TCM. A Broadway producer decides to get rich by creating the biggest flop of his career. Zero Mostel. Gene Wilder. Kenneth Mars. Directed and written by Mel Brooks.
Taking Lives
TCM. Angela Jollie. Ethan Hawke.
A terrifying murder thriller of a sociopath who takes on the different personalities of the people he murders. The ending scene, where he stabs her in her pregnant stomach was revolting.
Match Point
Theatre. Directed by Woody Allan
A serious drama of an ambitious young tennis pro who maneuvers his way into marriage and privilege of the upper English class as he proceeds to carry on an affair, getting his girlfriend pregnant. He then does a double homicide and gets away with murder.
Crimes and Misdemeanors
TCM. Directed by Woody Allen
The same story line, as Match Point, which was modernized. Ironically, in “Crimes”, there is a scene with a tennis player holding a racket in the background and a word of “Lucky” that gets used time and again.
Mrs. Purfrey at The Claremont
Theatre. This is a treasured gem of a small independent film. It is the intimate relationship that takes place between a grandmother age woman and a 28-year old man, Rupert Friend, who is perfect in his part, I loved it and found myself moved to tears.
Goal
On plane to Salzburg . Santiago wins and fails and fails some more in this suspenseful soccer movie of a poor Los Angeles athlete who goes to England and wins the championship.
In Her Shoes, 2005
On Airplane Flight from Salzburg
Cameron Diaz and Toni Colette. It is about two sisters, one the good and capable sister and the other a less than responsible, promiscuous and dishonest manipulative one. The unknown grandmother brings them together and helps them both evolve into mature and loving young girls.
Charlie Wonk and the Chocolate Factory
On Airplane. One of the worst films of the year. It was boring and stupid and silly.
Pretzel, 2005
Israeli Movie seen on DVD
Casanova
Theater
Sound of Music, 1965
TCM
Goal
On plane to Salzburg . Santiago wins and fails and fails some more in this suspenseful soccer movie of a poor Los Angeles athlete who goes to England and wins the championship.
In Her Shoes, 2005
On Airplane Flight from Salzburg
Cameron Diaz and Toni Colette. It is about two sisters, one the good and capable sister and the other a less than responsible, promiscuous and dishonest manipulative one. The unknown grandmother brings them together and helps them both evolve into mature and loving young girls.
Charlie Wonk and the Chocolate Factory
On Airplane. One of the worst films of the year. It was boring and stupid and silly.
Pretzel, 2005
Israeli Movie seen on DVD
Casanova
Theater
Sound of Music, 1965
TCM
Brief Encounter, 1945
TCM. Written and Produced by Noel Coward
Pretty Persuasion, 2005
DVD
JuneBug, 2005
DVD. A story of two young couples who discover the weaknesses and strengths of their relationships in the deep south.
A Woman in Paris, 1924
TCM Silent Film. A young woman who is rejected by her suitor in New York runs away to Paris to be the mistress to a wealthy and charming playboy. At the end, her New York suitor follows her and ends up killing himself in despair, his head falling into the fountain.
A Raisin In The Sun, 1958?
TCM. Based on the book An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser. Elizabeth Taylor is drop dead gorgeous. She plays the wealthy girl who falls in love with the ambitious, desperate young man who seeks the fortune and style and society that she comes from. Shelley Winters plays his plain girlfriend who becomes pregnant and who he drowns in a boating accident in order to be able to marry Elizabeth Taylor.
Souls For Sale, 1923
TCM. In this silent film, a young woman turns Hollywood upside down in her search for stardom. She leaves her cruel husband and jumps off the train and hooks up with a movie studio that was making a film in the desert.
The 40-Year-Old Virgin
DVD. A sad, commentary of American culture and values and its obsession with sex, sex, sex.
Broken Flowers
DVD. Bill Murray plays a sad, morose, man, who goes searching reluctantly for a son he may or may not have sired. The ending was very unfulfilling.
Round Trip
DVD. An Israeli mother leaves her husband, takes her kids and moved to Tel Aviv where she moves into a lousy neighborhood and begins a lesbian affair with the black nanny.
Souls For Sale, 1923
TCM. In this silent film, a young woman turns Hollywood upside down in her search for stardom. She leaves her cruel husband and jumps off the train and hooks up with a movie studio that was making a film in the desert.
The 40-Year-Old Virgin
DVD. A sad, commentary of American culture and values and its obsession with sex, sex, sex.
Broken Flowers
DVD. Bill Murray plays a sad, morose, man, who goes searching reluctantly for a son he may or may not have sired. The ending was very unfulfilling.
Round Trip
DVD. An Israeli mother leaves her husband, takes her kids and moved to Tel Aviv where she moves into a lousy neighborhood and begins a lesbian affair with the black nanny.
The Ballad of Jack & Rose
DVD. In the remote Canadian mountainside, an aged, dying hippie (Daniel Day Lewis) lives alone with his daughter and brings in a woman to live with. Her two sons accompany her. This “new family” represents civilization. It causes havoc and jealously and trouble.
Saraband
Theatre. Liv Ullmann plays herself at age of 63 years old as she reflects upon her divorce, the fall out, the sadness, the loss and the redemption of her life, mistakes and regrets.
An Ingmar Bergman Film on DVD
Mail Order Wife
DVD. It plays and acts and looks like a documentary about mail order brides, where both the documentary film maker and the loser husband get involved with the same bride, making her both of their brides until she leaves both of them and how they try to get her back. Very good.
Cactus Flower, 1968
TCM. With Walter Matheau and 21 year old Goldie Hawn who plays his girlfriend.
Witty and funny and clever, it is how two relationships straighten themselves out. Innocent.
The Good Woman
Theatre in New York. Taken from Oscar Wilde’s Lady Wendermeres Fan. It is a wonderful film. I loved the Italian scenery and the dialogue and the story line. It is a wonderful scathing attack on marriage that is witty, clever, with famous one-liners.
Casablanca
TCM. This all time classic of two lovers who reunite in Casablanca and then must part.
“Here’s to looking at you kid.”
Munich
Theater. Steven Spielberg’s 2nd rate cops and robbers film – could be filmed or theme anywhere – he chose Israel to promote his own political viewpoint. At least I did not pay to see this manipulated film, filled with lies and agendas and deceit from the screenwriter.
Vertigo
TCM. A classic Alfred Hitchcock film with James Stewart and Kim Novack.
Elizabethtown
DVD. Dumb movie with Orlando Bloom and Kristen Dunst.
Proof
DVD. Outstanding film with Gwenyth Plowtow and Anthony Hopkins about a symbiotic relationship of a genius scientist and his brilliant daughter who fear that she is going mad like her father and how her sister feeds into her fear of insanity.
Nine Lives
DVD. Wonderful film of 9 separate short stories and how they loosely interchange with each other
Tsotsi
Theatre. A hard thug murders his way through 3 people, blinding his friend and permanently crippling a woman and then steals her baby and through the baby then seeks redemption for his evil acts. Typical Hollywood theme that he was a victim of his poverty and should be forgiven for his sins. I had no feeling toward him or any sympathy.
Mrs. Henderson Presents
Theatre. Judy Dench stars in this film of an aging, wealthy widow who buys a theatre and revives it by showing nude women dancers standing still. The best line was when one of the dancers said she felt safer nude on stage then out in the audience among all the men. It was a poignant, well done film, along the lines of Being Julia. Same time period and place and similar story line.
Bleak House
TV. A nine-hour series on PBS that was simply wonderful. It was an 800 page book that was condensed well, with all Dickens colorful characters and story line of different types of love and loss and forgiveness.
Sense and Sensibility
TV. I have seen this Jane Austin remake many time and it always captures my interest and care.
The Billy Holly Story
TV. A rerun of a 1990 classic story of the great Billy Holly and his tragic death at a young age due to a plane crash. Great music and Gary Busey was phenomenal as Billy. His only role he ever played.
From Here to Eternity
TCM. A remarkable piece of film work with Burt Lancaster, Frank Sinatra and Deborah Karr. It is a man’s film, a war movie, good and evil, right and wrong, wonderful dialogue.
A new favorite. Very satisfying.
Transamerica
Theater. Typical Hollywood film of a transgender who reunites with his son before he can receive his operation. Every parent looks like a monster. A woman plays the role of a man who wants to become a woman. Lousy story, lousy son, lousy film. Hollywood loves transgender.
Sophie Scholl
Theatre. The best film I have seen this year of two young Germans who stood up to the Hitler war machine and lost. Wept. She reminded me of my girls. Conscience. Values. and Decency.
It was an arrest, interrogation and joke of a trial. Devastating and more devastating.
Love Story
TCM. Ali McGraw and Ryan O’Neal star in this story of young coeds who marry and she becomes sick and dies. She is bitchy trying to be witty and he is far more emotional and in love.
Paper Moon
TCM. A wonderful and charming story of 10 year-old Tantum O’Neal as she stars with her father in this Depression oriented film. Tantum steals the movie from everyone.
The Last Picture Show
TCM. This is a classic and one of my all time favorites. It only gets better and sadder as sad lives live with unrequited dreams and loss with nowhere to go.
Joyeux Noel
Theatre. It is about WW1. The Germans and the English stopped shooting at each other in order to celebrate Christmas Eve. It created such a scandal that the two governments would not allow this to be released and only a secret document describing it that leaked out has given any authenticity to the story. They even had a singer sing Silent Night! After the war was over the
Governments acknowledged that this did happen exactly the way it had been leaked. Can you imagine the two sides, shooting at each other in the trenches and on their own, along with their commanding officers, and agreeing not to shoot each other but to come out of their trenches and shake hands and have an evening singing Christmas songs together, led by a singer???!!! And, then the next day, go back to killing each other as if the evening before had not happened? This could be a sign of traitor behavior and dangerous, as each side can assess the other in terms of morale, weapons, strategy, etc.
Where The Truth Lies
DVD. A mystery movie of the story of Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin and a murder that took place in their bathroom. A C rated film with lots of gratuitous sex and intrigue. Black comedy.
NorthFace
DVD. Nominated for Academy Award, 2005 staring Charlize Theron, who plays an iron ore miner. She plays the victim where she was used and abused and no one believes her. It is a hard sad film, predictable with a wayward son who hates his mother, and who was raped and never told a soul.
The Net
DVD. Hope Cassidy, a beautiful computer expert who travels to Istanbul for the perfect job but instantly gets caught up in a high-tech-game job. She uses her brains and beauty to steal back her name and unravel the mystery. Thanks to some help from a mysterious cab driver and a sexy flight attendant, she’s able to uncover the shocking truth about what’s happening to her.
Lonesome Jim
Theatre. Casey Affleck stars in this film of despairing sad characters in Indiana.
There is an emotional element that is missing and for the sadness of the story line and plot, I should have been brought to tears and was not.
L’enfant
Theater. This won the highest award at the Cannes, 2005. It is about a young man who is indifferent to his newborn child and sells him to make a profit. Through his petty theft and low moral character and indifference to nearly everyone around him, he finds redemption through the horror that he did to his girlfriend. At the end of the film, in jail, he finally breaks down and weeps as he recognizes his evil doings.
Friends With Money
Theatre. With Jennifer Anniston. One of the worse movies I have seen. Trite, low class, stupid, unfeeling, disrespectful, dumb, how could the reviews be so wrong?
Sommersault
Theater. Australian. A wonderful, sad film of a beautiful lone 15 year-old girl who was aching for love in all the wrong places with all the wrong guys. She was soft and gentle and sweet and desperate and hungry and I so identified with her loneliness and sadness and hunger.
Water
Theater. An Indian film about the widows of India in 1938 and how they were used for exploitation and prostitution. These were widows who were abandoned and poor and had no resources. This was told through a seven year old fat girl who was a widow with no comprehension of her condition..
United 93
Theater. This was based on true life account of this suicide mission plane and the heroism involved. Terrifying and so realistic. I was jumping out of my seat. They used real people in the air traffic control towers and army base, and no famous actors. It was fabulous.
Lost City
Theatre. Dan Garvia’s personal family story of what happened to his family when Castro came to power. It was stylized and boring and contrived. Sad what happens to those who must endure and face exile.
The Proposition
Theatre. Australian. This film is a cowboy western that takes place in the outback. It is based on a true story of a gang of four brothers who murdered a family. A deal is made with one brother. He is to hunt down the killer brother and turn him in. In so doing this, he will be set free. It is violent and gruesome and no one takes a bath. It is realistic to a painful degree.
24
TV. Fourth season with Kfefer Sutherland as he stars as a covert agent for CTU (Central Terrorist Unit) as a modern day cowboy. He plays the loner, the outsider who is always right and keeps the free world safe from terrorism, nuclear and biological.
La Petite Jerusalem
Theater. Set on the outskirts of Paris, it is based in the largely Jewish neighborhood where religious, ethnic struggle, philosophy, love and desire collide. 18 year-old Laura, tries to reconcile her desire to learn western philosophy with her strict Orthodox upbringing. The resulting sexual discoveries and entanglements that both Laura and her married sister find themselves in create havoc while ultimately freeing both women from their self-imposed dictums. I found the film contrived and not believable and boring.
One Day in September
DVD, Documentary. The Israeli Massacre at the 1972 Olympics in Munich. I was filled with such rage when I finished watching it.
The Fog of War
Theater. Documentary. Robert McCamera’s point-of-view about his role in the Vietnam War and how he sees war now from the eyes of a 85 year old man.
Wha Wha
Theater. With Emily Watson who plays an overbearing stepmother toward a 15 year-old boy as the film disintegrates into an awful family drama. It is supposed to represent the last of colonialism in the South Africa region. Alcoholism. Cold Brits. OK.
Derailed
DVD. With Jennifer Anniston and Clive Owen. A suspenseful drama of a man who is set up to seduce Jennifer and get his money and when he realizes what has happened, he goes on a murderous spree and gets his just revenge. Good movie.
Something New
DVD. A black romantic comedy of a modern day Guess Who Is Coming To Dinner in reverse. The white gardener and the black MBA have to deal with all the problems of inter-racial tensions and expectations.
A Ship of Fools, 1965
TCM. This is an extraordinary piece of film work. A classic. I loved everything about it. The pathos. It is about the search for love in all the wrong places, the loss of innocence and history, the pathos. The brilliant dialogue and acting capture a film to near perfection..
An Unfinished Life
DVD. Jennifer Lopez and Morgan Freeman and Robert Redford. This is a lousy film about a daughter-in-law returning to Wyoming to her father-in-laws place. The son died and she was blamed for it. She came with the grand daughter that Redford never met.
A Dying Gaol
DVD. With Patricia Clarkson who plays a deadly revenge game when she finds out that her husband is homosexual and is playing around with a screenwriter. Through this screenwriter she gets her revenge and her death.
FireWall
DVD. Harrison Ford. Lousy. Walked away.
Waterloo
TCM. With Vivian Leigh and Robert Taylor. This was her favorite role of a young ballerina and soldier who fall in love, he goes off to war, she slips into poverty and despair and becomes a whore, and she cannot live with her past and confesses it to his Lady of a wonderful mother, and then throws herself under a truck. It is a wonderful movie and very romantic as Taylor as the leading man. There is a constant underlying sadness to Leigh’s performance.
Imagine Me And You
DVD. An English movie about a girl who is married to a guy and on her wedding day sees the love of her life (a woman) and suffers until she is united with her at the end of the movie.
Sariana
DVD. George Clooney’s choppy, confusing movie about a CIA agent who is doing his own thing with the oil companies as there are other entrances and exits of the same confusing theme.
Failure to Launch
DVD. This was a boring, predictable, silly movie with Jessica Sarah Parker as she tries to get the guy out of living with his parents and to become a responsible human being.
8 Miles
DVD. Disney. How Siberian huskies are rescued in the Antarctic.
A Woman Under The Influence
TCM. Gina Rowland stars in this masterpiece role of a woman who disintegrates into madness. Very real and intense and an outstanding. It is filmed by her husband John Cervantes
Faces
TCM. A John Cervantes film. Starring Judy Garland who plays a therapist who works in an institution for children that are mentally retarded. She wants to “save” Rueben and cannot.
The Prize Winner of Defiance Ohio
DVD. A very good movie about a poor family and how the mother writes jingles for TV and makes a lot of money to support her family. She has to cope with a drunk and jealous (of her talent) husband, while raising 10 children, as he takes his salary and her hard earned money to buy liquor. Her life was small and she was worn down by household duties. Julianne Moore played her sweet and controlling. A true story.
Marilyn Hotchkiss Ballroom Dancing and Charm School
DVD. With John Goodman. How a man recovers from his wife’s suicide by taking the place of Goodman, who was escaping from jail to make a promise he had made to his 12 year old girl friend, and in going to the dance school, he reclaims his life and hope and meets a girl that he likes.
Neal Young. Heart of Gold
DVD. In the remote Canadian mountainside, an aged, dying hippie (Daniel Day Lewis) lives alone with his daughter and brings in a woman to live with. Her two sons accompany her. This “new family” represents civilization. It causes havoc and jealously and trouble.
Saraband
Theatre. Liv Ullmann plays herself at age of 63 years old as she reflects upon her divorce, the fall out, the sadness, the loss and the redemption of her life, mistakes and regrets.
An Ingmar Bergman Film on DVD
Mail Order Wife
DVD. It plays and acts and looks like a documentary about mail order brides, where both the documentary film maker and the loser husband get involved with the same bride, making her both of their brides until she leaves both of them and how they try to get her back. Very good.
Cactus Flower, 1968
TCM. With Walter Matheau and 21 year old Goldie Hawn who plays his girlfriend.
Witty and funny and clever, it is how two relationships straighten themselves out. Innocent.
The Good Woman
Theatre in New York. Taken from Oscar Wilde’s Lady Wendermeres Fan. It is a wonderful film. I loved the Italian scenery and the dialogue and the story line. It is a wonderful scathing attack on marriage that is witty, clever, with famous one-liners.
Casablanca
TCM. This all time classic of two lovers who reunite in Casablanca and then must part.
“Here’s to looking at you kid.”
Munich
Theater. Steven Spielberg’s 2nd rate cops and robbers film – could be filmed or theme anywhere – he chose Israel to promote his own political viewpoint. At least I did not pay to see this manipulated film, filled with lies and agendas and deceit from the screenwriter.
Vertigo
TCM. A classic Alfred Hitchcock film with James Stewart and Kim Novack.
Elizabethtown
DVD. Dumb movie with Orlando Bloom and Kristen Dunst.
Proof
DVD. Outstanding film with Gwenyth Plowtow and Anthony Hopkins about a symbiotic relationship of a genius scientist and his brilliant daughter who fear that she is going mad like her father and how her sister feeds into her fear of insanity.
Nine Lives
DVD. Wonderful film of 9 separate short stories and how they loosely interchange with each other
Tsotsi
Theatre. A hard thug murders his way through 3 people, blinding his friend and permanently crippling a woman and then steals her baby and through the baby then seeks redemption for his evil acts. Typical Hollywood theme that he was a victim of his poverty and should be forgiven for his sins. I had no feeling toward him or any sympathy.
Mrs. Henderson Presents
Theatre. Judy Dench stars in this film of an aging, wealthy widow who buys a theatre and revives it by showing nude women dancers standing still. The best line was when one of the dancers said she felt safer nude on stage then out in the audience among all the men. It was a poignant, well done film, along the lines of Being Julia. Same time period and place and similar story line.
Bleak House
TV. A nine-hour series on PBS that was simply wonderful. It was an 800 page book that was condensed well, with all Dickens colorful characters and story line of different types of love and loss and forgiveness.
Sense and Sensibility
TV. I have seen this Jane Austin remake many time and it always captures my interest and care.
The Billy Holly Story
TV. A rerun of a 1990 classic story of the great Billy Holly and his tragic death at a young age due to a plane crash. Great music and Gary Busey was phenomenal as Billy. His only role he ever played.
From Here to Eternity
TCM. A remarkable piece of film work with Burt Lancaster, Frank Sinatra and Deborah Karr. It is a man’s film, a war movie, good and evil, right and wrong, wonderful dialogue.
A new favorite. Very satisfying.
Transamerica
Theater. Typical Hollywood film of a transgender who reunites with his son before he can receive his operation. Every parent looks like a monster. A woman plays the role of a man who wants to become a woman. Lousy story, lousy son, lousy film. Hollywood loves transgender.
Sophie Scholl
Theatre. The best film I have seen this year of two young Germans who stood up to the Hitler war machine and lost. Wept. She reminded me of my girls. Conscience. Values. and Decency.
It was an arrest, interrogation and joke of a trial. Devastating and more devastating.
Love Story
TCM. Ali McGraw and Ryan O’Neal star in this story of young coeds who marry and she becomes sick and dies. She is bitchy trying to be witty and he is far more emotional and in love.
Paper Moon
TCM. A wonderful and charming story of 10 year-old Tantum O’Neal as she stars with her father in this Depression oriented film. Tantum steals the movie from everyone.
The Last Picture Show
TCM. This is a classic and one of my all time favorites. It only gets better and sadder as sad lives live with unrequited dreams and loss with nowhere to go.
Joyeux Noel
Theatre. It is about WW1. The Germans and the English stopped shooting at each other in order to celebrate Christmas Eve. It created such a scandal that the two governments would not allow this to be released and only a secret document describing it that leaked out has given any authenticity to the story. They even had a singer sing Silent Night! After the war was over the
Governments acknowledged that this did happen exactly the way it had been leaked. Can you imagine the two sides, shooting at each other in the trenches and on their own, along with their commanding officers, and agreeing not to shoot each other but to come out of their trenches and shake hands and have an evening singing Christmas songs together, led by a singer???!!! And, then the next day, go back to killing each other as if the evening before had not happened? This could be a sign of traitor behavior and dangerous, as each side can assess the other in terms of morale, weapons, strategy, etc.
Where The Truth Lies
DVD. A mystery movie of the story of Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin and a murder that took place in their bathroom. A C rated film with lots of gratuitous sex and intrigue. Black comedy.
NorthFace
DVD. Nominated for Academy Award, 2005 staring Charlize Theron, who plays an iron ore miner. She plays the victim where she was used and abused and no one believes her. It is a hard sad film, predictable with a wayward son who hates his mother, and who was raped and never told a soul.
The Net
DVD. Hope Cassidy, a beautiful computer expert who travels to Istanbul for the perfect job but instantly gets caught up in a high-tech-game job. She uses her brains and beauty to steal back her name and unravel the mystery. Thanks to some help from a mysterious cab driver and a sexy flight attendant, she’s able to uncover the shocking truth about what’s happening to her.
Lonesome Jim
Theatre. Casey Affleck stars in this film of despairing sad characters in Indiana.
There is an emotional element that is missing and for the sadness of the story line and plot, I should have been brought to tears and was not.
L’enfant
Theater. This won the highest award at the Cannes, 2005. It is about a young man who is indifferent to his newborn child and sells him to make a profit. Through his petty theft and low moral character and indifference to nearly everyone around him, he finds redemption through the horror that he did to his girlfriend. At the end of the film, in jail, he finally breaks down and weeps as he recognizes his evil doings.
Friends With Money
Theatre. With Jennifer Anniston. One of the worse movies I have seen. Trite, low class, stupid, unfeeling, disrespectful, dumb, how could the reviews be so wrong?
Sommersault
Theater. Australian. A wonderful, sad film of a beautiful lone 15 year-old girl who was aching for love in all the wrong places with all the wrong guys. She was soft and gentle and sweet and desperate and hungry and I so identified with her loneliness and sadness and hunger.
Water
Theater. An Indian film about the widows of India in 1938 and how they were used for exploitation and prostitution. These were widows who were abandoned and poor and had no resources. This was told through a seven year old fat girl who was a widow with no comprehension of her condition..
United 93
Theater. This was based on true life account of this suicide mission plane and the heroism involved. Terrifying and so realistic. I was jumping out of my seat. They used real people in the air traffic control towers and army base, and no famous actors. It was fabulous.
Lost City
Theatre. Dan Garvia’s personal family story of what happened to his family when Castro came to power. It was stylized and boring and contrived. Sad what happens to those who must endure and face exile.
The Proposition
Theatre. Australian. This film is a cowboy western that takes place in the outback. It is based on a true story of a gang of four brothers who murdered a family. A deal is made with one brother. He is to hunt down the killer brother and turn him in. In so doing this, he will be set free. It is violent and gruesome and no one takes a bath. It is realistic to a painful degree.
24
TV. Fourth season with Kfefer Sutherland as he stars as a covert agent for CTU (Central Terrorist Unit) as a modern day cowboy. He plays the loner, the outsider who is always right and keeps the free world safe from terrorism, nuclear and biological.
La Petite Jerusalem
Theater. Set on the outskirts of Paris, it is based in the largely Jewish neighborhood where religious, ethnic struggle, philosophy, love and desire collide. 18 year-old Laura, tries to reconcile her desire to learn western philosophy with her strict Orthodox upbringing. The resulting sexual discoveries and entanglements that both Laura and her married sister find themselves in create havoc while ultimately freeing both women from their self-imposed dictums. I found the film contrived and not believable and boring.
One Day in September
DVD, Documentary. The Israeli Massacre at the 1972 Olympics in Munich. I was filled with such rage when I finished watching it.
The Fog of War
Theater. Documentary. Robert McCamera’s point-of-view about his role in the Vietnam War and how he sees war now from the eyes of a 85 year old man.
Wha Wha
Theater. With Emily Watson who plays an overbearing stepmother toward a 15 year-old boy as the film disintegrates into an awful family drama. It is supposed to represent the last of colonialism in the South Africa region. Alcoholism. Cold Brits. OK.
Derailed
DVD. With Jennifer Anniston and Clive Owen. A suspenseful drama of a man who is set up to seduce Jennifer and get his money and when he realizes what has happened, he goes on a murderous spree and gets his just revenge. Good movie.
Something New
DVD. A black romantic comedy of a modern day Guess Who Is Coming To Dinner in reverse. The white gardener and the black MBA have to deal with all the problems of inter-racial tensions and expectations.
A Ship of Fools, 1965
TCM. This is an extraordinary piece of film work. A classic. I loved everything about it. The pathos. It is about the search for love in all the wrong places, the loss of innocence and history, the pathos. The brilliant dialogue and acting capture a film to near perfection..
An Unfinished Life
DVD. Jennifer Lopez and Morgan Freeman and Robert Redford. This is a lousy film about a daughter-in-law returning to Wyoming to her father-in-laws place. The son died and she was blamed for it. She came with the grand daughter that Redford never met.
A Dying Gaol
DVD. With Patricia Clarkson who plays a deadly revenge game when she finds out that her husband is homosexual and is playing around with a screenwriter. Through this screenwriter she gets her revenge and her death.
FireWall
DVD. Harrison Ford. Lousy. Walked away.
Waterloo
TCM. With Vivian Leigh and Robert Taylor. This was her favorite role of a young ballerina and soldier who fall in love, he goes off to war, she slips into poverty and despair and becomes a whore, and she cannot live with her past and confesses it to his Lady of a wonderful mother, and then throws herself under a truck. It is a wonderful movie and very romantic as Taylor as the leading man. There is a constant underlying sadness to Leigh’s performance.
Imagine Me And You
DVD. An English movie about a girl who is married to a guy and on her wedding day sees the love of her life (a woman) and suffers until she is united with her at the end of the movie.
Sariana
DVD. George Clooney’s choppy, confusing movie about a CIA agent who is doing his own thing with the oil companies as there are other entrances and exits of the same confusing theme.
Failure to Launch
DVD. This was a boring, predictable, silly movie with Jessica Sarah Parker as she tries to get the guy out of living with his parents and to become a responsible human being.
8 Miles
DVD. Disney. How Siberian huskies are rescued in the Antarctic.
A Woman Under The Influence
TCM. Gina Rowland stars in this masterpiece role of a woman who disintegrates into madness. Very real and intense and an outstanding. It is filmed by her husband John Cervantes
Faces
TCM. A John Cervantes film. Starring Judy Garland who plays a therapist who works in an institution for children that are mentally retarded. She wants to “save” Rueben and cannot.
The Prize Winner of Defiance Ohio
DVD. A very good movie about a poor family and how the mother writes jingles for TV and makes a lot of money to support her family. She has to cope with a drunk and jealous (of her talent) husband, while raising 10 children, as he takes his salary and her hard earned money to buy liquor. Her life was small and she was worn down by household duties. Julianne Moore played her sweet and controlling. A true story.
Marilyn Hotchkiss Ballroom Dancing and Charm School
DVD. With John Goodman. How a man recovers from his wife’s suicide by taking the place of Goodman, who was escaping from jail to make a promise he had made to his 12 year old girl friend, and in going to the dance school, he reclaims his life and hope and meets a girl that he likes.
Neal Young. Heart of Gold
Turned it off after 10 minutes. It was just a documentary and promotion of his concert tour and music.
A Child Is Waiting
TCM. An emotionally fragile woman takes a job teaching mental handicapped children. With Judy Garland and Burt Lancaster. Based on a true memoir. To me, it was more about the child.
The White Cliffs of Dover. 1944
TCM. An American woman with a British husband fights to keep her family together through two world wars. With Irene Dunne. Direction Clarence Brown. Loved it. Saw it twice. She lost everything at the end. Her husband and her child, her mother in law and her husband.
A Foreign Affair, 1948
TCM. A prim Congresswoman gets caught up in the romantic decadence of post-war Germany. Marlene Dietrich.
On A Clear Day
DVD. English. With Brenda Blethyn. Frank, 55 years old and suddenly unemployed, finds himself without self-confidence or a sense of direction. In a desperate attempt to restore both, he secretly trains to swim the English Channel. As his moment of truth draws near, the seas change and Frank is forced to face relationships that he has neglected in the past. It is a heart warming movie of a middle aged working-class couple who are still not finished dealing with the grief of losing their son in a drowning accident. Through swimming the English Channel, Frank was able to finally forgive himself for not saving his son.
Little Miss Sunshine
Theater.. Every detail in the movie was amazing. The transitions were seamless. Nothing was accidental. Like buying the sex magazines and how that played a significant role when they were pulled over by the police. The little girl, Oliva literally stole the movie for me but then every actor was perfect. The Mother and her rage was extraordinary. Everyone played their part perfectly. But the little girl was extraordinary. She was so real and you never know the power of what you say and the impact of what you say, said my Rachel. Look how she asked Miss Calif? if she liked ice cream. And, that conversation had taken place at the diner 2 days earlier. It was so real and absorbing. I want to see it again. The only value that made me cringe was when the grandfather said, sleep with lots of women. sleep with lots of women. Maybe I was feeling protective of Rachel considering I was sitting with she and Adam. I thought the dance of Miss Sunshine was hysterical. The father with his emphasis on being a loser, and he was the biggest one of all was sad. How none of them realized their dreams. It was a masterpiece of film work.
Scoop
Theater. Woody Allen’s movie with Hugh Jackman and Scarlett J. A typical Woody film with reused dialogue and boring plot and I felt antsy sitting there most of the time. He makes me so nervous. Scarlet poses as a journalist and falls in love with the tarot card murderer.
Body and Soul
DVD. A classic with John Garfield and Lilli Palmer. An authentic boxing film based on the true life story of Barney Rose, the great Jewish boxer. The photography was phenomenal and the acting superb. Without the special effects of newer boxing films, it had a far greater authenticity and realness.
Conversations With Women
Theater. Lousy title of a dialogue film of two people on a split screen who re-meet at a wedding, had been married before, and had a one night affair. Sad and lonely and incomplete, as are their lives.
Quinceanea
Theatre. A Spanish film of a young girl who gets pregnant, her boyfriend abandons her, the grandfather takes her in and her gay gang banger cousin steps up to the plate and assumes the responsibility of raising the child. Good solid film. The title comes from the 15 year old coming out party of the daughter. She is now a woman.
Broken Bridges
DVD. Bo Price is down-on-his luck country music singer who returns to his hometown following the death of his younger brother. There, his life is changed forever when his high-school sweetheart reveals he is the father to her 16 year-old- daughter. (Saw on Airplane)
Four Last Songs
DVD on Airplane. With Stanley Tucci. Larry is a struggling musician playing piano in a local bar in the Mediterranean. His luck finally seems to be turning when he is given the opportunity to stage a tribute concert honoring a great composer who lived in the village, until events unfold that threaten to jeopardize his fate once again.
An Inconvenient Truth
Theatre. Al Gore’s Documentary. Lifelong environmental champion Al Gore and Director Davis Guggenheim examine global climate change and the challenges it potentially creates in the coming decades. Presenting data in an interesting and thoughtful way, this film urges us to act “boldly, quickly, and wisely” to reduce our impact on the planet’s climate.
Keeping Up With The Steins
DVD on Airplane. Young Benjamin Fielder is terrified as he approaches his bar mitzvah and rite of passage to manhood. And though Benjamin fears the spotlight of an opulent affair, his father Adam is determined to surpass the extravagant bar mitzvah thrown by his rival Arnie Stein by hosting the most lavish event of the season.
My Super Ex-Girlfriend
DVD. On airplane. Urma Thurman, Luke Wilson. Matt thinks he has finally found the perfect girl. Unfortunately, things sour and Matt decides to call it quits. Even more unfortunate for Matt, his girlfriend happens to be able to fly, has super strength, and can burn holes through steel with her thermal vision. As he soon finds out, breaking up is not only hard to do, it can sometimes be downright dangerous.
Step Up
DVD . On airplane. A reckless, street-smart delinquent and his friends trash an auditorium at a school for the performing arts. Sentenced to community service at the school, he meets a beautiful, open-minded dancer and is drawn into that world, discovering his own talent for dance.
You, Me and Dupree
DVD. On airplane. Kate Hudson, Owen Wilson. Carl and Molly Peterson are just starting their new life together – complete with a cute house, boring neighbors, stable jobs, and the routines of newlywed existence. There is just one unfortunate hitch in their perfectly constructed new world, and his name is Dupree.
Volver
Theatre. Pedro Almagimor. With Penelope Cruz. A three generational story of women who are faced to deal with their issues with each other of loss and abandonment, lack of love and problems with men. A mother returns as a “ghost” to seek the truth and heart she yearns for from her unloved and angry daughter who was raped by her father/husband.
The Queen
Theatre. With Helen Mirrans. The story of Queen Elizabeth and Tony Blair as they respond and talk during the days of Dina’s murder and death and burial.
Stagecoach
TCM. This is a 1940’s classic starring John Wayne. It is about six characters that are forced to interact as they go out west. They have little to do with each other but the movie captures the grim and hardship and heroism and the stagecoach scene against the Indians are exciting.
Early Morning
Theater. With Ashley Judd who plays a weak alcoholic who lives close to the edge in an autobiographic sketch of life in rural Arkansas. Her marvelous performance captures her anger and fear and loneliness and desperation for love, especially from her father
Stranger Than Fiction
Theatre. With Will Farrell and Emma Thompson and Queen Lativah. A serious comedy about a writer with writers block who gets into the head of her protagonist and then has to kill him off and how he saves himself by going to an English Professor played by Dustin Hoffman who does his usual Meet The Parents schtick.
From The Window To The Sea
Theater. Part of the Liberty Film Festival, the documentary was about Hollywood, Israel and the Middle East with a Q&A with filmmaker Pierre Rehov and Michael Medved. The director was French from Algeria, who went under cover passing as an Arab who speaks Arabic, to put on record what the “street” really feels about Israel and Jews. It was chilling and hard to watch.
Sweet Land
Theatre. Think of this beautiful film as a gift, the kind of delicate but deeply emotional love story, both sincere and restrained, that, like love itself, is more sought after than found. The persuasively acted story of a mail-order bride in 1920 Minnesota, this fine romance is sure-footed enough to tread on the borders of sentimentality without falling into that ever-seductive trap. (Kenneth Turan)
In The Street
TCM. Lucy Arnez’s favorite role that she played (serious drama) before she became launched as a star and comedian. She plays a ganster’s girlfriend who he pushes down the stairs when she confronts him and Lucy is brought back to life and love through the care of Henry Fonda.
Roughly Speaking
TCM. Rosalind Russell plays a woman with four children who tries to make it work with her husband who finally leaves and divorces her. A new man, her soul mate, takes on the children and raises them and they go through life and its fortitude of making and losing money. Sentimental and contrived and too sweet but it held my interest.
Borat
Theater. An over-the-top comedy in vulgarity and gross animal house humor. It is about an anti-anti-semite who reveals people’s bigotry and anti-semitism. Because I was prepared for the Jewish stereo type humor, I did not take the offense I would have had I gone in cold. However, turning the religious Jews into cockroaches and throwing money at them was particularly offensive.
Looking For Comedy in the Muslim World
DVD. Written, produced and starred in by Albert Brook it was neither funny nor witty.
I found him over bearing, a prima donna, demanding and complaining and full of ego.
The Da Vinci Code
DVD. This movie starred Tom Hanks. It was incredibly boring and dull and I could not wait until it was over. There was no chemistry or interest, hard to follow and tedious. It followed the book faithfully without any of the suspense or fear or anticipation of the next clue.
John Tucker Must Die
DVD. A good film for its silly genre. A playboy three timing senior gets his com unpins with Lindsey Logan playing the girl who is out to trick him by causing him to fall in love with her, setting him up to then dump him so that he sees what it feels like. Stupid but entertaining.
A Prairie Home Companion
DVD. This was Robert Altman’s last film about the closing of a restaurant. It was the last night. It was a country western jiving place staring Meryl Streep and a cast of various stars. It was so boring that we stopped watching it after 15 minutes. The characters, all played by wealthy well known actors, were a hard to follow group, all sharing a short story about their life and why they ended up where they were and in the heartbreak relationships they seemed to get into.
Thank You For Not Smoking
DVD. An excellent satire about a lobbyist who works for the smoking companies and how he represented them by his charm and boyish manner and good looks and how he came to realize the damage that he was doing. I felt how these people put their lives in their hands by extremes who will do anything to prevent them from doing what they were hired to do, which was market and sell their product.
Separate Lies
DVD. This was a slow film with Emily Watson. It is about a wealthy English childless couple who Seem to get along on the surface but the wife enters into a meaningless affair with an arrogant, passionless full-of-himself man, where she accidentally commits a murder of a man who is married to her maid, with a drive by hitting as he rides his bicycle and how they cover up the murder and her role in it. Eventually the marriage breaks up, the husband stands by her, you wonder why, and you wonder what was the whole point to the film in the first place.
Opal Dream
Theater. Australian. Director, Peter Cattaneo The Full Monty. It is about a little girl living in the Outback who goes to pieces when her father tells her that her two imaginary friends have been lost in the families opal mine. You see how the family rallies around her when her father is accused of being a “rat.” (Going into someone else’s mine and stealing their opals) I cried at the end when you see how people want to be good and come to see that the girl is sick and that they have been wrong in her accusation and criticism. A wonderful gem of a movie.
Sorry, Wrong Number
TCM. Burt Landcaster and Barbara Standwik. A man plots to kill his invalid wife. She has overheard her own execution and the plot when she breaks into a phone conversation where they are plotting her murder. She puts it all together. It is scary and very well done. A classic.
The Good Shepard
Theater. Starred by Angelie Jolie and Matt Daemon, the movie is about the beginning formation of the CIA and the intrigue behind the scenes and the narrative of Matt’s home life which was awful – a neglected and unhappy wife, a scared and unsafe son, and how their cold emotions play off of one another. It was 3 hours too long, boring and tedious and stylized and one of the worst films of the year.
The Painted Veil
Theater. Starred and produced by Ed Norton and Naomi Watts, this beautiful and tender story, filmed in interior China was a remarkable and meaningful interpretation of Somerset Maughm’s short story. This is the third rendition of it and the best.
The History Boys
Theater. Based on the 11 Tony winner play, the movie was simply satisfying and fine.
It was about a few boys who were trying to get into Christ Church at Cambridge. Themes of sexuality and frustration and loneliness and poetry and prose all weaved together into a beautiful tapestry of dialogue. The characters were complex and well rounded. I liked the Jewish boy the best. He was the most sensitive. I never heard such memorization of poetry or the sub current in dialogue expressed so beautifully as in this movie. They were speaking about one thing but the other, the sexual metaphor was always lurking behind what they were saying.
DreamGirls
Theater. Overblown, over sung, musical revue of unmemorable songs and weak narrative and lightly based story on the Supremes. Beayonce is great but Jennifer Houston gave me a headache with the typical hard black attitude and screeching.
Venus
Theater. Starring Peter O’Toole who plays a dying old man of 82 and a young up-start 19 year old girl who feeds his fantasy and life of regret and pleasure. The guys hated it, saw him as a disgusting dirty old man and we saw Peter O’Toole. I thought he captured with great sensitivity the sadness of growing old and lonely, the frustration of having little satisfaction, the knowledge that your life is over.
A Child Is Waiting
TCM. An emotionally fragile woman takes a job teaching mental handicapped children. With Judy Garland and Burt Lancaster. Based on a true memoir. To me, it was more about the child.
The White Cliffs of Dover. 1944
TCM. An American woman with a British husband fights to keep her family together through two world wars. With Irene Dunne. Direction Clarence Brown. Loved it. Saw it twice. She lost everything at the end. Her husband and her child, her mother in law and her husband.
A Foreign Affair, 1948
TCM. A prim Congresswoman gets caught up in the romantic decadence of post-war Germany. Marlene Dietrich.
On A Clear Day
DVD. English. With Brenda Blethyn. Frank, 55 years old and suddenly unemployed, finds himself without self-confidence or a sense of direction. In a desperate attempt to restore both, he secretly trains to swim the English Channel. As his moment of truth draws near, the seas change and Frank is forced to face relationships that he has neglected in the past. It is a heart warming movie of a middle aged working-class couple who are still not finished dealing with the grief of losing their son in a drowning accident. Through swimming the English Channel, Frank was able to finally forgive himself for not saving his son.
Little Miss Sunshine
Theater.. Every detail in the movie was amazing. The transitions were seamless. Nothing was accidental. Like buying the sex magazines and how that played a significant role when they were pulled over by the police. The little girl, Oliva literally stole the movie for me but then every actor was perfect. The Mother and her rage was extraordinary. Everyone played their part perfectly. But the little girl was extraordinary. She was so real and you never know the power of what you say and the impact of what you say, said my Rachel. Look how she asked Miss Calif? if she liked ice cream. And, that conversation had taken place at the diner 2 days earlier. It was so real and absorbing. I want to see it again. The only value that made me cringe was when the grandfather said, sleep with lots of women. sleep with lots of women. Maybe I was feeling protective of Rachel considering I was sitting with she and Adam. I thought the dance of Miss Sunshine was hysterical. The father with his emphasis on being a loser, and he was the biggest one of all was sad. How none of them realized their dreams. It was a masterpiece of film work.
Scoop
Theater. Woody Allen’s movie with Hugh Jackman and Scarlett J. A typical Woody film with reused dialogue and boring plot and I felt antsy sitting there most of the time. He makes me so nervous. Scarlet poses as a journalist and falls in love with the tarot card murderer.
Body and Soul
DVD. A classic with John Garfield and Lilli Palmer. An authentic boxing film based on the true life story of Barney Rose, the great Jewish boxer. The photography was phenomenal and the acting superb. Without the special effects of newer boxing films, it had a far greater authenticity and realness.
Conversations With Women
Theater. Lousy title of a dialogue film of two people on a split screen who re-meet at a wedding, had been married before, and had a one night affair. Sad and lonely and incomplete, as are their lives.
Quinceanea
Theatre. A Spanish film of a young girl who gets pregnant, her boyfriend abandons her, the grandfather takes her in and her gay gang banger cousin steps up to the plate and assumes the responsibility of raising the child. Good solid film. The title comes from the 15 year old coming out party of the daughter. She is now a woman.
Broken Bridges
DVD. Bo Price is down-on-his luck country music singer who returns to his hometown following the death of his younger brother. There, his life is changed forever when his high-school sweetheart reveals he is the father to her 16 year-old- daughter. (Saw on Airplane)
Four Last Songs
DVD on Airplane. With Stanley Tucci. Larry is a struggling musician playing piano in a local bar in the Mediterranean. His luck finally seems to be turning when he is given the opportunity to stage a tribute concert honoring a great composer who lived in the village, until events unfold that threaten to jeopardize his fate once again.
An Inconvenient Truth
Theatre. Al Gore’s Documentary. Lifelong environmental champion Al Gore and Director Davis Guggenheim examine global climate change and the challenges it potentially creates in the coming decades. Presenting data in an interesting and thoughtful way, this film urges us to act “boldly, quickly, and wisely” to reduce our impact on the planet’s climate.
Keeping Up With The Steins
DVD on Airplane. Young Benjamin Fielder is terrified as he approaches his bar mitzvah and rite of passage to manhood. And though Benjamin fears the spotlight of an opulent affair, his father Adam is determined to surpass the extravagant bar mitzvah thrown by his rival Arnie Stein by hosting the most lavish event of the season.
My Super Ex-Girlfriend
DVD. On airplane. Urma Thurman, Luke Wilson. Matt thinks he has finally found the perfect girl. Unfortunately, things sour and Matt decides to call it quits. Even more unfortunate for Matt, his girlfriend happens to be able to fly, has super strength, and can burn holes through steel with her thermal vision. As he soon finds out, breaking up is not only hard to do, it can sometimes be downright dangerous.
Step Up
DVD . On airplane. A reckless, street-smart delinquent and his friends trash an auditorium at a school for the performing arts. Sentenced to community service at the school, he meets a beautiful, open-minded dancer and is drawn into that world, discovering his own talent for dance.
You, Me and Dupree
DVD. On airplane. Kate Hudson, Owen Wilson. Carl and Molly Peterson are just starting their new life together – complete with a cute house, boring neighbors, stable jobs, and the routines of newlywed existence. There is just one unfortunate hitch in their perfectly constructed new world, and his name is Dupree.
Volver
Theatre. Pedro Almagimor. With Penelope Cruz. A three generational story of women who are faced to deal with their issues with each other of loss and abandonment, lack of love and problems with men. A mother returns as a “ghost” to seek the truth and heart she yearns for from her unloved and angry daughter who was raped by her father/husband.
The Queen
Theatre. With Helen Mirrans. The story of Queen Elizabeth and Tony Blair as they respond and talk during the days of Dina’s murder and death and burial.
Stagecoach
TCM. This is a 1940’s classic starring John Wayne. It is about six characters that are forced to interact as they go out west. They have little to do with each other but the movie captures the grim and hardship and heroism and the stagecoach scene against the Indians are exciting.
Early Morning
Theater. With Ashley Judd who plays a weak alcoholic who lives close to the edge in an autobiographic sketch of life in rural Arkansas. Her marvelous performance captures her anger and fear and loneliness and desperation for love, especially from her father
Stranger Than Fiction
Theatre. With Will Farrell and Emma Thompson and Queen Lativah. A serious comedy about a writer with writers block who gets into the head of her protagonist and then has to kill him off and how he saves himself by going to an English Professor played by Dustin Hoffman who does his usual Meet The Parents schtick.
From The Window To The Sea
Theater. Part of the Liberty Film Festival, the documentary was about Hollywood, Israel and the Middle East with a Q&A with filmmaker Pierre Rehov and Michael Medved. The director was French from Algeria, who went under cover passing as an Arab who speaks Arabic, to put on record what the “street” really feels about Israel and Jews. It was chilling and hard to watch.
Sweet Land
Theatre. Think of this beautiful film as a gift, the kind of delicate but deeply emotional love story, both sincere and restrained, that, like love itself, is more sought after than found. The persuasively acted story of a mail-order bride in 1920 Minnesota, this fine romance is sure-footed enough to tread on the borders of sentimentality without falling into that ever-seductive trap. (Kenneth Turan)
In The Street
TCM. Lucy Arnez’s favorite role that she played (serious drama) before she became launched as a star and comedian. She plays a ganster’s girlfriend who he pushes down the stairs when she confronts him and Lucy is brought back to life and love through the care of Henry Fonda.
Roughly Speaking
TCM. Rosalind Russell plays a woman with four children who tries to make it work with her husband who finally leaves and divorces her. A new man, her soul mate, takes on the children and raises them and they go through life and its fortitude of making and losing money. Sentimental and contrived and too sweet but it held my interest.
Borat
Theater. An over-the-top comedy in vulgarity and gross animal house humor. It is about an anti-anti-semite who reveals people’s bigotry and anti-semitism. Because I was prepared for the Jewish stereo type humor, I did not take the offense I would have had I gone in cold. However, turning the religious Jews into cockroaches and throwing money at them was particularly offensive.
Looking For Comedy in the Muslim World
DVD. Written, produced and starred in by Albert Brook it was neither funny nor witty.
I found him over bearing, a prima donna, demanding and complaining and full of ego.
The Da Vinci Code
DVD. This movie starred Tom Hanks. It was incredibly boring and dull and I could not wait until it was over. There was no chemistry or interest, hard to follow and tedious. It followed the book faithfully without any of the suspense or fear or anticipation of the next clue.
John Tucker Must Die
DVD. A good film for its silly genre. A playboy three timing senior gets his com unpins with Lindsey Logan playing the girl who is out to trick him by causing him to fall in love with her, setting him up to then dump him so that he sees what it feels like. Stupid but entertaining.
A Prairie Home Companion
DVD. This was Robert Altman’s last film about the closing of a restaurant. It was the last night. It was a country western jiving place staring Meryl Streep and a cast of various stars. It was so boring that we stopped watching it after 15 minutes. The characters, all played by wealthy well known actors, were a hard to follow group, all sharing a short story about their life and why they ended up where they were and in the heartbreak relationships they seemed to get into.
Thank You For Not Smoking
DVD. An excellent satire about a lobbyist who works for the smoking companies and how he represented them by his charm and boyish manner and good looks and how he came to realize the damage that he was doing. I felt how these people put their lives in their hands by extremes who will do anything to prevent them from doing what they were hired to do, which was market and sell their product.
Separate Lies
DVD. This was a slow film with Emily Watson. It is about a wealthy English childless couple who Seem to get along on the surface but the wife enters into a meaningless affair with an arrogant, passionless full-of-himself man, where she accidentally commits a murder of a man who is married to her maid, with a drive by hitting as he rides his bicycle and how they cover up the murder and her role in it. Eventually the marriage breaks up, the husband stands by her, you wonder why, and you wonder what was the whole point to the film in the first place.
Opal Dream
Theater. Australian. Director, Peter Cattaneo The Full Monty. It is about a little girl living in the Outback who goes to pieces when her father tells her that her two imaginary friends have been lost in the families opal mine. You see how the family rallies around her when her father is accused of being a “rat.” (Going into someone else’s mine and stealing their opals) I cried at the end when you see how people want to be good and come to see that the girl is sick and that they have been wrong in her accusation and criticism. A wonderful gem of a movie.
Sorry, Wrong Number
TCM. Burt Landcaster and Barbara Standwik. A man plots to kill his invalid wife. She has overheard her own execution and the plot when she breaks into a phone conversation where they are plotting her murder. She puts it all together. It is scary and very well done. A classic.
The Good Shepard
Theater. Starred by Angelie Jolie and Matt Daemon, the movie is about the beginning formation of the CIA and the intrigue behind the scenes and the narrative of Matt’s home life which was awful – a neglected and unhappy wife, a scared and unsafe son, and how their cold emotions play off of one another. It was 3 hours too long, boring and tedious and stylized and one of the worst films of the year.
The Painted Veil
Theater. Starred and produced by Ed Norton and Naomi Watts, this beautiful and tender story, filmed in interior China was a remarkable and meaningful interpretation of Somerset Maughm’s short story. This is the third rendition of it and the best.
The History Boys
Theater. Based on the 11 Tony winner play, the movie was simply satisfying and fine.
It was about a few boys who were trying to get into Christ Church at Cambridge. Themes of sexuality and frustration and loneliness and poetry and prose all weaved together into a beautiful tapestry of dialogue. The characters were complex and well rounded. I liked the Jewish boy the best. He was the most sensitive. I never heard such memorization of poetry or the sub current in dialogue expressed so beautifully as in this movie. They were speaking about one thing but the other, the sexual metaphor was always lurking behind what they were saying.
DreamGirls
Theater. Overblown, over sung, musical revue of unmemorable songs and weak narrative and lightly based story on the Supremes. Beayonce is great but Jennifer Houston gave me a headache with the typical hard black attitude and screeching.
Venus
Theater. Starring Peter O’Toole who plays a dying old man of 82 and a young up-start 19 year old girl who feeds his fantasy and life of regret and pleasure. The guys hated it, saw him as a disgusting dirty old man and we saw Peter O’Toole. I thought he captured with great sensitivity the sadness of growing old and lonely, the frustration of having little satisfaction, the knowledge that your life is over.
Comedy in the Muslim World
The Worlds Fastest Indian
On A Clear Day
Failure To Launch
Go For Zucker
The Worlds Fastest Indian
On A Clear Day
Failure To Launch
Go For Zucker
