Archive | June 2012
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The Cronenberg Chronicle-Phase Three: A History of Violence (2005)
In his nearly 40 years of directing features, if I had to pick Cronenberg’s best film of the last 20–it would probably be his adaptation of John Wagner and Vince Locke’s graphic novel, “A History of Violence”. Its only competition would be David’s uber-controversial “Crash” from 1996, itself an adaptation of a novel by J. […]
Coriolanus
Ralph Fiennes takes on double-duty as star and director of “Coriolanus”…his debut behind the camera. An accomplished Shakespearean performer(I saw his Tony-winning Hamlet on Broadway in 1995), he still took a major risk in bringing one of the Bard’s lesser known tragedies to the big screen(although it was my privilege and a thrill to see […]
Moonrise Kingdom
Is it a deficiency to have a style that is unmistakably distinctive? Stanley Kubrick, David Cronenberg, Woody Allen…3 very different filmmakers whose work you would never confuse with anyone else’s. Some erroneously peg this auteurist approach to simply a “sameness” to all of their respective films. Certainly a motion picture from any of them tend […]
We Need to Talk About Kevin
You know you’re in trouble when they wallop you with the Christ imagery in the opening shot. And then a few scenes later the devil enters. Throughout the proceedings, distressed mommy(Tilda Swinton)suffers the trials of Job. Director Lynne Ramsay, so confident and subtle in her helming of “Morvern Callar” almost a decade ago, has seemingly […]
Chronicle
It’s a superhero origin film. No, it’s a remake of Stephen King’s “Carrie”. Or is it a live-action version of anime classic, “Akira”? All three make sense, and apparently director Josh Trank cites 1978’s “The Fury” as an influence too. So, between that and 1976’s “Carrie”, I think it’s safe to say that Josh hearts […]
Flashback: on 1971’s Drive, He Said
Michael Margotta is a badass. I didn’t realize that until recently, but I still wish I had told him back when he was my acting teacher in the mid-1980’s. You see, “Drive, He Said”(Jack Nicholson’s official debut as a director)has been hard to come by for years. But a squeaky clean print has recently made […]
The Secret World of Arrietty
Beautiful in its simplicity, gorgeously animated and co-created by the great animator Hayao Miyazaki. I avoided the American dub in theaters and waited anxiously for the North American DVD release, so I could watch in the original Japanese with English subtitles(note: I always avoid the English language dub of everything. You should too, and most DVD […]
“The Avengers” one unbeatable adversary…Mr. James Cameron
As predicted on this blog weeks ago, “The Avengers” has now become the 3rd highest grossing film of all time(domestically and internationally), as of just this past Friday. Yes, obviously, Iron Man, Captain America, The Hulk and Thor have proven almost unbeatable at the box office this spring. But it is also becoming apparent that, […]
Reviewed by Mark Leonard 