Besides minor adjustments with its story and certain supporting characters, Neil Burger’s (“Limitless”) The Upside is a fairly faithful remake of the popular 2011 French film “The Intouchables.” Both movies are inspired by the real-life friendship of French aristocrat Philippe Pozzo di Borgo and his Algerian caretaker Abdel Sellou and each highlight their dynamics of…
Written and directed by Taylor Sheridan, the Oscar-nominated screenwriter of “Sicario” and “Hell or High Water,” Wind River is a murder mystery about the death of a young Native American women, found frozen in the snow. Part character study, part police procedural, and part political statement, it is a deeply disturbing film that contains graphic…
Years ago, I remember going to my local run-down McDonalds and while impatiently waiting for my greasy order to arrive, my restless eyes laid upon a bronze rectangular plaque of a middle-aged man named Ray Kroc. I wondered, “Who is this dude?” As I read the brief epitaph on the plaque, I learned he was…
“And I shall rest my head between two worlds, in the Valley of the Vanquished” — Léolo, Jean-Claude Lauzon Whether Harvey Weinstein’s purpose in producing Lion was to add to his collection of Oscars or just to tell a sweet, heartfelt story about a lost boy searching for his home, the result is that he…
Following the well-laid plans of just about every pugilistic biopic ever made (with the exception of “Raging Bull” and “The Fighter”), director Jonathan Jakubowicz with Hands of Stone, plods along (just like his subject’s boxing style) in this familiar telling of the rise of a famous boxer, in this case, Roberto Durán (Edgar Ramírez, “The…
The lyrical lad of film-making, in the form of Irish writer-director John Carney (who gave us the wonderfully musical drama in 2007’s “Once”), is at it again as he brings the continued inspiration of music and motivation in the engagingly festive coming-of-age musical melodrama Sing Street. Carney, the former member of the Irish rock group…
One certainly has to hand it to Quentin Tarantino — as a film-maker, he has taken violence, hatred and perversity to the next level and has made quite a living from the results. He has also created quite a few amazing two-hour films — unfortunately, most of his movies run more than two and a…
