It’s been a tragic end to 2016, so as we contemplate the sorrowful loss of Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds, among others, let’s try to look forward to 2017. In this week’s “So what happens to Princess Leia?” story, director Colin Trevorrow and producer Kathleen Kennedy have had a sit-down to discuss what is to…
A Monster Calls, and you should answer. This is a really wonderful film about how a young boy deals with his mother battling a terminal illness. And in retrospect, maybe it reminded me a little of how I dealt with my parents divorce. I definitely found certain parallels between myself and Conor, played by a…
Hey, it’s an abbreviated holiday edition of random film type news! Short and sweet, shall we say? In this week’s “Oh crap” story, actress Carrie Fisher had a significant heart attack while flying from London to Los Angeles. She is currently in critical condition in an L.A. hospital, and is on a ventilator for assisted…
La La Land arrives with a lot of hype. If you’re in the business of Oscar prognostication, it’s in a 50/50 race for Best Picture with the very different kettle of fish Moonlight. (Neither of these, of course, might come to pass; momentum could easily arise for such bigger fare as Sully, Arrival, Fences, Live By Night or the tiny…
Office Christmas Party is about an office Christmas Party. It’s the Chicago branch, part of a larger corporation with headquarters in New York. The founder of the company is dead; his daughter Carol (Jennifer Aniston) is now the CEO while son (and younger brother) Clay (T.J. Miller from Silicon Valley) runs Chicago. She’s uptight and awful and not…
SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT It’s a war movie. You’re bringing your kids to a war movie. Remember the recrimination of the adult nerd/dork/geeks of the world when the first prequel came out? No way any of those people say this film is “for babies.” I felt slightly tricked into…
Welcome to another week of entertainment surprises, delights, and disappointments. We’re off! In this week’s “Money for the Rogue” story, Rogue One has taken in about $29 million in it’s opening Thursday night, which isn’t bad at all, even it it is less impressive than The Force Awakens early earnings at the time. I wouldn’t…
Gareth Edwards’ (and, it must be acknowledged, Tony Gilroy’s) Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is sensational, a thrilling, spectacularly crafted action-adventure tale set in the Star Wars universe. Unburdened by the weight of expectation, and J.J. Abrams’ almost pathological addiction to fan service, this “stand-alone” romp is more fun, more thrilling and just a better movie…
Jackie, a film about the preparations for John F. Kennedy’s funeral as experienced by his widow Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy (Natalie Portman), is a relentlessly sad hundred minutes, a close-up dissection of one person’s intensely painful grief combined with unique, almost unimaginable pressure. Fuelled by a baroque string-heavy score by Under The Skin maestro Mica Levi, the film, directed…
Sometimes a movie comes along that challenges me to figure out what’s wrong with it. I KNOW The Founder is imperfect, but it was hard to put my finger on why, initially. It’s certainly not a bad film, but it’s key fault left me feeling, well, NOT feeling. The Founder is the story of how…