Irrational Man Movie Review: Woody Allen's 45th Feature

Correction 10 August 2016 - I originally labeled this as Allen's 50th feature. I think I pulled that number from a crude count of his IMDb credits which include TV work and one of the three vignettes in New York Stories. This was actually his 45th theatrically released feature film as a director, including What's Up, Tiger Lily?

Abe and Jill accidentally overhear a troubling story in a diner.

I’ve thought Woody Allen was washed up and done as a filmmaker for almost twenty years, but then every now and then he throws a curve ball of Vicky Christina Barcelona or Midnight in Paris, so I’m not about to make any big pronouncements, but Irrational Man is one that makes me desperately hope he doesn’t close out his career now lest the stink linger forever. That’s not really fair, I guess. No matter how bad an artist’s latter-day sins might be, the great stuff will always maintain a redemptive quality. Just look at Stevie Wonder.

Magic in the Moonlight Movie Review

Jack English

There may not be a filmmaker more grounded in realism who also frequently touches on elements of magical realism than Woody Allen. Here is a man who has a strong philosophical view of life, death, and existence, who seems resigned to the idea that what you see is what you get and that there is no deity or afterlife. Here is a man who dabbled in magic tricks as a boy and who grew up to become one of the late 20^th century’s most important and prolific generators of the greatest magic tricks of all – motion pictures. For what are the movies but an illusion? Not only are the stories told fictional tales through which we, the audience, have a chance to live out fantasy wish fulfillment, but the physical process of film projection is a series of still photographs presented in such rapid succession that it gives the illusion of movement.

Short Cut Movie Review: The Croods

A Short Cut Movie Review is normally less than 400 words, but in some cases may go slightly over. This is my attempt to keep writing about as many films as I see without getting bogged down with trying to find more to say. They are meant to be brief snapshots of my reaction to a movie without too much depth.

I can’t figure out how The Croods, an animated film from Dreamworks, was nominated for the Oscar for Animated Feature over a couple of other options that were demonstrably better movies.

Emma Stone voices Eep, a typical American teenager in most respects excepting the fact that she lives in prehistoric caveman days. She whines and complains about not being able to leave the cave at night, her family is a real drag, and she goes bonkers over some new shoes. Her dad, Grug (Nicolas Cage) is an excessive worrier. Ugga (Catherine Keener) is the mom who goes along to get alone. Cloris Leachman is Gran, the hanger-on in the family, and Clark Duke is the dim-witted son, Thunk.

25 Years Ago This Month: November 1988

What I've seen

Oliver & Company, inspired by Dickens' Oliver Twist, was Disney's predecessor to their animated musicals renaissance a year later. With songs by Billy Joel, it paved the way for The Little Mermaid and The Lion King. 

Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown brought great international success, and a first Oscar nomination, to Pedro Almodóvar.

I always had a soft spot for the Bill Murray comedy Scrooged, a contemporary update of Dickens' A Christmas Carol with Murray as a cold-hearted TV executive who learns the meaning of Christmas through lessons delivered by a ghost played by Carol Kane, Bob Goldthwaite in the Bob Cratchit role. Also with Robert Mitchum, Karen Allen, and Alfre Woodard.

The Amazing Spider-Man Movie Review

Was it really necessary for Sony to reboot the Spider-Man series only five years after the last film and ten years after the first? Is Sam Raimi’s trilogy already ancient history? Apparently for the Millenials anything older than half a decade is passé. I don’t mind a new actor in the Peter Parker/Spider-Man role or a new director at the helm. James Bond has changed hands through six actors across fifty years. The problem I find is the absurd need to retell the origin story. The Batman series went through three actors and two directors with a major stylistic shift halfway through without getting back into Bruce Wayne’s history. It was Christopher Nolan who rebooted that franchise by taking a completely new track on the mythology. Unlike Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man which is virtually indistinguishable from the first trilogy.

The Help Movie Review: Subtlety Is not its Strong Point

The Help, written and directed by Tate Taylor and based on the popular best seller by Kathryn Stockett, is a do-gooder drama that thinks it’s treating important subject matter with great care, but actually does a horrible disservice to history, the Civil Rights Movement, and all the people who played a role (many of whom game their lives) in it. That said, it’s worth noting that there is a huge disparity between the kind of film Dreamworks has chosen to advertise with the trailers and the actual film that Taylor made.

The adverts would have us think The Help is a comedy with some dramatic elements, treating Jackson, Mississippi, cerca 1963 as a hotbed of sassy black women and comical white racists. I was genuinely surprised to find that it’s not until the final 30 minutes or so of this overlong 140 minute film that it devolves into cheap laughs. As a matter of fact, the bulk of the film is built on a foundation of real drama, mostly provided by the astounding performances of Octavia Spencer, Viola Davis, and Cicely Tyson.

Crazy, Stupid, Love Movie Review

I think the Steve Carell sad-sack schtick is beginning to wear a little thin for me. In the new romantic comedy Crazy, Stupid, Love he plays Cal, yet another lovable loser who needs outside help from someone much cooler than he is to redefine his style. Aided by the affably funny Paul Rudd in both The 40-Year Old Virgin and Dinner for Schmucks, this time it’s Ryan Gosling, whose inclusion is in the cast is little more than a desperate plea for the teenage girl demographic to show up, who helps with the makeover.

Zombieland Movie Review

There are vampire movies and there are zombie movies. They come in all shapes and sizes. They come in comedy, drama and outright horror. Only one of them truly lends itself to comedy, however. Vampires are not inherently funny in the way zombies are. Oh, they’ve tried with vampires. Who can forget a young Jim Carrey starring in Once Bitten? The comedy in some vampire movies tends to spring forth from more situational comedy: Kristy Swanson as the valley girl turned killer in Buffy the Vampire Slayer; James Woods’ wisecracking in John Carptenter’s Vampires; or the outrageousness of From Dusk Till Dawn.