Movie Reviews
In Darkness
In 1943 the fucking Nazis decided to liquidate the Jewish ghetto in Lvov. (Or Lviv, or Lwow, sources differ. It’s a city with a complicated history. At the time it was part of Poland; now it’s in the Ukraine. No, they didn’t move the city, they moved all the Poles.) A small group of Jews entered the sewer system and tried to hide there to escape the slaughter. They were assisted by Leopold ... Read more »
Basic
I have no idea what the title signifies. The story concerns a training mission in Panama for Army Rangers. Six of them are dropped off in the jungle in the middle of a raging storm, and only two of them come out, one man carrying a wounded comrade. John Travolta as an ex-Ranger is called in to interrogate them, find out what the hell happened. (He’s the old pro, so he gets to humiliate ... Read more »
Romeo + Juliet
I am an unapologetic Baz Luhrman fan. I say this because a lot of people feel he starts out over the top, and then goes on from there. I wouldn’t argue, and that’s what I like about him. The only director I can think of who made such totally, all-out, balls-to-the-wall, jaw-dropping visual and musical insanity is Ken Russell. Luhrman has made only five films and of them, only Read more »
The Client
Wouldn’t this be cool: At the time this was made, John Grisham had it in his contract that he could veto any casting choice. This was only his fourth novel, and already he had that sort of clout. He exercised it by insisting that no child actor be cast in the central role of Mark Sway, the young man who witnesses the suicide of a Mob lawyer and learns, literally, where the body is buried. ... Read more »
Support Your Local Gunfighter
This is a fitfully amusing film about James Garner as a con man who arrives in the little mining town of Purgatory and is mistaken for Swifty Morgan (Chuck Connors in an uncredited role), a fast gun someone has hired. He in turn convinces the great Jack (“Wall-eyed”) Elam to impersonate Swifty. Comic complications ensue. Susanne Pleshette seems to be imitating Debbie Reynolds’s overacting ... Read more »
Key Largo
Bogey and Bacall. What can you say? Those two generated sparks from the first of the four times they appeared together, in To Have and Have Not. This is their last pairing. Then we have Edward G. Robinson as a gangster with four thugs along with him. He has taken over the Largo Hotel, owned by Lionel Barrymore and his daughter-in-law, Bacall. Her husband died in ... Read more »
Stardust
(Second review: I’m going to leave the first one in place, because it just goes to show you. I didn’t remember seeing it, didn’t remember not being impressed. And THIS time through, I liked it a lot. It’s at least partly the result of how you’re feeling on a particular day. I must have been in a sour mood the first time. And so, here’s the new review:)
I don’t know how I missed this ... Read more »
The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert
Terence Stamp, Guy Pearce, and Hugo Weaving are raging drag queens from Sydney who set out in an old bus for Alice Springs, 1723 miles away, through some of the most desolate land on Earth, every mile of it populated mostly by lizards, insects, and homophobes. (Aside: I think that most male actors relish the idea of playing a gay cross-dresser and really camping it up. Sometimes this is a ... Read more »
Burke and Hare
… were notorious grave robbers and body snatchers in 1828. Medical researchers in Scotland at the time were desperate for cadavers to learn on, and a new law and a drying up of the most plentiful source of stiffs, people who had been hanged, prevented them from getting what they needed. When there is a demand, a supplier will be found, and for a short time William Burke and William ... Read more »
Mandela and de Klerk
I am writing this one day after the death of Nelson Mandela, and the whole world is in mourning. Every living U.S. president (except George H.W., whose health is not so good) is going to the funeral, and probably most of the other leaders of the world. Flags are flying at half mast, something I can’t recall seeing for any other non-American. Senators and Congresspersons who voted against ... Read more »