Me Before You belongs to a much-maligned genre. It features young adults and is based on a novel aimed at that demographic (like “The Fault in Our Stars” and “Twilight”); its focus is a young woman’s experience of a complicated relationship with her fellow generic archetype (like “The Notebook” and “Dear John”); the relationship features…
What’s the square root of a relationship? I’m no math master, but the enjoyable Sam Cooke soothingly answers this in a way with his hit song “Wonderful World” with the lyric: “. . . But I do know one and one is two.” And without two, it’s just you. Sure, singleness has its self-sufficient and…
While the plot is increasingly predictable, it is impressive to see the boldness of this franchises action.
British social realism is a cinema movement that developed in the 1960s with an eye to portraying the dour and grim reality of working class life in Britain. Such titles as “Kes” (1969), “Saturday Night and Sunday Morning” (1960) and “My Beautiful Launderette” (1985) explored social tensions around race, gender and sexuality, as well as…
I teach high school English and have a master’s degree in my content, so I’ve read quite a bit and I’ve studied many authors. I took a seminar in Jane Austen, but, to my disappointment, the only book I enjoyed was one NOT written by Austen (Evelina by Frances Burney, in case you’re curious). I’ve…
As evidenced by “San Andreas” and “Godzilla” (and a whole host of others) destroying cities and landmarks in movies is a ton of fun. The bigger the spectacle definitely equates to better. In 2013’s actioner, “Olympus Has Fallen,” in which Gerard Butler had to save the POTUS from North Koreans, the destruction focused on the…
Set in fictional Wessex County in south-west England in the 1870s, Thomas Vinterberg’s (“The Hunt”) adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s novel Far from the Madding Crowd chronicles the ups and downs of Bathsheba Everdene (Carey Mulligan, “Inside Llewyn Davis”), a smart, headstrong woman who is fiercely proud of her independence when it comes to choosing suitors….
