Tuesday, May 21 2013
Looking for the Perfect Moment of Abject Failure: ‘Plimpton! Starring George Plimpton as Himself’
George Plimpton was a blue-blooded aesthete who chronicled his many failures and never cared about being called a dilettante.
Friday, May 17 2013
The Pleasures of Collecting and… Grafting: ‘The Fruit Hunters’
The reason he collects fruit, Richard Campbell elucidates, is not only because he seeks variety and pleasure in tasting, but also because he sees the risks of industrial farming and monoculture.
‘Stories We Tell’: Sarah Polley Ponders Movies and Truths
This is a story of deception and romance, of family and making movies, and it shapes Stories We Tell, because it occasions a series of self-reflections, revelations, and reactions, all stories in themselves.
‘Erased’: A Father’s Past is Inescapable, or Is It?
Although Erased doesn't portray it particularly well, the question it raises is an intriguing one: who controls anyone's life narrative?
Thursday, May 16 2013
‘Star Trek Into Darkness’: Dick Cheney’s Legacy
Benedict Cumberbatch's John Harrison is at once the most compelling and least predictable figure amid a dauntingly predictable ensemble.
Wednesday, May 15 2013
‘Never Forget To Lie’: Child Survivors of the Holocaust
Looking back on the lies now, the lies that saved lives, this film presents them in the fragments they must remain, appreciates gaps between them, frames images as they allude to losses.
Tuesday, May 14 2013
‘Venus and Serena’: Sisters First and Always
Venus and Serena shows how a complex constellation of expectations and presumptions follows these tennis stars sisters throughout their lives and careers.
Friday, May 10 2013
‘The Great Gatsby’: Excess and Then Some
This Jazz Age is presented in the film as so many brightly colored, manic fantasies, in frantic, crowded dance scenes, in speedy, deliriously unconvincing driving scenes, and even conventionally awkward, filtered-light sex scenes.
‘Peeples’ Depicts Another Rich Family in Need of Emotional Rehab
You might be surprised to see Melvin Van Peebles show up midway through Peeples.
Thursday, May 9 2013
Lies, Laments and Lessons Learned on Filming in China: ‘Unmade in China’
The story of how Gil Kofman comes to be filming in China is at once antic and instructive, a saga of frustration and perseverance, business and government.
Wednesday, May 8 2013
Warrior Spirits and the Modern Indian Woman: ‘The World Before Her’
Prachi's mother observes, "It’s a new culture, they're not going to follow our old ways, each generation chooses its own path."
Tuesday, May 7 2013
‘What Maisie Knew’ and What Adults Don’t Know
Again and again, Maisie is left waiting to be picked up, alone in a foyer or on a bench, watching a guardian at work, helping the doorman at a parent's building to sort mail.
Monday, May 6 2013
‘Independent Lens: Seeking Asian Female’
It's always the case that a film can't show the many dimensions of experience on screen, that it must assemble a series of pieces to resemble a storyline. This one is a roller coaster ride by film's end.
Friday, May 3 2013
‘At Any Price’: Fathers, Sons, and Girlfriends
If At Any Price is generally distracted by its father-son business, the women who help to shape and also resist that business provide alternative views.
Thursday, May 2 2013
‘Iron Man 3’: Tony Stark’s Multiplicities
Even if Tony, so committed to self-control even when he seems most utterly incapable of it, accomplishes his mission, the specter of the many suits remains.
Tuesday, April 30 2013
‘An Oversimplification of Her Beauty’: Art Coming Together and Apart
The film is most striking when it makes another turn, when it points out the limits of fiction and documentary as means to insight. Each becomes the other, as romance -- adoration, desire, loss -- becomes a form of both.
Monday, April 29 2013
Tribeca Film Festival 2013: ‘Some Velvet Morning’ & ‘Sunlight Jr.’
These two dramas at Tribeca construct narrow, frustrating worlds, focused on couples in crisis.
The Perils of Border Crossing: ‘The Undocumented’
The story of Francisco Hernandez provides an aptly difficult and elusive focus, in the sense that he has disappeared following his decision to cross the desert.
Friday, April 26 2013
‘The Big Wedding’ Makes Divorce Look Good
The Big Wedding has its moments, but it's short on ideas about, say, parents and children, sibling relationships or, oh, I don't know, weddings.
Matthew McConaughey’s Return to Excellent Work with ‘Mud’
It's hard to imagine many other A-list stars pulling off such a regionally specific role, and it doesn't seem like an accident that Matthew McCoanughey's return to excellent work has engaged with his Southern roots.
