54 (R)
The day the music died wasn’t when Buddy Holly’s plane crashed, but when nightclub entrepreneur Steve Rubell was arrested for income tax evasion. Rubell was the co-owner of the notorious night club Studio 54 that became the “in” place to be for celebrities both famous and infamous. Read the rest of this entry »
Natalie Wood’s last film was almost a non-event. When the actress mysterious drowned during the final weeks of filming, her death set into motion a series of backstage negotiations that finally allowed director Douglas Trumbull to release his film. Wood had several vital scenes left to film, and at first, it seemed that unlike the old Hollywood adage, the show wouldn’t go on. Read the rest of this entry »
As an 11-year-old boy deep into science-fiction and horror, “Planet of the Apes” was the perfect antidote to a dreary 1968 summer. My mom and her brother went to see the film at a local drive-in, and after they came home, they did nothing buy talk about the film. Read the rest of this entry »
The new film “Artificial Intelligence” is just as conflicted as its lead character, a robot boy who believes he is real.
Directed and written by Steven Spielberg, “A.I.” was originally developed by Stanley Kubrick. Spielberg completed “A.I.” as a tribute to the vision of Kubrick, and even though Kubrick died two years ago, his influence is felt throughout the film. Read the rest of this entry »
Yet another attempt to parody the success of “The Blair With project.” This one involves a journalist who accompanies five kids from the suburbs into the Hood in search of the infamous “Hip Hop Witch.” Made on the cheap, the film is barely funny. The main attraction is the brief testimonies of numerous popular Hip Hop artists, including Vanilla Ice and Eminem. Will only appeal to people so high on reefer that they don’t care what they watch as long as it’s loud. (A-PIX) Read the rest of this entry »
Grey skies are going to clear up, but not before writer-director P.T. Anderson rains on the parade of his cast of characters in “Magnolia.” One half biblical epic, one half human opera, “Magnolia” emerges as one of the best films of 1999. Read the rest of this entry »
“Slums of Beverly Hills” is one big grin, an awkwardly funny tale that proves that no matter how low you rate on the social scale, you can always depend on family.
Even when I doubted writer-director Tamara Jenkins’ sincerity, I still found “Slums of Beverly Hills” entertaining and morbidly funny. How else do you describe a comedy with a preoccupation for teenage breasts, vibrators, dead cats and female plumbing? Read the rest of this entry »
THE ADVENTURES OF PLUTO NASH (PG-13)
(Warner Bros.)
BLOOD WORK (R)
(Warner) Read the rest of this entry »
Director Michael Bay once bragged about his use of quick cuts, never allowing a shot to linger more than a couple of seconds. So how come his films feel like marathons? Bay may be the master of blink-and-you’ ll-miss-it filmmaking, but he’ s also a slave to redundancy. He’ s like the annoying party guest who won’ t go home. Read the rest of this entry »
If indeed the whole world is a stage, where does that put the dressing rooms? As someone who comes from a theater background, I can honestly say that Shakespeare was only half right when he said that “the play is the thing.” Read the rest of this entry »
