Drama, Movies

Letters from Iwo Jima

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War movies fall into three categories. Government-funded propaganda that is designed to rally the civilian population, summer action movies that hope to thrill youngsters with exhilarating battle scenes in which good in the end triumphs over evil, and finally critical films that want to undermine the very premise that war is something anyone should desire. image [Read More]
Diary

Great Books of Quotations

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Louis Menand reviews two recent books of quotations in the New Yorker.  After reading his fun review, I really want these two books for my library. Anyone forgot my birthday? Sherlock Holmes never said “Elementary, my dear Watson.” Neither Ingrid Bergman nor anyone else in “Casablanca” says “Play it again, Sam”; Leo Durocher did not say image [Read More]
Drama, Movies

Notes on a Scandal

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Don’t! Stop! Don’t! Stop! Don’t… Don’t stop! I thought that Notes on a Scandal was a film about one of these notorious conservative British politicians caught up in a sex scandal. Wrong! The scandal involves people from a very different social group. Not knowing anything about the plot made the film all the image [Read More]
Drama, Movies

The Last King of Scotland

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If I could decide the Oscars all by myself, the King (Forest Whitaker) and the Queen (Helen Mirren) would receive the 2007 Oscars for best actor. The two roles could not be more different. But Whitaker and Mirren individually deliver one of the best performances in the history of cinema portraying a real human image [Read More]
Drama, Movies

Little Children

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Sarah (Kate Winslet) and Brad (Patrick Wilson) meet on a playground in a suburb of Boston just as their marriage is entering a difficult period. They feel an immediate attraction. Little Children chronicles how people who are stuck in a staid, lifeless marriage struggle when they develop extra-marital romantic feelings, unexpectedly standing before a temptation image [Read More]
Drama, Movies

Babel

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With Babel Alejandro González Iñárritu has established himself in my eyes as one of the most innovative filmmakers of our times. For Iñárritu and his longtime writing partner, Guillermo Arriaga, life is not a cakewalk. The basic sensibility running through Love is a Bitch, 21 Gramms and now Babel is deep pessimism: at any moment image [Read More]
Documentary, Movies

When the Levees Broke

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Spike Lee is no Ken Burns. His “documentary” about the human tragedy that unfolded during and after the Hurricane “Katrina” hit the Gulf Coast is not unfair but unbalanced. Lee’s cause is noble one. He wants to draw attention to the suffering experienced by the residents of New Orleans even a year after the catastrophe. image [Read More]