Idiot Clause. I feel most embarrassed for Dudley Moore. What a talent! Wasted in SANTA CLAUS: THE MOVIE; not just wasted, but defiled, besmirched, and shat upon! SANTA CLAUS: THE MOVIE is a nauseating mess of brainless plotlines and platitudes. The trailers allude to the villain: “Now someone wants to take the magic out of Christmas!” Don’t look now, movie, … Read More
INTERSTELLAR
Odyssey Three: When Surfer Dudes Boldly Go… In his 2014 Oscar speech, Matthew McConaughey told us his hero was “himself, in ten years’ time.” Everyone thought he was a narcissistic jackass. Until INTERSTELLAR, when he travels to the future through a wrinkle in time and meets – himself! Standing lofty on the shoulders of 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY and CONTACT, … Read More
RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES
A planet where apes evolved from James Franco? PLANET OF THE APES (1968) was about a man trying to find himself in an Apes’ world; RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES is about an ape trying to find himself in a Man’s world. Dispensing with all the Tim Burton monkey business, RISE is a sober and epic thriller on … Read More
A CIVIL ACTION
Justice IS blind – so can’t see Truth. In movies, the good guys always seem to win court cases. Over an ingratiating orchestra swell, no less. But in reality, good or bad has nothing to do with the outcome of court cases. It’s how you play the game. If you can afford to be in the game in the first … Read More
2010: ODYSSEY TWO
A Midget in the Footsteps of Giants. No one said it would be easy. Following in the mythic footsteps of Stanley Kubrick and equally legendary Arthur C. Clarke. Maybe it was this inimitable pedigree that gave lowly Peter Hyams the impetus to craft such a reasonably watchable sequel to 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY. A tension-filled space trek where we laugh … Read More
KINSEY
A Cocksure Man. Apparently, Kinsey had a big one. For a pioneer of world-shaking sex research, that’s one helluva hook. And straight from the ‘truth is better than fiction’ bin – his wife had a small one… Liam Neeson is biologist Alfred C. Kinsey, who was single-handedly responsible for bringing sobriety and scientific method to the wild-eyed speculation and downright … Read More