the audience in its grip for the better part of ninety minutes. As you live out Oscar’s final day (and if you shush those inner thoughts of “how do they know that?”), you’re dreading the coming doom, known because this is based on a…
Elysium provides an incredible allegorical look at the possible direction humanity could take. I know many will watch this and simply be entertained (a bit), but my thoughts were provoked. The depth to which the political commentary digs surely cannot be missed; at least I want to believe that. The acting, to me, was par,…
When I told my friend that Pacific Rim was on my list of movies to see, he reacted with surprise and incredulity. Yes, Pacific Rim. You too? Surprised? Indeed, for if you follow my movies at all, you know that for the past half-dozen years, I’ve been mostly drawn toward the Oscar-type artsy-type films. But…
When a death occurs, a void is left in the survivors’ lives. But although the death in this film looms over all, it is not necessarily the void that needs so badly to be filled by each person in this Israeli film (with subtitles), Fill the Void. Instead, each of the primary family members has…
The East is a wonderfully intriguing film that dives deep into ecoterrorism and the independent agencies working against such working behind the scenes—-and that exposes some of that which lives behind the curtain. Part way though, it’s hard to recall or commit to who’re the good guys and who you want to fall. And that…