The Godfather Part III
November 9, 2005
Why? This is the question that many people asked themselves before and after seeing Francis Ford Coppola’s third (and hopefully last) installment of The Godfather saga. The first two parts were such perfect meditations on violence and the absolute corrupting...
The Complete James Dean Collection
November 5, 2005
For someone who had such a small, cinematic output—only three feature films—James Dean left behind an impressive legacy. Along with Marlon Brando, he best personified the Method style of acting where the individual would go to great lengths to feel...
Spanglish
November 4, 2005
From the man that brought us some of the best dramas and comedies in the recent-present like As Good As It Gets, Jerry Maguire and Riding in Cars With Boys, and let’s not forget his writing duties on The Simpsons. James L Brooks directs a superbly...
Beyond the Sea
November 4, 2005
Insightful biopic or bloated vanity project? That’s what audiences and critics were asking themselves when Kevin Spacey’s labour of love, Beyond the Sea (2004), a dramatization of the life and times of legendary crooner Bobby Darin, came out. Since...
Finding Neverland
October 28, 2005
What made author James M. Barrie such a brilliant fantasist is that he could see the world differently, as a child might and was not tied down by society’s stuffy conventions. Finding Neverland (2004) is based loosely on an account of how he wrote his...
L’Eclisse
October 28, 2005
In an essay included in the accompanying booklet, Jonathan Rosenbaum points out that Michelangelo Antonioni’s L’Eclisse (1962) was the final film in a “loose trilogy about Eros, art, business and emotional alienation in the contemporary world.”...
Spivs
October 27, 2005
Cockney grifter Ken Stott gets more than he bargains for when a routine truck hijack leaves him with two refugee children to take care of. Seven years. That’s how long ago Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels appeared and gave the British film industry...
Ladder 49
October 22, 2005
The fact that Ladder 49 (2004) celebrates firefighters is admirable in and of itself but it unfortunately portrays them in such a simplistic way that Ron Howard’s Backdraft (1991) seems like the epitome of moral complexity by comparison. You know you’re...
The Woodsman
October 14, 2005
Kevin Bacon has had an interesting career to the say the least. In the ‘80s, he was being groomed as a leading man with Footloose (1984) but ended up rejecting these kinds of films in favour of memorable supporting roles in the ‘90s with the likes...
Sideways
October 11, 2005
Alexander Payne’s last film, About Schmidt (2002), continued his fascination with American cinema in the ‘70s by featuring one its biggest (and most prolific) stars, Jack Nicholson. His latest movie, Sideways (2004), continues the road movie motif...
