Screen
The only living boy in Boo York
Disney has a record of racial sensitivity rivaled only by emails from loathed uncles with subject lines that start “FW: FW: FW: RE: Obama.”...
For ‘Shutter Island,’ the wait may be worthwhile
Movies can be like wine: Once uncorked, they don't often last long on the shelf. But Hollywood history could be a lot kinder to the postponed "Shutter Island," and the movie's last-minute date change might actually work to the thriller's advantage...
Staying human with Michael Franti
It’s Election Day, Nov. 6, 2018, and it feels serendipitous to get the chance to talk with Michael Franti about his new documentary, Stay...
Reel to reel | Week of September 19, 2013
Afternoon Delight Rachel (Kathryn Hahn) is a quick-witted and lovable, yet tightly coiled, 30-something steeped in the creative class of Los Angeles’ bohemian, affluent Silver Lake neighborhood. Everything looks just right — chic modernist home, successful husband, ...
Wadiya do that for?
Although it turned many a talentless friend into an amateur impressionist, Sacha Baron Cohen’s performance as Borat was inarguably hilarious. The improvised, horribly racist, legitimately brilliant film that put Cohen on the map was a straight-up phenomenon and a ...
Les swing and les miss
Two minutes in: You can do this, Ryan. Sure, a three-hour film version of a Broadway musical is a dry way to waterboard you, but people say Les Misérables is the best adaptation yet. Maybe this is the one that finally changes your mind...
Object of my Affleck-tion
It’s easy to thrill people when they don’t know what’s coming. OK, maybe not easy — paging Mr. Shyamalan — but certainly less difficult than whipping up tension in a film based on a decades-old actual incident, the resolution of which is but a Google search away. ...
Meta-references are not always good
In the first few minutes of Scream 4, the teenage girls home by themselves on a dark night are watching a DVD and discussing the merits and demerits of the Saw franchise, which one of the girls refers to as “torture porn,” and then brrrrrrrrrrrrp brrrrrrrrrrrrp goes ...
Just an old-fashioned love song
"Your wife’s got that gorgeous glow that comes with your first marriage,” a party guest quips to the oblivious husband. Yes, his face says...
The problem with pulling your punches
When Wonder Woman sailed into theaters this summer, coolly breaking superhero box office record after box office record, it was no surprise that curious...
A portrait of change, a portrait of love
Richard and Mildred Loving just wanted to be together. They loved each other and wanted to raise a family and in 1958, the two...
When death misses
There was a scene, lo those many (OK, 11) years ago, in the original Final Destination. One of the characters who inadvertently “cheated death” and ruined “death’s grand design” had holed up in a cabin, which then had to be made accident-proof...
