HollywoodandFine.com A second-rate “Die Hard” knock-off with Gerard Butler playing the Bruce Willis role, “Olympus Has Fallen” is preposterously overblown, an action movie that seems to prove the old saying: If brains were gunpowder, this movie wouldn’t have enough to blow its own nose. Directed by Antoine Fuqua – who …
HollywoodandFine.com A small but compelling story, “No Place on Earth” excavates the lost tale of one Ukrainian family’s survival during the Holocaust, when they hid in a series of deep caves that would intimidate even veteran spelunkers. Indeed, this documentary by Janet Tobias was inspired by the findings of one …
HollywoodandFine.com Ahhh, romantic comedy, that most elusive of genres: often attempted, so rarely successfully. You can count on one hand the number of good romantic comedies in any given year. Not that people aren’t making them – they just don’t do them very well. Which is why “Admission” is such …
HollywoodandFine.com Funny, surprising and full of heart, the French-Canadian comedy “Starbuck” has nothing to do with coffee (that name, after all, came from a character in “Moby-Dick”) and everything to do with redefining notions of family. Directed by Ken Scott from a script he wrote with Martin Petit, the film …
HollywoodandFine.com The darling of the Australian Academy Awards and a hit on the festival circuit, “The Sapphires” is that pure treat: an aggressively entertaining movie about the struggle, uplift, romance and joy of music. Based on a true story, it touches on the deep-seated racism in Australia that kept its …
HollywoodandFine.com As allegories go, Juan Diego Solanas’ “Upside Down” is about as deep as that famous Frank Gorshin “Star Trek” episode – we’re talking classic “Star Trek,” mind you. In the episode, titled “Let That Be Your Last Battlefield,” the Enterprise picks up two aliens whose faces are split down …
HollywoodandFine.com No one will ever accuse me of being a fan of Harmony Korine’s films. But I was surprised by his newest, “Spring Breakers” (opening in limited release Friday 3/15/13), which seems like a “Girls Gone Wild” video with automatic weapons, but is actually a bit deeper (and even creepier) …
HollywoodandFine.com Why would a movie studio try to stop critics from reviewing movies? It’s called a review embargo – and it seems a little self-explanatory. But still, I’d like to take this opportunity to discuss a little movie-critic inside-baseball stuff. Perhaps we can get a larger discussion going. For those …
HollywoodandFine.com Philip Roth may be our greatest living writer. So why would he give himself over to filmmakers who would make a movie as dull, superficial and pedantic as “Philip Roth: Unmasked”? The film, which receives a special theatrical run starting this week at Film Forum in New York, will …
HollywoodandFine.com The history books won’t tell you the story of U.S. Marine Gen. Bonner Fellers that you see in “Emperor.” Which is just as well because Fellers’ real story is more chaotic and less overtly heroic than the character portrayed by Matthew Fox in Peter Webber’s new film. Fox is …