Perfect Sense
Perfect Sense is a film certainly worthy of appreciation, but a struggle to love. It promises an exciting premise—people around the world are starting to lose their senses, beginning with the sense of smell, and no one knows why. Caught in the middle of the mysterious pandemic are a pair of lovers, a chef and a researcher, who discover they need one another to make it through the chaos.... read more
Return
Return is the debut film from writer and director Liza Johnson. The film follows a female soldier, Kelli (Linda Cardellini), who after returning from war in the Middle East, struggles to settle back into her old life. Although initially thrilled to be reunited with her husband, Mike (Michael Shannon), her two little girls, and her friends, life at home slowly begins to appear hollow and pointless. She quits her job, one she had held for a long time before the war, suddenly and without explanation. Instead of finding new work, she wastes months on the couch in her pajamas, watching... read more
In Darkness
The Holocaust/WWII film genre has given birth to cinematic masterpieces (The Pianist, Schindler’s List, Sophie Scholl), maudlin excursions into fantasy (Life Is Beautiful) and serious-minded films that reach a bit too far (Black Book). To even think that such events could be recreated again and again within the confines of a film genre, which is inherently subject to its own clichés and devices, is a bit cringe-inducing. But from great horror often springs great art, and there are important stories of courage and survival, as well as the most base human depravity, that have yet to be told. Famed... read more
It's About You
Internationally renowned photographer Kurt Markus and his son Ian accepted an invitation from roots-rocker John Mellencamp to follow him on tour and produce a documentary about their experience. Mellencamp gave them a cryptic bit of instruction. “It’s about you,” he told them. So off they went, with a vintage 8mm movie camera and some simple sound equipment, to follow the band. What did they see? What did they learn? And why is this an important story to tell?... read more
Once Upon a Time in Anatolia
Once Upon a Time in Anatolia, co-written and directed by Nuri Bilge Ceylan, is a Turkish police procedural based on the real-life experiences of one of the writers. The story follows a group of men as they travel around the Anatolian steppe at night in three cars in search of a buried body. The main homicide suspect, Kenan (Firat Tanis), is being escorted from one location to the next as part of a deal he’s made with police Commissar Naci (Yilmaz Erdogan) to identify the grave of the man he murdered. In exchange for the informaiton, he hopes to secure... read more
Man on a Ledge
In advance of the premier of I Hate My Teenage Daughter, one of Fox’s newest sitcoms about just that, Slate published a thought-provoking, if somewhat cumbersome, piece by contributing writer Jacob Rubin about the entertainment’s industry latest obsession with titles that tell us exactly what we’re about to watch. Obvious offenders include 2 Broke Girls, Bridesmaids, and, of course, Snakes on a Plane. In his write-up, Rubin argues that this phenomenon is the consequence of today’s rabid hunger for quick-hit information, making short titles that get straight to the point good business. “The stories we are told,” Rubin concludes, “center,... read more
Outrage
Takeshi Kitano, aka “Beat” Takeshi, returns to the yakuza genre with Outrage, his fifteenth film. First known as a TV comic, Kitano has carved himself a space in the upper echelons of the art house film world, perhaps most notably with his 1997 Venice Golden Lion-winning Hana-bi (Fireworks). He’s made a variety of films, all with his patented humor and often with deadpan silence and his singular brand of flashy violence.... read more
The Grey
What does it mean, on a spiritual and moral level, to be a man? What is our place in nature? When all the chips are down, what do we cling to as the measure of our character and worth as we leave the final mark of our very existence? These are the lofty questions posed by The Grey, the new film by director and co-writer Joe Carnahan, based on a short story called “Ghost Walker” by Ian Mackenzie Jeffers (who also co-wrote the screenplay).... read more
Miss Bala
A giant metaphor for Mexico and the dismay that plagues the country, Miss Bala, the new action-drama from Mexican writer-director Gerardo Naranjo, is visceral eye candy with steady performances and a seamless marriage of sight and sound. Yet with its bleak vision and apathetic treatment of undeveloped characters, the film falls short of the early acclaim it has received on the festival circuit.... read more
Newlyweds
Ed Burns’ latest writing and directing venture holds the perfect recipe for swiftly putting audiences into a New York state of mind. Like Burns’ own early films, Newlyweds is reminiscent of early Woody Allen films (Annie Hall, Manhattan, Hannah and Her Sisters), utilizing rich characters and relatable story lines that depict complicated relationships. Even the theatrical poster for Newlyweds brings to mind those of Allen’s early days, suggesting a simplicity and authenticity to the story at hand. Shot on an estimated $9,000 budget, Burns hired virtually all unknown actors and worked with a three-man crew. Together with 2010’s Nice Guy... read more
Red Tails
In many ways, Red Tails could be considered the World War II movie that never got made. A throwback to war films of the 1950s, it centers on an elite squadron of African-American pilots, the Tuskegee Airmen, and their opportunity to fight. Making racism a mere backdrop with a focus on the men and their experiences, the film is less interested in laying on white guilt than in making sure the story is told, since it never would have been in a past era. In doing this, however, producer George Lucas and director Anthony Hemingway concurrently create a somewhat bland... read more
Watching TV with the Red Chinese
On the surface, the story of Watching TV with the Red Chinese is a simple one, documenting several months in the lives of literature teacher Dexter Mitchell (Ryan O’Nan), his on-again-off-again girlfriend Suzanne (Community’s Gillian Jacobs), and the three Chinese students (Leonardo Nam, James Chen, and Keong Sim) recently arrived to America who move into his building. But the film, based on the novel by Luke Whisnant, is a lot meatier at the core, serving as an examination of how we perceive ourselves and others through the veil of culture, both geographical and pop (with a side order of destiny... read more
Carol Channing: Larger than Life
Carol Channing is such an endearing, sharp, funny personality that director Dori Berinstein could easily have just thrown her camera on a tripod, have the 90-year-old musical theater legend spin anecdotes for an hour and a half, and had a great documentary. Thankfully, what she made is even better. Sure, Channing still tells those stories about her life and stage career in her paradoxically inimitable-yet-oft-imitated style. But there are also heartfelt testimonies from fellow actors and personalities, most legends in their own right, about how talented and genuine she is.... read more
Haywire
In his follow-up to Contagion, auteur Steven Soderbergh makes over the espionage thriller and puts an ass-kicking woman in the lead. That Haywire features a female action star isn’t in itself particularly innovative (see: Salt, Wanted). That the female action star isn’t Angelina Jolie, and that Soderbergh built the film around a mixed martial arts fighter in her first theatrically released film—well, that’s something one doesn’t see every day. In addition to her EliteXC and Strikeforce bouts, Gina Carano has appeared in TV’s American Gladiators and direct-to-DVD actioner Blood and Bone, but here she headlines a cast that includes A-listers... read more
Le Havre
One would have every reason to believe the film Le Havre is French. After all, the film’s title stems from a namesake city in the Seine-Maritime department of the Haute-Normandie region in France, a fairly indiscriminate and dowdy portside town that serves as excellent fetishist fodder for Francophiles. But as it’s helmed by Finnish director Aki Kaurismäki, Le Havre is so Finnish it’s actually Finland’s official Oscar submission for Best Foreign Language Film.... read more
Jiro Dreams of Sushi
Directed by David Gelb, Jiro Dreams of Sushi is a documentary about one of the greatest masters of the culinary world who no one has ever heard of. This man is 85-year-old sushi shokunin (Japanese artisan), Jiro Ono who runs a ten-seat, sushi-only restaurant called Sukiyabashi Jiro located in a Tokyo subway station. He is hailed internationally as an innovator in the art of sushi, people travel from around the world specifically to eat at his restaurant, and he has been awarded a coveted three star Michelin review, making him the oldest Michelin chef alive. A seat in his restaurant... read more
Joyful Noise
Think Glee with a religious twist. Joyful Noise, starring Queen Latifah and Dolly Parton, features all the rival divas, angsty romance and moving musical numbers of the hit TV show—plus the timing of a bad sitcom (sans laugh track) and the melodrama of a movie of the week. The rousing arrangements performed by both industry icons and fresh faces are the only saving graces in what’s otherwise a mess of slight plot and lazy dialogue—although you may find yourself laughing—hard—at how bad the jokes are.... read more
Northeast
In writer-director Gregory Kohn’s Northeast, we watch Will (David Call) hang out on the streets and in the cramped apartments of New York: We watch him eat an apple as daytime traffic swooshes between him and the 16mm camera. We watch him smoke a cigarette against the fuzzy city lights at night. We watch him stare out a window into the lemon-colored light of dawn. We even watch his space heater warm up with an electric glow and buzz.... read more
Beauty and the Beast 3D
Like The Lion King before it, Disney’s Beauty and the Beast gets a big-screen re-release to exploit its 3D conversion for Blu-ray. The first animated film to be nominated for a Best Picture Oscar, Beauty and the Beast, along with The Little Mermaid in 1989 and The Lion King in 1994, composed the last push of classic hand-drawn cartoons before Toy Story tipped the form definitively toward computer animation. The Lion King proved there’s still an audience for generation-old animation, grossing nearly $100 million in 3D since reopening in the fall. And like Simba and his friends, Beauty and the... read more
Sing Your Song
Sing Your Song is a résumé disguised as a documentary film. It provides a detailed, meticulous outline of the life of Harry Belafonte, complete with notable achievements and personal references (including Martin Luther King, Jr.!). And while director Susanne Rostock deserves credit for compiling the man’s remarkable life in an entertaining, easy-to-engage format, the film is utterly canned.... read more
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