Good Hair (2009)Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009 |
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Chris Rock explores the wonders of African-American hairstyles. |
Movie blog, movie reviews
Good Hair (2009)Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009 |
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Chris Rock explores the wonders of African-American hairstyles. |
My Brilliant Career (1979)Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009 |
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The heroine, Sybylla (Davis), a headstrong girl growing up in early 20th century Australia, has the opportunity of marriage to a wealthy young man (Harry played by Niel) whom she loves, but rejects it in order to maintain her independence, preferring to take a job as governess/housekeeper to the family of an illiterate neighbor to whom her father owes money. |
Broken Flowers (2005)Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009 |
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Sherry, the girlfriend of the former “Don Juan,” successful older businessman Don Johnston, ends their relationship. At around the same time, he receives an anonymous pink letter revealing to him that he has a nineteen-year-old son, but he has no clue as to who the mother might be. Don’s friend and neighbor ,Winston, an aspiring “Sherlock Holmes,” compiles a list of Don’s former girlfriends and presses a plan for a cross-country trip to meet each of them and subsequently learn the identity of the son. A reluctant and emotionless Don, armed with flowers, first visits the widow, Laura, preceded by her teenage daughter, Lolita, who affronts him by appearing naked in an asexual context in a show of emancipation at his expense. Laura herself, however, is the one person in the film who treats him humanely and as a sexual being. Then he meets the successful real estate agent Dora and her husband Ron and they have an uncomfortable dinner together, with Don as a third wheel. He next takes flowers to the office old flame Dr. Carmen, now a writer on the psychology of pets and a communicator with animals, (based on her ‘relationship’ with a deceased canine.) Her much younger secretary gives Don a markedly icy reception supposedly because of his unannounced arrival. He unapologetically imposes on Carmen’s schedule, but despite his best efforts he can not penetrate her armor. And the secretary, as an afterthought, returns the flowers. Lastly, he plies his charms with Penny, yet another example of resentment, living in the woods with a pair of younger motorcycle toughs, one of whom, on the pretense of gentlemanly concern about what he makes out to be insensitivity towards Penny, cold-cocks Don Johnston. Johnston wakes up in his car with the flowers broken. A little desperate now, he makes the brief acquaintanceship of a young, kind-hearted lady florist, Sun Green, who begins to show some inclination towards tenderness, although she finds his name, Don Johnston, impossibly quaint. Back on the street, unshaven and looking increasingly like a bum, Johnston has a brief encounter with a young male hitchhiker for whom he buys a sandwich, but then makes an awkward comment how the hiker, who has been brought up in a Fatherless setting, must think Don is his Father! This goes over about as poorly as every other attempt at expression by Johnston throughout the film. It now becomes clear that while Don’s perception of everyone from his past as blatantly neurotic is pretty accurate, Don Johnston himself, with the romantic supports of his youth withdrawn and standing lost perilously in traffic, is also himself a pretty spurious and expendable character in the eyes of the world, or at least for the moment his odyssey has brought him to that pass. Don ultimately returns home without solving the mystery but realizing that his past is lost irretrievably. |
Once Were Warriors (1994)Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009 |
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Set in urban Auckland (New Zealand) this movie tells the story of the Heke family. Jake Heke is a violent man who beats his wife frequently when drunk, and yet obviously loves both her and his family. The movie follows a period of several weeks in the family’s life showing Jake’s frequent outburst of violence and the effect that this has on his family. The youngest son is in trouble with the police and may be put into a foster home while the elder son is about to join a street gang. Jake’s daughter has her own serious problems which are a key element in the plot. |
American Me (1992)Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009 |
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This epic depiction of thirty years of Chicano gang life in Los Angeles focuses on a teen named Santana who, with his friends Mundo and the Caucasian-but-acting-Hispanic J.D., form their own gang and are soon arrested for a break-in. Santana gets into trouble again and goes straight from reform school to prison, spending eighteen year there, and becoming leader of a powerful gang, both inside and outside the prison, while there. When he is finally released, he tries to make sense of the violence in his life, in a world much changed from when last he was in it. |
Explorers (1985)Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009 |
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This adventurous space tale stars Ethan Hawke and young star River Phoenix as misfit best friends whose dreams of space travel become a reality when they create an interplanetary spacecraft in their homemade laboratory. Ben Crandall is a young visionary who dreams of space travel while watching late-night B monster movies, pouring over comic books, and playing Galaga in the confines of his bedroom. But one night he has a vivid dream of flying over a space-like circuit board and shares his visions with his best friend Wolfgang, a young scientific genius who is able to translate his dreams into a complex computer program that actually works. With the help of their new friend, they create a homemade spacecraft and embark on a secret adventure to another galaxy where they find that things are not always as different as they seem. |
The Deer Hunter (1978)Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009 |
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Michael, Nick, and Steven are three buddies from the steel mill town of Clairton, Penn.They are like schoolmates, hanging out in a local bar and enjoying weekends of deer-hunting. Michael and Nick are also both in love with Linda, who seems to juggle both of the men. But their placid life is soon to be changed after they are enlisted in the airborne infantry of Vietnam. So they all celebrate a goodbye at Steven’s wedding and they leave to Vietnam, where they are captured by the enemy and forced to play a game of Russian Roulette. They escape and return home, but their lives are forever changed. Nick stays in Vietnam, Michael returns to Linda, and Steven is handicapped after losing a leg in the war. |
101 Dalmatians II: Patch’s London Adventure (2003)Friday, December 18th, 2009 |
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Roger, Anita and their canine clan are packing for the big move to Dalmatian Plantation, a home in the country with plenty of room for the 101 pups and far from the clutches of Cruella DeVil. The feistiest pup, Patch, feels lost in a sea of spots and longs to be a one-of-a-kind wonderdog like his TV hero, Thunderbolt. While watching the Thunderbolt Adventure Hour, Patch hears about a chance to appear on the show while it’s filming in London. However, the family move will interfere with Patch’s opportunity - until he’s accidentally left behind in the commotion. Patch heads for the audition to meet his hero. Meanwhile, Thunderbolt’s “trusty” sidekick, Lightning, reveals that the producers of the show want to replace Thunderbolt with a younger dog. In order to save his job, Thunderbolt decides he will go into the real world and perform an act of true heroism to prove himself. A veritable reference book to Thunderbolt’s many adventures, Patch provides the perfect guide for the TV star in his attempts at real-life heroics. As for Cruella DeVil - she’s back and more obsessed with Dalmatians than ever. At first, she’s able to calm her frenzy through an affiliation with a spot-fixated artist. |
Gone with the Wind (1939)Tuesday, December 15th, 2009 |
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Scarlett is a woman who can deal with a nation at war, Atlanta burning, the Union Army carrying off everything from her beloved Tara, the carpetbaggers who arrive after the war. Scarlett is beautiful. She has vitality. But Ashley, the man she has wanted for so long, is going to marry his placid cousin, Melanie. Mammy warns Scarlett to behave herself at the party at Twelve Oaks. There is a new man there that day, the day the Civil War begins. Rhett Butler. Scarlett does not know he is in the room when she pleads with Ashley to choose her instead of Melanie. |
One Tough Bastard (1996)Friday, December 11th, 2009 |
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Bosworth plays a hand-to-hand combat expert who’s family gets killed by some bad guys. Following the usual revenge theme, Bosworth chases the bad guys throughout the movie. |
The Haunting of Molly Hartley (2008)Friday, December 11th, 2009 |
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Molly Hartley looks to put her troubled past behind her with a fresh start at a new school, where she sparks with one of the most popular students. But can her secrets stay buried, especially as she learns more about the horrific truth that awaits her once she turns 18? |
Afterwards (2008)Friday, December 11th, 2009 |
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Newly divorced lawyer Nathan Del Amico is shaken up after he meets a doctor who claims that he can sense when select people are about to die. Though he doesn’t believe the doctor, events in Nathan’s life slowly make him think he’s not long for this world. |
The Terrorist Next Door (2008)Friday, December 11th, 2009 |
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A dramatization inspired by the real-life events surrounding the recruitment and capture of Ahmed Ressam - aka the “Millennium Bomber”. Ressam was convicted of smuggling a bomb into the United States as part of an Al Qaeda plot to blow up Los Angeles International Airport on New Year’s Eve, 1999. |
Sleepover (2004)Friday, December 11th, 2009 |
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In the summer before their freshman year in high school, Julie has a slumber party with her best friends: Hannah, Nancy and Farrah. As a trio, they end up having the adventure of their lives. In an attempt to cast off their ‘less-than-cool’ reputations once and for all, Julie and her friends enter into an all-night scavenger hunt against their popular girl rivals. Hijacking dad’s car, sneaking into clubs, evading Julie’s mother, and even a first kiss—anything is possible at Julie’s sleepover. |
The Janky Promoters (2009)Wednesday, December 9th, 2009 |
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Two shady concert promoters (Cube and Epps) get into hot water when their chance to book a superstar rapper goes awry. |
Ghost Machine (2009)Wednesday, December 9th, 2009 |
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A group of young U.S. military techs borrow a top-secret combat simulator for a weekend of unauthorized gaming. But when they set up the system inside an abandoned prison used for the torture of post-9/11 prisoners, they discover that someone – or something – has uploaded itself into their A.I. software. A deadly new player has now joined the game: How do you survive the final level of lock-and-load virtual reality when escape is impossible, slaughter is uncontrollable and the enemy is unstoppable? The ultimate battle begins inside the GHOST MACHINE. |
Mary and Max (2009)Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 |
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It is a simple tale of pen-friendship between two very different people; Mary Dinkle, living in the suburbs of Melbourne, Australia and New Yorker Max Horovitz. Spanning 20 years and 2 continents, Mary and Max’s friendship survives much more than the average diet of life’s ups and downs. |
Tender Mercies (1983)Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 |
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Alchoholic former country singer Mac Sledge makes friends with a young widow and her son. The friendship enables him to find inspiration to resume his career. |
Summer of ‘42 (1971)Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 |
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Silent as a painting, the movie shows us day-dreamer Hermie and his friends Oscy and Benjie spending the summer of ‘42 on an US island with their parents - rather unaffected by WWII. While Oscy’s main worries are the when and how of getting laid, Hermie honestly falls in love with the older Dorothy, who’s married to an army pilot. When her husband returns to the front, Hermie shyly approaches her. |
Ordinary People (1980)Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 |
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Beth, Calvin, and their son Conrad are living in the aftermath of the death of the other son. Conrad is overcome by grief and misplaced guilt to the extent of a suicide attempt. He is in therapy. Beth had always preferred his brother and is having difficulty being supportive to Conrad. Calvin is trapped between the two trying to hold the family together. |
Farewell, My Lovely (1975)Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 |
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This, the second adaptation of Raymond Chandler’s novel, is much closer to the source text than the original - _Murder, My Sweet (1944)_ (qv), which tended to avoid some of the sleazier parts of the plot - but still concerns private eye Philip Marlowe’s attempts to locate Velma, a former dancer at a seedy nightclub and the girlfriend of Moose Malloy, a petty criminal just out of prison. Marlowe finds that once he has taken the case, events conspire to put him in dangerous situations, and he is forced to follow a confusing trail of untruths and double-crosses before he is able to locate Velma. |
North Dallas Forty (1979)Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 |
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A semi-fictional account of life as a professional Football (American-style) player. Loosely based on the Dallas Cowboys team of the early 1970s. |
Meet John Doe (1941)Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 |
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As a parting shot, fired reporter Ann Mitchell prints a fake letter from unemployed “John Doe,” who threatens suicide in protest of social ills. The paper is forced to rehire Ann and hires John Willoughby to impersonate “Doe.” Ann and her bosses cynically milk the story for all it’s worth, until the made-up “John Doe” philosophy starts a whole political movement. At last everyone, even Ann, takes her creation seriously…but publisher D.B. Norton has a secret plan. |
Fanny (1961)Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 |
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Almost 19-year-old Marius feels himself in a rut in Marseille, his life planned for him by his cafe’-owning father, and he longs for the sea. The night before he is to leave on a 5-year voyage, Fanny, a girl he grew up with, reveals that she is in love with him, and he discovers that he is in love with her. He must choose between an exciting life at sea, and a boring life with the woman he loves. And Fanny must choose between keeping the man she loves, and letting him live the life he seems to want. |
Fanny (1961)Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 |
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Almost 19-year-old Marius feels himself in a rut in Marseille, his life planned for him by his cafe’-owning father, and he longs for the sea. The night before he is to leave on a 5-year voyage, Fanny, a girl he grew up with, reveals that she is in love with him, and he discovers that he is in love with her. He must choose between an exciting life at sea, and a boring life with the woman he loves. And Fanny must choose between keeping the man she loves, and letting him live the life he seems to want. |
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