Movie Reviews

Solaris

(2002)

Boring and unnecessary.

The Social Network

(2010)

I guess I really started to feel it with rap music. The generation gap, I mean. My parents didn’t understand rock and roll, and I suspect their parents didn’t understand jazz and swing. I don’t get rap. I don’t like it, never will. If you’re younger than me (and I’ve started to feel that almost everybody is) the chances are good that you like rap.

I don’t see myself as a ... Read more »

Snow White and the Huntsman

(2012)

Early on in this picture Charlize Theron as the Evil Queen Ravenna actually does face the Magic Mirror and asks it:

Mirror, Mirror on the wall,
Who is fairest of them all?

Well, the mirror really should have answered something like this: “You’re kidding, right? Fishing for compliments? Charlize, as you well know, in a beauty contest with you and Kristen Stewart ... Read more »

The Snow Walker

(2003)

You’ll immediately note the similarities with Carroll Ballard’s masterpiece Never Cry Wolf. They’re both based on books by Farley Mowat. Charles Martin Smith starred in the first one, and he directed this one. He must have fallen in love with the Arctic. I can see loving what it looks like, it’s gorgeous, but if you’d actually filmed up there I can’t imagine ... Read more »

Snow Cake

(2006)

Portraying the disabled on screen is fraught with peril, in my opinion. Many an actor has made a fool of himself or herself trying to do so. It can be painful to watch. I won’t cite examples. You can probably think of some. Autism is particularly tough to deal with. Recently Claire Danes did a good job in Temple Grandin, at least partly because she had advice ... Read more »

Tuntamaton sotilas

(The Unknown Soldier, Finalnd, 1955)

Here’s a true rarity. It’s not available on DVD in the US; the only way to see it is probably the way we got it, as a gift from Jarmo, our friend in Finland. I get the impression it’s sort of like a Finnish Gone With the Wind, the definitive epic of a critical time in the history of the young republic, their greatest threat and their finest ... Read more »

Snakes on a Plane

(2006)

(Alternate title: Shit on Your Shoe.) This film is sooooooooo bad it’s not really worth the keystrokes I’d need to skewer it. It knows nothing about snakes, and it knows nothing about airplanes. One example of many thousands in the first 40 minutes (which is as far as we got): If you lifted a floor hatch in the cockpit of a ... Read more »

The Smiling Lieutenant

(1931)

This one stars Maurice Chevalier, Claudette Colbert, and Miriam Hopkins. I wanted to see it mostly because it was directed by Ernst Lubitsch. His combination of wit and humor and sophistication was so unique and dependable they had a name for it: The Lubitsch Touch. I’ve seen seven or eight of his films, and he’s never let me down. And he doesn’t here, either, despite having Chevalier. ... Read more »

Smiley’s People

(1982)

After Lonesome Dove, the BBC’s Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy was my favorite TV mini-series ever. So I had high hopes for this one, produced by the same people and with most of the same cast, including the magnificent Sir Alec Guinness as the imperturbable George Smiley. Alas, though they tried hard, this book just wasn’t as amenable to ... Read more »

The Truth About Charlie