Blog
These stories have been around a long time. Some of them I have updated. Many of them I haven’t. This started out when blogs were like, new!
Not Bad: “The Illusionist” (2006)
Edward Norton is The Illusionist in a 2006 period film by Neil Burger. I got bored with Steven Millhauser's short story, "Eisenheim the Illusionist," and so stopped reading it. I'm glad it was transferred to the screen, however, for there is much to love in this...
On Two Edith Wharton Gems: “Atrophy” And “All Souls'”
Edith Wharton's "Atrophy" is a first-rate short story about . . . well, the atrophy, the wasting away of human relationships. It parallels the physical condition of the ailing illicit lover of Nora Frenway, married to a man with his own "weak health" as well as a...
Sent Down And Down Again: Joan Chen’s “Xiu Xiu”
The Chinese actress, Joan Chen, has a fine if very unhappy film in Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl (1999), which Chen directed and co-wrote. Clearly influenced by the artistic drive and anti-totalitarian pessimism of such directors as Zhang Yimou and Tian Zhuangzhuang,...
The Unbeautiful Arises: The Film, “American Beauty”
American Beauty (1999) is about a discontent suburbanite whose go-getter wife and truculent daughter disdain him, and who falls in love with his daughter's beautiful best friend. It involves some other folks too, among them a harsh Marine officer who is a repressed...
Quality “Kwai”: “The Bridge on the River Kwai”
The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), by David Lean, is a film of elevations. People move around on top of mountains, banks, bridges; and there are shots of the sky above treetops. Natural (and manmade) grandeur is frequently close to where men are working and...
Mamet Remained Interesting With “State and Main”
David Mamet's film, State and Main (2000), concerns contretemps and obstacles between a moviemaking team and the citizens of a town called Waterford, Vermont, where the team are fashioning a film. The characters captivate: William H. Macy's agitated director, Alec...
Forcefully Funny: “Fatty’s Tintype Tangle”
If you like the film comedies of the silent era, you should try the Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle short, Fatty's Tintype Tangle (1915), directed and starred in by the comic actor. Arbuckle is forcefully funny and entrancingly winsome as the harried Fatty, who is driven to...
Joe Becomes Donnie: “Donnie Brasco”
For an American movie, Donnie Brasco (1997) is near-great. For a movie period, it is simply good, but of course that's saying a lot. Notwithstanding he made the repelling Four Weddings and a Funeral, it helps that DB was directed by the talented Mike Newell, who,...
Radiation Sickness In “Black Rain,” The Movie
Japan's Black Rain (1988) is about disease. And Hiroshima. The disease is radiation sickness, ergo the cause is the bomb. The film begins on August 6, 1945, when Hiroshima got it in the neck, and a more horrid city catastrophe you will not find in a movie, albeit to...
