They say that reading is fundamental, but the romantic goings-on in the mature rom-com Book Club should be more of a page-turner especially when it involves some of Hollywood’s all-time seasoned and decorated actresses. In a way it is quite refreshing (and rare) to encounter an unconventional romantic comedy catering to senior citizens as the…
“Artificial Intelligence: Monster or Shangri-La?” Though the official tagline of Do You Trust This Computer? may prelude to a neutral stance on the evolution of AI, the resulting film is far more a cautionary prophecy than a wide-eyed musing about possibilities awaiting the human race. Chris Paine (“Who Killed the Electric Car?”) returns to the…
14 years in the real world is instantly obliterated at the start of Incredibles 2, which picks up the story of the superpowered Parr family at the exact moment that their previous cinematic adventure ended. Time may have stood still for the titular heroes until now, but a lot has happened in the last decade-and-a-half…
German Angst is a movie for the “V/H/S,” “Zombieworld,” “The ABCs of Death” crowd in that it is technically a collection of three shorter films — “Final Girl,” “Make a Wish,” and “Alraune,” respectively — full of extreme violence and horrific fun. With “Final Girl” as a quiet, graphic, and personal revenge fantasy, “Make a…
It is a cliché to say that less is more. In the case of Ant-Man and the Wasp, Marvel excels in delivering the delights of smaller scales, both in the physical and emotional sense. After the weighty politics of “Black Panther” and the epic scale of “Avengers: Infinity War,” the latest entry in the Marvel…
All I remember from eighth grade was being shunted from the Glee Club to the Stamp Club because, as my music teacher said, “it would be a better fit for you.” Better fit or not, it interfered with my plan to be a show biz star in the mold of Al Jolson. Unlike awkward pre-teen…
Ása Helga Hjörleifsdóttir, director and screenwriter of The Swan (“Svanurinn”), a low-key Icelandic film (adapted from the 1992 novel by Guðbergur Bergsson) was asked in an interview how she tackled the job of transforming a novel written with a preponderance of interiority into a movie. The question can be answered by examining its cinematography, which…
