dramas
Review: The Nines
A troubled actor under house arrest for arson. A television writer juggling both creative and political concerns trying to get his show on the air. A video game designer trying to find help for his stranded wife and daughter. What do these three men have in common? Well, they’re all played by Ryan Reynolds, for one thing, but the nature of their connections is the mystery at the heart of John August’s thought-provoking but maddening THE NINES.
Review: Walk the Line
In the opening moments of Walk the Line, Johnny Cash (Joaquin Phoenix) gently thumbs the edge of a buzzsaw in the wood shop of Folsom Prison moments before his infamous concert before its inmates. The blade of this saw, an instrument which altered the course of Cash’s life when he was eleven years old, [...]
Review: The Upside of Anger
Joan Allen does staid-and-proper so well, she seldom gets the chance to play sexy. In fact, I can’t remember ever finding her particularly sexy in any movie I’ve ever seen her in. I don’t mean that as a knock against Allen; so many of the parts she’s played have called for Frosty Joan [...]
Review: A Love Song for Bobby Long
The New Orleans found in A Love Song for Bobby Long doesn’t map to the real New Orleans: it’s a romantic impression of a mythical New Orleans, all hot jazz and cool rain, a city imagined by writers for generations as a safe haven for broken creatives. This New Orleans can’t help, of [...]
Review: The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou
At some point during the last few years–I think quite likely it was during the making of Charlie’s Angels, if not earlier–Bill Murray decided it was time for him to put away his trademarked schtick for awhile and do some actual acting. Oh, he’d tried doing the dramatic stuff early in his career, of [...]
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