Day: October 5, 2015
Steve Jobs: EW review
October 5, 2015It’s been four years since Steve Jobs passed away, and since then, no shortage of biographers and filmmakers (not to mention his friends and enemies) have tried to get beneath the messianic myth and divine what made the Apple CEO tick. But whose version of Jobs are we supposed to believe? Was he a Zen […]
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Jaws 19 gets a trailer ahead of Back to the Future anniversary
October 5, 2015According to Back to the Future II, by Oct. 21, 2015, we were supposed to have a lot of amazing things: auto-laced sneakers, Pepsi Perfect (which is actually happening), hoverboards, flying cars, and much more. While everything in that movie has definitely not come true, Universal Studios has helped celebrate the franchise’s 30th anniversary by releasing a trailer […]
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Film Review: ‘Future June’
October 5, 2015Courtesy of Rio Film Festival A rigorous sociology lesson without one iota of teacherly rhetoric, Maria Augusta Ramos’ superb new documentary “Future June” instead counts on penetrating powers of perception to lay bare the economic imbalances ailing contemporary Brazil. After taking on the addled Brazilian justice system in her three previous features, Ramos once more […]
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Busan Film Review: ‘West North West’
October 5, 2015Courtesy of Busan Film Festival Cultural, sexual and relational boundaries are delicately negotiated in “West North West,” a moody romantic melodrama about three young women fumbling their way toward an uncertain future. This sophomore feature effort from Japanese writer-director Takuro Nakamura (“Taito”) wraps its characters in a palpable veil of loneliness and isolation, aided by piercingly […]
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Film Review: ‘Goosebumps’
October 5, 2015Courtesy of Columbia Pictures Young audiences are in for an early lesson in disappointing cinematic literary adaptations with “Goosebumps.” This first big-screen spin on R.L. Stine’s popular kid-lit series — which already inspired four seasons of TV — turns an endearing collection of silly, spooky stories into a busy, noisy, soulless eyesore. Perfectly timed to capitalize on […]
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Busan Film Review: ‘Go Home’
October 5, 2015Courtesy of Busan Film Festival “Go Home,” reads the angry grease-paint message scrawled on the wall of the now-ransacked villa Nada (Golshifteh Farahani) finds upon her return to the Lebanese village where she grew up. Alas, Nada can’t really go home, not now, not ever, in Jihane Chouaib’s slow and overly obvious account of this […]
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Busan Film Review: ‘4th Place’
October 5, 2015Courtesy of Busan Film Festival Fans of “Whiplash” will recognize the physical and psychological bruising a young swimmer receives from his coach and mother in order to win a medal in “4th Place,” South Korean helmer Jung Ji-woo’s poetic and engrossing drama condemning the underlying sadism and psychosis of a competitive educational culture, which destroys […]
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Film Review: ‘Bridge of Spies’
October 5, 2015Courtesy of DreamWork Pictures/Fox 2000 Pictures It’s no small feat turning a shyster and an enemy spy into national heroes, but that’s the unique achievement of Steven Spielberg’s “Bridge of Spies.” If Jimmy Stewart were alive today, the director surely would have asked him to play James Donovan, a noble New York insurance lawyer roped into […]
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