An exclusive CityArts critics discussion of Walter Hill’s comeback By Armond White Bullet to the Head is an event. It is director Walter Hill’s first theatrical film since 2002’s Undisputed and the most meaningful Sylvester Stallone acting vehicle since Rocky. On this occasion I discuss the significance of Bullet to …
HollywoodandFine.com When I was in college, I once interviewed the late Rupert Crosse, an African-American actor who got an Oscar nomination for a 1969 film called “The Reivers,” whose star was Steve McQueen. If I’d known then that I would, 40 years later, write a book about John Cassavetes (in …
HollywoodandFine.com I lost count of the number of noggins that were perforated by hot lead in “Bullet to the Head,” but it was more than a dozen. Henchman apparently is a particularly dangerous job description, at least in this movie, though they’re not the only ones who wind up with …
HollywoodandFine.com I found myself strangely compelled by Austin Chick’s “Girls Against Boys,” as much for what it doesn’t say as for what it does. The film starts with a flash-forward, with a young woman named Lu (Nicole LaLiberte), sexually teasing a cop (Matthew Rauch) in a bedroom, then getting him …
HollywoodandFine.com The waste of talent in Fisher Stevens’ “Stand Up Guys” is criminal. It’s the movie equivalent of shooting a man in Reno, just to watch him die. This tale of three aging lawbreakers – played by Al Pacino, Christopher Walken and Alan Arkin – is not just clichéd. It’s …
HollywoodandFine.com Now that his first comeback movie has seriously bombed, what’s next for Arnold Schwarzenegger? I’m here to suggest that, in fact, “The Last Stand,” which opened to slim box office in the U.S. a couple of weeks ago, is actually a step in the right direction for the aging …
YouTube satire tops Gangster Squad By Armond White Gangster Squad is not the first important cinema work of 2013–that would be the YouTube clip “Demand Celebrities Go Fuck Themselves”–but the two are related. Both deal with violence, the top-ranking political issue this news cycle, as an undeniable part of our …
HollywoodandFine.com It’s the rare political satire that really works – if only because real politics are so much weirder and painfully amusing than anything a writer could concoct. Exhibit A: Mark Sanford, disgraced governor of South Carolina, announcing he will run for Congress (where he’ll fit right in). If finding …
HollywoodandFine.com Based on a cult novel by David Wong, Don Coscarelli’s “John Dies at the End” suffers the same problem as its source book: an elaborate imagination in service to writing that is never anywhere near as funny or clever as the writer seems to believe. As a result, this …
Critic Armond White assesses the past movie year By Armond White In 2012 politics became personal fantasy. Movies weren’t just entertainment but were used to justify prejudiced (even escapist) points of view. Critics misread films to suit political partisanship but they could do so only because filmmakers were similarly biased. …
HollywoodandFine.com Sheldon Candis’ “LUV” is a rough coming-of-age tale that establishes Common as a rapper who could easily put his music career behind him and concentrate on acting. It also introduces a young talent, Michael Rainey Jr., as his nephew, in a breakthrough role that theoretically could signal the start …
HollywoodandFine.com Allen Hughes’ “Broken City” has the bones and perhaps even the DNA of a better, darker and more interesting film. Its tale of marital discord and political in-fighting, as well as corruption and malfeasance, could have been constructed as one of those painfully compelling tales of a good man …
HollywoodandFine.com Sometimes, all you want is a knock-down, guns-blazing approximation of an old-style western, even if it’s set in contemporary times. As a modern oater, “The Last Stand” is shamelessly entertaining. As guilty pleasures go, this one is relatively defensible. Directed by Korean émigré Kim Jee-woon, it’s a 21st-century take …
HollywoodandFine.com It’s taken me a while to get around to it, but I wanted to offer a nod of approval for Walter Salles’ “On the Road,” which came out in limited release at the end of 2012. Dismissed by some critics for being too vague in its storytelling, Salles’ film …
