The one useful purpose that Night of Something Strange may provide is as an interesting counterpoint to another horror contemporary, “WTF!.” Both are modern takes on the 1970s and 1980s teen slasher model, and both depict shallow, reprehensible heroes getting slaughtered. But while “WTF!” succeeds as a critique of its protagonists’ vacuity, Night of Something…
Can an independent comedy about 14th-century religious debauchery involving naughty nuns be a legitimate rib-tickler in a sluggish summer movie season of wacky, yet toothless, farces (e.g., “The House”)? Refreshingly it can be, especially if it is writer-director Jeff Baena’s boisterous and bawdy The Little Hours, a corruptible comedy that brings its satirical cynicism to…
The camera loves Sam Elliott, and why not? He has a tall, lean body with thick gray, unruly hair hanging over a furrowed brow, a trademark horseshoe mustache to go along with dark chest hair; it all blends so well with the unforgettable masculinity in his deep, golden voice that seems to descend directly from…
The end of a relationship is chronicled convincingly and compellingly in Danish filmmaker Kristian Håskjold’s short Forever Now. It begins with the start of a breakup and ends with, well, the end of the breakup, so there are few plot-based surprises in its compact running time that barely exceeds 15 minutes. Instead, Håskjold is content…
The craps-shooting, comedy caper, The House, is a bad gamble for former “Saturday Night Live” alums Will Ferrell and Amy Poehler. The betting windows tell a tepid tale of strained, transparent chuckles in this limp-minded, suburban satire that rolls the so-called humor dice to no avail. The mixture of collegiate financial desperation, spoof-inspired small-time mobsters,…
The chasm between what parents want for their children and what kids want for themselves is rarely addressed in films, especially in romantic comedies where the focus is primarily on young couples falling in and out of love and then back in again. Of course, we know that parents are usually involved, especially immigrant families…
It’s a well-known fact that most third installments of film franchises do not rise to the level of the first (and often the second). Now, these examples are subjective, of course, but I present as evidence the following pictures: “Rocky III,” “Superman III,” “The Dark Knight Rises” and “Star Wars: Episode VI: Return of the…
