HollywoodandFine.com One of those movies that worked much better than it deserved to, 2010’s “Red” offered action that was smart, funny and well-cast enough to make you forget just how ordinary it really was. Unfortunately, its sequel, “Red 2” is a movie of a very different and unwelcome type: the …
HollywoodandFine.com Dear Steven Soderbergh: Please don’t stop making movies. Your name is high on the list of filmmakers whose careers I’m thankful have coincided with my career as a movie critic. And “Side Effects” is further proof that you are at the height of your powers as a filmmaker. There’s …
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 “Lay the Favorite” feels like it should be a better gambling movie – funnier, like “The Sting,” or more exciting like “The Cincinnati Kid.” But despite a cast that includes Rebecca Hall, Bruce Willis, Vince Vaughn and Catherine Zeta-Jones – and a director like Stephen Frears – “Lay the …
HollywoodandFine.com “Rock of Ages” is technically a jukebox musical: a stage presentation of comedy, drama and song in which, instead of using original songs, the writers build a story out of existing music, re-purposing it to retrofit a plot or a plot point. Think “Mamma Mia.” But really, the jukebox …