22 items found for your search. If no results were found please broaden your search.
(12/01/05 5:00am)
Pride and Prejudice is perhaps Jane Austen's most beloved novel, with its tale of unlikely love between stubborn Elizabeth Bennet and the aloof Mr. Darcy. So while the book was adapted to the fantastic BBC miniseries starring Colin Firth a decade ago and reinterpreted as the Bollywood musical Bride and Prejudice just last year, a new adaptation is certainly welcome, especially to the legions of Austen's rabid admirers (who most recently flocked to the bookstores to buy The Jane Austen Book Club).
(11/10/05 5:00am)
Good Night, and Good Luck is set in an era when cigarette commercials were still on television and anchors lit up on air. This smoke-and-jazz-filled film chronicles the 1950s fight between Senator Joseph McCarthy and reporter Edward Murrow over the Senator's red-baiting ways. Of course, the point seems to be the not-so-veiled allegorical implication that McCarthyism is still happening to some extent today. Shot in black and white, the film's cinematography evokes the great political dramas from the pre-color era, and the fast-paced newsroom scenes and rapid-fire dialogue bring to mind His Girl Friday.
(11/03/05 5:00am)
First came the much-lauded American Beauty. Then came Road to Perdition, which was not as heralded but still boasted dazzling cinematography and strong performances by the entire ensemble cast. So naturally, the expectations were sky-high for Sam Mendes' third feature, Jarhead. The problem with sky-high expectations is that they are impossible to meet, no matter the quality of the movie.
(10/20/05 4:00am)
We'll start with Ryan Carnes, who is arguably the most recognizable by face. And character type. His first two major roles were the gay boy next door in 2005's Eating Out and the gay roommate of John the gardener on Desperate Housewives. Carnes was spotted at a casting call in the Midwest after his sophomore year at Duke, and consequently left college to pursue acting in Los Angeles. The studly screen star chatted with recess about his GPA, kissing Eva Longoria and playing gay.
(09/15/05 4:00am)
In the flippant world of Lord of War, where the ch-chings of a cash register cheerfully replace the sound of gunshots, remorseless violence reigns supreme. Or at least it should. The shocking comedy of dealing arms without regard for their uses stumbles when the characters display some semblance of a conscience.
(09/01/05 7:00am)
The same beauty, vivaciousness and infectious energy that characterized 2002’s City of God also appear in Fernando Meirelles' follow-up work, the lushly realized Constant Gardener. In addition to Meirelles, the two films also share cinematographer César Charlone, whose documentary images of both films' locations create an authenticity rare in modern film. The duo has swapped Brazil for Kenya, and corrupt children’s gangs for corrupt drug companies to tell an equally poignant, if less shocking, tale of violence and iniquity.
Gardener opens with British diplomat Justin Quayle (Ralph Fiennes) being informed of the death of his feisty activist wife, Tessa (Rachel Weisz). He is not only informed that her body has been found, however, but also told by the villainous Sandy (Danny Huston) that she had been having an affair with her dead companion, Dr. Arnold Bluhm, among others. Gardener is not as much a thriller as it a love story between Justin and Tessa as he delves into the life of the wife he never really knew. As he continues her work, exposing Western pharmaceutical companies for their African crimes, he discovers loyalty in the wake of her rumored infidelity.
The film features a number of fine performances: Bill Nighy is deliciously evil as a cold-hearted government official, looking as if he hasn’t taken off his zombie make-up from his stint in Shaun of the Dead. Weisz is lovely and likeable in flashbacks as the passionate activist. Fiennes is at his subtle best. In the beginning he is so aloof that he hardly shows any emotion even when told of Tessa's death—when he identifies her in the morgue, it is he who comforts Sandy and not the other way around. This allows for the film's most intriguing arc, as Justin leaves his stoicism behind in favor of his wife's fervent conviction. His hobby of yardwork is what ostensibly gives the film its title, but he and Tessa’s constant digging for the truth lends the name a deeper meaning.
Although the film may have benefited from a few shaved minutes, the gorgeous cinematography makes the journey worth it. Meirelles and Charlone manage to find the beauty in the slums of Kenya through vivid colors, charming natives-turned-extras, and extraordinary camera work. The script may center on a conspiracy and a love story, but the film as a whole, with its incredible photography documenting the continent's beautiful geography and striking class differences, becomes really just about Africa, warts and all.
(07/20/05 4:00am)
It’s raining in Paris, and it’s hard to say what is most seductive—starlet Jeanne Moreau’s come-hither French murmuring, the sensuous jazz of Miles Davis or the cité d’amour itself. This, Louis Malle’s 1958 film Elevator to the Gallows, was the birth of cool.
(04/21/05 4:00am)
The Interpreter, the latest from Sydney Pollack, packs the punch and thrills of a Dan Brown novel without the obvious plot holes and far-fetched endings. Sylvia (Nicole Kidman), born in the fictional African country of Matobo, works as an interpreter for the UN, where she overhears an assassination plot against the dictator of her native country. Keller (Sean Penn) is the Secret Service agent in charge of investigating the threat, as well as Sylvia and her checkered past. A bombed bus, several dead bodies and a lot of sexual tension later, we’re left wondering if the lame romantic subplot between Sylvia and Keller was really necessary. The complicated political plotline would have been enough to keep this thriller afloat.
(03/10/05 9:00am)
Kalindri Padia, Siva Allu and Nagi Reddy want to bring a new type of theater experience to North Carolina. With the opening of their Galaxy Cinema in Cary Dec. 30, they have done just that.
(02/03/05 5:00am)
film
(11/04/04 5:00am)
Director Alexander Payne's fourth effort, Sideways, is a two-hour profession of love to wine.
(09/30/04 4:00am)
To those hardcore zombie fans who fear spoofing the original Dead trilogy (Day of the Dead, Dawn of the Dead, Night of the Living Dead) is blasphemous, fear no longer; even the trilogy’s director, George Romero, called Shaun of the Dead an absolute blast. And a blast it was. Anybody who loves a certain old-school Michael Jackson music video should love this British rom-zom-com—Shaun is 99 minutes of Thriller-wonderful.
(07/21/04 4:00am)
The term "independent film" used to mean wannabe directors financing their movies with maxed out credit cards and casting their non-actor friends. Witness Kevin Smith--he wrote, directed and starred in the cult-classic Clerks, co-starring his friend Jason Mewes, on a shoestring budget of $27,000. After the relative success of many independent films in the early '90s such as Smith's Clerks and Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs, the big six media conglomerates began snatching up the successful independent film firms.
(04/15/04 4:00am)
A tastefully half-nude blonde lies on the hood of an antique red convertible. An ominous man clad in a black suit appears in the background. Two more men, one holding a club, the other holding a net, gradually materialize in the foreground.
(02/26/04 5:00am)
The problem of adapting The Passion of the Christ from the New Testament is transforming a succinct story into a two-hour movie. Filling in the gaps is where director Mel Gibson has the opportunity to exercise creative license.
(02/26/04 5:00am)
Predicting the Oscars is a lot like playing Texas Hold'em. Fantasy movies are a 2/7 offsuit; actors who wear extensive makeup and/or feign mental illness are pocket rockets; and Harvey Weinstein (founder of Miramax) is the Hollywood equivalent of Chris Moneymaker, that lucky, greedy bastard. Even if you know the basic strategy, it doesn't make the betting any easier.
(02/13/04 5:00am)
Your forty-page Poli Sci case study getting you down? Tired of learning the energy confirmations of cyclohexanes in Orgo? Just think, if you had gone to Wesleyan instead of Duke, you could be directing your own porno instead of struggling through another problem set. Yeah, you read that right: At Wesleyan University, the final project in "Pornography: The Writing of Prostitutes" was to create a work of pornography. Works of literature, photography, and even erotic video were all accepted and encouraged. One student turned in a video featuring the eyes of a masturbating male, another turned in a video of herself scantily clad and bound to a wall, asking to be whipped.
(01/15/04 5:00am)
Everyone loses exactly 21 grams when he dies. Could those 21 grams be the weight of the soul? Is everyone's soul worth the same weight? These are two of the many questions that Alejandro Iñárritu's highly philosophical 21 Grams raises.
(11/06/03 5:00am)
The Station Agent is like a spontaneous road trip to the beach. You're not quite sure what'll happen next, but you're sure glad you went along for the ride.
(10/23/03 4:00am)
Do you laugh at black jokes? Gay jokes? Handicapped jokes? Priest jokes? How about necrophilia? We gave up long ago on being politically correct. It's just no fun. Scary Movie 3 tries to toe the line, but tries a little too hard. It's tacky, feebleminded and simply devoid of taste.
