Movie Reviews
National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation
Every once in a while a sequel turns out as good as, or almost as goods as, the original. I’d say that in this case, the original is better, but only by a little. The character of Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase) is a bit more manic and his mean streak comes out a little more … and of course invariably gets him into trouble. Randy Quaid is the ultimate hillbilly moron, his every belch and ... Read more »
21 Jump Street
For some reason I thought this was critically panned, then found out that it did pretty well with both reviewers and the audience. Maybe I got it mixed up with an Adam Sandler piece of celluloid dog vomit. I never saw the TV show, which is usually a good thing when they make a movie out of the TV show, because I don’t have any expectations. All I really knew about it was that this was the ... Read more »
Corman’s World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel
Roger Corman is a force of nature. In a career spanning almost sixty years as producer and director, he has somehow endured while many more respected Hollywood figures have crashed and burned. He has done it, of course, by providing the drive-in and third-rate-theater-going public the schlock they have always craved. Hell, I saw most of his output from the fifties and early sixties, many ... Read more »
Four Days in November
Probably the first major documentary about the Kennedy assassination, made well before the massive conspiracy industry had really gotten off the ground. It recounts the events leading up to the killing, showing a great deal of footage I had never seen before. There is no chatter about the grassy knoll, Castro, the Mafia and such, which is just as well. I concluded long ago that it’s ... Read more »
Africa
Our beloved David Attenborough tackles the exciting and mysterious continent. This time he only appears a few times in scenes establishing the five regions he divides Africa into: Kalahari, Savannah, Congo, Cape, and Sahara. A sixth hour considers the future of the continent and its wildlife, which is not encouraging, though there are rays of hope here and there. Throughout, as usual, we ... Read more »
Passion
I had high hopes for this because it was directed by Brian De Palma, who is sometimes very good, and stars Noomi Rapace and Rachel McAdams, who are both very good. And it does go along well for quite a while, and then it tries too hard to have twists and surprises in the manner of Hitchcock, who De Palma has always emulated. But it eventually got to be Too Damn Much, and not believable. No ... Read more »
White House Down
A very weird situation here. This movie was released in June of 2013, and it was preceded by Olympus Has Fallen in March. Both movies concern takeovers of the White House, and in both the building is pretty much destroyed. And frankly, I’m having a hell of a time remembering which one was which. In one of them Jamie Foxx was the president. In another it was Aaron ... Read more »
The Place Beyond the Pines
Here is a really odd movie. Glancing at the trailer without really paying attention, I had gathered that it was going to be about motorcycle stunt driving. And at first, it is. Ryan Gosling goes into a spherical metal cage with two other motorcyclists and they do some hair-raising stunts. (I once saw a show like it at the Jefferson County Fair in Beaumont, though the riders only went in a ... Read more »
Someone to Watch Over Me
Tom Berenger is a working-class cop happily married to Lorraine Bracco. Mimi Rogers is an extremely rich woman who witnesses the murder of a wealthy man by a mob boss. Her life isn’t worth a nickel if the boss can get to her before she can testify against him. Tom is assigned to her round-the-clock protection detail. He and other cops virtually move in with her in her jaw-droppingly ... Read more »
Admission
Tina Fey is the one of the brightest female comics, both as a writer and an actress, working today. She really deserves better than this by-the-numbers outing concerning her conflicts as an admissions officer at Princeton, a woman who every day has to dash the hopes of hundreds of applicants. She finds out that one such is the child she gave up for adoption a long time ago. Complications ... Read more »