Miracle at St. Anna

Spike Lee is an uneven filmmaker, to say the least. Lately, except for some good documentaries, I can’t say I’m too impressed with his work. Which is a shame, as this is a story that needs to be told, but better than this.

The history of the Buffalo Soldiers, all-Negro cavalry units of the US Army, stretches back to 1866. In World War II, as most people know, most black soldiers ... Read more »

Miracle Mile

This is one of those movies I treasure. Made on a small budget, didn’t get much of a release, I’d never heard of it when I happened into the theater one day … and I was blown away. It starts out to be one thing, and then it jerks you up as sharply as a hangman’s noose. You are lulled, artfully, into thinking you are looking at a simple love story, and then within sixty seconds realize ... Read more »

The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek

I decided to see this one again after yet another news story about the much-loathed “Octomom.” You know, Nadya Suleman, the crazy lady who recently bore the only surviving (at this writing, and it looks like they will all make it) set of octuplets ever delivered. And everybody thought that was just amazing … for about 24 hours. Then the afterbirths hit the fan. It came out that she was ... Read more »

Mirage

Mirage (1965) About a year before this Charade was a huge hit. It was smart and funny and suspenseful, and the writer wanted to do another one like it. So he hit upon the tired old amnesia schtick, and came up with this. It’s well-made, it looks great with noirish B&W photography and disorienting editing, but the plot doesn’t really hold water. Pop ... Read more »

Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries

Kerry Greenwood is an Australian writer who has so far penned twenty mystery novels about the formidable Phryne (Fry-knee) Fisher, a private detective in 1928 Melbourne. These stories and some new scripts have been made into two seasons of TV shows that Lee and I have found addictive. (I am also working my way through the novels, which are nice.)

Phryne is, some media critic said, ... Read more »

Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries (Third Season)

More fabulous clothes and hats. More fabulous old cars, lovely Melbourne mansions. More ruby-red lipstick and the good old gold-plated .38 with ivory grips and the stiletto in the garter. In short, more of all the things that made the original two seasons of Phryne Fisher stories so entertaining. Whodunit is really beside the point in a show like this. The plots are as unlikely as any ... Read more »

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

We have been on a real roll with fantasy movies lately, enjoying The BFG, Pete’s Dragon, and the new Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events. This one continues the streak. We really liked it, and I can’t understand why the reviews weren’t any better. Once more, as in the above, today’s incredible special effects were put to ... Read more »

Miss Pettigrew Lives For a Day

This is based on a novel written in 1939, but as I watched it I felt it easily could have been a stage play. There are a limited number of scene changes, and it is dialogue-driven. Further, I thought it could make a real nice musical … and in fact, in the DVD extras, I learned that Universal optioned it many years ago, intending it to be a musical starring Billie “Glenda the Good ... Read more »

Miss Potter

A highly fictionalized account of the life of Beatrix Potter, whose books I never read. For a movie starring Renee Zellweger, Ewan McGregor, and Emily Watson—big stars, all of them—it seems to have done very little business. It’s really not what I had hoped for. They might have mentioned that Potter was a recognized expert on fungi, and while they added a postscript that she donated most ... Read more »

Miss Sloane

Jessica Chastain is a super-lobbyist and a really unpleasant person. You just know that if you met her, you would hate her on sight. We meet her when she is testifying before Congress about something, then we flash back to a month before and follow the trail of nastiness and unethical behavior that led up to it. I can’t say a lot more as there is a twist ending that I did Read more »