Movie Reviews
Titles starting with L
Law Abiding Citizen
The events portrayed in this movie are often referred to as “Taking the law into your own hands.” I don’t think that’s accurate. When you go out to avenge some great wrong without the help of the police and the courts, you are ignoring law entirely. You become your own law, and it’s because the law did not grant you justice. Bear in mind that “law” and “justice” are two entirely different ... Read more »
Lawrence of Arabia
I vividly remember seeing this in a theater in Beaumont, Texas, when it first came out. Roadshow engagement! Reserved seats! Intro music, Intermission music, Exit music! Only two showings per day! Higher ticket price! And it was glorious, just glorious, and worth every penny. That was the same year I saw How the West Was Won at the Cinerama Theater in Houston, ... Read more »
Le cercle rouge
A hugely influential movie from Jean-Pierre Melville, a French director who never made a big name for himself in America. Though it’s in color, this is the sort of movie that the term film noir was invented for. Nobody in it is very nice, but man, are they ever cool! Many directors of American thrillers count Melville as one of their heroes. The cast is ... Read more »
Le Havre
This film is odd in many ways, not least of which is that it is set in the French port city of Le Havre, is in French, but it was written and directed by someone I at first thought was Japanese. His name is Aki Kaurismäki, and doesn’t that look Japanese? But I didn’t spot the umlaut at first. It turns out he is Finnish! He has a following a bit too large to call him a cult director, but ... Read more »
The League of Gentlemen
As I probably say before the review of any movie about a caper or a con game (I’m not going to check them all) I love movies about capers and con games. I find that most of them are labors of love, too. Someone has a clever story to tell, and wants to tell it as fairly as possible, setting it up, starting the caper, and then pulling a reverse or two on your unsuspecting ass. True, there ... Read more »
A League of Their Own
World War Two was a good time for the Negro Leagues of American baseball. Most of the white stars were in the military (where I believe a lot of them battled Hitler and Tojo by playing ball), so MLB was a shadow of its former self. Black men were drafted, too, but at home many black people had good-paying jobs for the first time in their lives, working in war industries. They had money to ... Read more »
Leap!
I don’t want to be too nasty with this film, because I’m sure its heart is in the right place. Families with young children will like it, as will pre-adolescent girls who wish to become ballerinas. But the plot is by the numbers, message being “Follow your dreams, and everything will turn out all right!” Which flat-out isn’t true, but children don’t need to be ... Read more »
Leap of Faith
Steve Martin used to be one of my favorite comics, and he still can be, if he tries. Trouble is, he hasn’t been trying much lately. From his first film right up to this one, he had an amazing string of critical and financial successes. After this one, his career just seems to peter out, though I guess he’s still making money. This is one of his best. It isn’t a comedy, though there are ... Read more »
Learning to Drive
One of those minor little films that are enjoyable to watch, but I know I’ll have forgotten almost everything about it a year from now. The chief pleasures are the cast. Patricia Clarkson is a New York writer whose husband has just left her. She decides she needs to learn to drive, and hires Ben Kingsley, a Sikh, as an instructor. Through a series of misunderstandings and culture clashes, ... Read more »
The Learning Tree
It is a sad fact that groundbreaking art often doesn’t seem all that wonderful a few decades down the line. This is because once the ground is broken, others arrive and find it possible to explore with a lot more freedom the things the pioneer had to struggle to be allowed to express at all. I think that is the case here. Gordon Parks was a photographer who wrote a semi-autobiographical ... Read more »