Joseph Gordon-Levitt might possibly regard “Don Jon” as his Orson Welles achievement — after all, he wrote, directed, and stars in the movie, a Hollywood trifecta. The picture may perhaps rank somewhat below “Citizen Kane” in quality, but we all know that standards everywhere have declined. Rather than an American epic, it begins as an […]
George Grella
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“Salinger”
The new documentary on J. D. Salinger, timed to appear close to the publication of a new biography, should revitalize interest — if that were needed — in one of the most admired writers of the last half of the 20th century. Ever since the publication of his most famous work, “The Catcher in the […]
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“The Family”
The Mafia penetrates American life so deeply and fully that the organization provides the subject for both gangster films and comedies (mobedies?). Although the mob’s traditional business enterprises — robbery, drugs, prostitution, gambling, extortion, political corruption, etc., etc., usually accompanied by violence and bloodshed — hardly qualify as material for laughs, some writers and filmmakers […]
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“In a World…”
The curious title of “In a World…” comes from a repeated phrase, the opening words of the voiceover introduction of a series of amazon-warrior films, which the characters refer to as a “quadrilogy.” In a sense the whole movie revolves around those words, which come to accumulate more meanings as the story progresses through a […]
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“Closed Circuit”
The recent revelations about the long history of the American government spying on its citizens through a variety of sophisticated methods make the appearance of the British film “Closed Circuit” especially relevant. Public knowledge and even tolerance of the myriad surveillance devices that observe and report on the actions of millions of people create an […]
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“The World’s End”
There will always be an England, at least as long as there’s a PBS, and as long as the Brits continue to mine one of their greatest natural resources, eccentricity. Trust an English filmmaker to spin some contemporary popular genres in a different direction, as Edgar Wright did a few years ago in “Shaun of […]
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Woody Allen’s annual picture
Although he dutifully releases something like a film a year, and despite the reflexive gushing of the reviewers, Woody Allen has actually not produced a genuinely good movie in years, perhaps even decades. A good deal of his work ranges from abysmal — “Alice,” “Mighty Aphrodite,” “The Curse of the Jade Scorpion” — to the […]
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‘Elysium’
After the success of his highly unusual 2009 science-fiction film, “District 9,” Neill Blomkamp now moves into the big time, Hollywood version, with another excursion into the genre, “Elysium.” Instead of a cast of relatively unknown players, the director this time benefits from the luster and the talents of a couple of big stars — […]
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“I’m So Excited”
With a hard-earned reputation for flirting with outrageous and comical interpretations of sex, the Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar demonstrates in his new movie, “I’m So Excited,” that the outrageousness and the comedy, without wit and invention, cannot sustain an entire film. A late work in a reasonably prolific and quite successful career, the picture seems […]
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“Fruitvale Station”
Arriving laden with prizes from the usual festivals, “Fruitvale Station” demonstrates once again the relevance of the small, independent films shoehorned into the narrow space amidst the noisy blockbusters, witless comedies, and insipid chick flicks that clog the summer screens. Along with such documentaries as “Capitalism: A Love Story,” and “The Tillman Story,” and a […]
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“Girl Most Likely”
Amid the reverberating thunder of the seasonal spectaculars, a movie without any special effects should reassure audiences that Hollywood has not yet destroyed the world with planetary collision, climate catastrophe, thermonuclear war, or all those tiresome zombies. A modest little romantic comedy and a quintessential chick flick, “Girl Most Likely,” provides a modicum of relief […]
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“Pacific Rim”
The fact that the great beast from the depths of the sea haunts the human imagination may account in part at least for the appearance of “Pacific Rim,” perhaps the most excessive blockbuster of the season. The sea monster that threatened Andromeda, the mother and son duo that Beowulf fought, Moby Dick, the great white […]
