Movie Reviews
Hula Girls
Change a depressing, failing, industrial, Thatcherized city in the English midlands to a failing, depressing coal mine in a cold part of Japan. Change overalls to grass skirts. Change striptease to hula dancing. Change out-of-work factory men to out-of-work coal miner’s daughters. Finished? What you’ve done is change The Full Monty to Hula ... Read more »
Hugo
I think what I liked the most about this one was the use of 3D. I confess I haven’t seen a lot of recent films in 3D, but the ones I have seen, in the 2D version, convince me that the 3D was just an embellishment, used mostly in action sequences: roller coaster rides, things protruding from or flying out of the screen. Ho-hum. Until now, the only film I’ve seen that I am certain would be ... Read more »
Howl’s Moving Castle
Once more I will acknowledge that Hayao Miyazaki is an unquestioned genius, with the one of the most stunning visual imaginations I’ve ever encountered. For him, I overcome my objections to anime because he’s simply a blast to take a trip with. And again, I don’t have any problem with dubbed anime, since the lips don’t synchronize with anything, anyway. There are a lot of big western names ... Read more »
Howl
For the most part, the Beat Generation doesn’t interest me. I tried reading Jack Kerouac’s book and found it dull and self-indulgent. I just wasn’t interested in his adventures with Neal Cassady and others. And I freely admit that very little poetry appeals to me that was written after, say, T.S. Eliot. But Allen Ginsberg is the exception. I can’t say I knew him, but I met him, during the ... Read more »
Grizzly Man
I can’t really review this as a film, because I am too emotionally tied up in the subject of it and I didn’t watch it all. So discount my opinion by that factor.
Did you ever meet someone who, from the first instant, you just knew you hated? Despised, loathed, abhorred everything about him? Timothy “Treadwell” is such a man for me. Or was, because he got ... Read more »
How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying
The 1960s was a transitional time for Broadway musicals. In the past was the work of Rogers and Hammerstein (Oklahoma, The Sound of Music), Lerner and Loewe (My Fair Lady, Camelot). Soon to come were musicals by Kander and Ebb (Cabaret, Read more »
Grey Gardens
Yes, I agree, it’s a fascinating story … but that fascinating? Consider: There was the original 1975 documentary by the Maysles Brothers. In 2001 Rufus Wainwright wrote a song entitled “Grey Gardens.” Then in 2006 there was an award-winning musical … which still boggles my mind; it has to be the unlikeliest subject for a musical since ... Read more »
Grey Gardens
An 80-year-old woman lives with her 58-year-old daughter in a few filthy rooms of a rotting 28-room mansion. They share it with a lot of mangy cats, raccoons and possums in the attic (which they feed), and, no doubt, rats and mice scrabbling in the walls. Both are named Edith Beale, Big Edie and Little Edie. Little Edie has been here for 20 years, but will be leaving soon (she tells us ... Read more »
How to Kill Your Neighbor’s Dog
No dogs were harmed in the making of this movie. In fact, Kenneth Branagh didn’t actually kill the dog. It’s all about the angst of a playwright who has been unable to duplicate his early successes. It never really amounts to anything, except for a while when he is learning to know and like his young neighbor (Suzi Hofrichter, who was 11 years old then). The girl is very good, and an ... Read more »
How to Get Ahead in Advertising
Richard E. Grant is a totally cynical and ruthless ad exec in London. He claims he knows how to sell anything, but for some reason a new campaign for an as-yet-unnamed pimple cream has him stymied. And then a boil appears on his shoulder. Yuck, right? But even worse, this boil has a face, and keeps growing. It begins to speak to him. He is institutionalized, but when he comes out he’s even ... Read more »